Following my earlier questioning post regarding advertising on social networks it is interesting to see the sponsor partner direction of Bebo as it moves to outgun TV channels and online broadcasters in luring mass audiences to web-specific programmes.

I first saw about The Gap Year programme at a Backpacking Queensland committee meeting earlier this year.  The Gap Year is an online reality series in which 6 travellers from Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, Britain, Canada and the US travel the world for 6 months filming and uploading regular 5 minute clips for the social networking site Bebo.  The Gap Year is being produced by Endemol - the name behind the Big Brother TV series.

This is not unlike the site OE.TV which combines professionally produced travel videos with user generated stories.  But the very limited activity on OE.TV (no comments on the home page community since late May) pales in comparison to the 44 million Bebo users.  In fact, it is predicted that The Gap Year will generate 100 million video views.

And these sorts of predictions are generating some amazing sponsorship partners.  It is understood that the likes of Tourism Australia, JetStar and Proctor and Gamble have invested over AUD$1 million between them in sponsorship of The Gap Year.  The is some big advertising money!

Will it fly?  I think it is quite likely to.  The viral loop nature of social networks is that friends will see other friends watching the series.  Sure you can do this on You Tube - but it does not have the same stickiness.  The potential for advertising and new mediums is pretty exciting.

Tags: Bebo, Online video, Social Networks, You Tube

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 29th, 2008 at 3:52 pm and is filed under Opinion. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.