Reddit has announced a new content partnership with the NBA, which see the professional basketball league share exclusive material to the platform in the lead-up to the coming NBA Finals
As explained by Reddit:
“The partnership will see unique NBA content featured on Reddit, including a series of NBA AMAs Ask Me Anything (AMA®) sessions on the platform in partnership with NBA and Reddit. With more than 3.9 million members in r/NBA alone, this collaboration gives NBA fans on Reddit access to content and game highlights, presented by a roster of brands.”
The NBA is hugely popular on Reddit, with over 3.9 million members of the platform’s biggest NBA subreddit r/NBA.
The first Ask Me Anything event as part of the new partnership is being held today, with Boston Celtics forward Jason Tatum taking on Redditor queries.
LA Lakers star Anthony Davis is also set to host an AMA later in the season.
In addition to Q and A sessions with stars, Reddit says that it will also share “custom game action highlights and NBA and WNBA content” in the first partnership between the two groups.
The deal marks the latest step in the evolution of Reddit, which is quietly becoming a bigger player in the social media space, and a bigger competitor for ad dollars, as brands look to connect with the platform’s highly engaged, niche audiences.
The platform has, however, taken an overall usage hit, as a result of its broader clean-up and improvement efforts.
Last June, Reddit removed thousands of its most controversial communities as part of a major update of its rules around hate speech, which was prompted by the #BlackLivesMatter protests in the US. That’s lead to a significant reduction in hateful and abusive conduct on the platform, which is a great improvement, but it did also see Reddit revise its monthly active usage number from 430 million in late 2019, to 350 million this year.
Still, Reddit has reported seeing solid growth in daily active usage, which may be another side-effect of its clean-up efforts, while removing its more controversial elements will also make the app a more welcoming place for brands and promotions, by reducing concerns around unwanted content association.
Exclusive content deals like this further reinforce such efforts, and as it looks to take the next stage with its business plans, you can expect to see more announcements like this in future.
