Monday’s launch of The Voice on Snapchat kicks off NBCUniversal’s multi-year partnership to produce content based on its established properties that’s designed specifically for the social media app.
The rollout begins with a five-part series where this season’s coaches on The Voice judge user-submitted videos, with each coach selecting a winner who may appear on the September 19 broadcast premiere of the serie’s 11th season.
“Our partnership with Snapchat represents inclusion, creativity and innovation, the key elements that have made The Voice one of TV’s most successful franchises,” Paul Telegdy, president, alternative and reality group NBC Entertainment, said in a statement. “This interactive collaboration provides our passionate fan base a chance to directly participate and become a part of our Voice family.”
The Voice on Snapchat has received more than 20,000 submissions in less that 48 hours after opening the call for videos on August 8, according to a press release from NBC.
The network released a schedule for its five-episode series, which will run roughly three to four minutes and drop on Mondays.
- Aug. 22 – Coach Alicia Keys
- Aug. 29 – Coach Adam Levine
- Sept. 5 – Coach Miley Cyrus
- Sept. 12 – Coach Blake Shelton
- Sept. 19 – Final episode
The Snapchat program marks the first of a handful of NBC programming slated for Snapchat through the partnership, with spinoffs from The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, Saturday Night Live in the pipeline. And on September 8, E! News will debut a weekly pop culture series The Rundown featuring segments exclusive to Snapchat.
“My hope is six months from now we’ll have a handful of really strong performing intellectual properties that’s come out of this new initiative,” Ron Lamprecht, executive vice president of business development and digital distribution at NBCUniversal, told the LA Times. “And if we can create a hit series outside our established properties, that would be the holy grail. That would be a sign that we’ve really learned how to program for this platform.”’
He added that with its 18-34-year-old millennial audience, “massive usage,” and “massive growth,” Snapchat is a logical partner. And NBC isn’t the only network jumping onto the Discover feature with the hopes of wooing younger viewers.
Comedy Central hosts a range of digital series on Snapchat, while MTV greenlit the relationship series Pants Off and revived Cribs.
As networks look for new ways to use social media to distribute content, social platforms also have their eye on TV programming. Twitter recently spent $10 million to stream NFL games and Facebook has declared a focus on video content.
READ MORE: LA Times
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