Facebook is betting big on live streaming. The social network first introduced a pilot program that allowed celebrities to broadcast video in real-time back in August; yesterday it rolled out the feature to all users and now, it’s available to verified Pages as well.
The feature is available on Facebook’s iOS app and the company says it’s useful for making announcements, sharing breaking news and running live Q&A sessions.
To use it, navigate to your verified Page on the iOS app, tap Publish and then select Live Video. You can add a description of what your stream will be about before you begin broadcasting.
When you’re live, you’ll be able to see the number of viewers, the names of other verified people or Pages who are tuning in, as well as a real-time stream of comments.[related-posts]
Once you’re done streaming, Facebook will publish your broadcast to your page so your followers can view it at a later time. The live stream will also display a ‘subscribe’ button to viewers, which they can tap to receive a notification the next time you’re on the air.
With today’s announcement, Facebook is taking the live streaming fight to Twitter, which has its own broadcasting app, Periscope. Expanding support for the feature to Pages means that brands will be able to show off their new products and events to fans in a whole new way on the social network.
