Big Ten Network is revamping its digital products by making all of the content generated by the schools available on BTN2Go.
Starting this week, BTN2Go users will be prompted to select their favorite Big Ten school. The app will then change its look from all BTN branding to the colors and logos of the favorite school.
The fan also will begin to see a new assortment of school-specific content, in an effort to get the most school and conference video available in one place.
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Users of the app will be able to select their favorite school. The app will then offer content from that school.
Image: BIG TEN NETWORK
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“We want BTN2Go to become the daily destination for our fans,” said Michael Calderon, BTN’s vice president for programming and digital media. “They’ll be able to personalize it and turn it into their school’s app.”
In the past, the content generated by the schools stayed on the school’s official athletic website. Going forward, the school content will still be on the school’s site, but it also will be available on BTN2Go. That will provide fans all of the content generated by BTN and the school’s video department in one location.
“This is something we’ve been wanting to do for several years,” Calderon said. “We know that people like the Big Ten, but they love their school.
“What we’ve seen in the first four years of BTN2Go is that people use the app for live events. But we also have all this other great content that we produce and the schools produce that we have the right to distribute.”
BTN, which is co-owned by Fox Sports and the conference, was one of the first channels to launch a TV Everywhere app when it created BTN2Go in 2012. The first few years were focused on marketing the app so that authenticated users knew how to find it and use it. The last two years have been more dialed in on BTN Plus, a subscription service for live events — mostly Olympic sports — that don’t make it on the linear channel.
The next step will be integrating all of the content produced by the schools.
During the last few months of the 2015-16 season, Big Ten schools averaged 60 video clips a week from news conferences, one-on-one interviews, insider shows and other sources of programming. If the schools keep up that pace, BTN2Go will be adding eight to 10 clips a day from each school, in addition to the content that BTN produces exclusively for digital.
The new-look BTN2Go also reflects just how sophisticated schools have become in creating content from their in-house production crews.
When BTN2Go launched in 2012, Penn State had one standard-definition control room running video boards in the football and basketball venues. Now, the Nittany Lions have three HD control rooms running video boards in six venues and producing 350 live events a year, according to Jim Nachtman, assistant athletic director for media and video production.
This summer, the school created a new insider series on the men’s basketball team called “Unlocked,” which previously ran on the school’s website but in the future also will enjoy the distribution of BTN2Go.
Derryl Myles, who runs video services for Illinois, said schools have become less territorial about keeping their content for the school website only.
“The traditional ways of consuming media have changed so much,” Myles said. “It’s now consumed by shares and retweets, and BTN becomes another vehicle to get that information out.”
