Earlier this week I asked whether Snapchat should be part of a B2B content marketing strategy. A few days since that post and Real Madrid (valued at $3.26bn) have announced a partnership with Snapchat to be the first individual sports team with an ‘Official Story’. What is a Story? For those who are not familiar, a story provides the curator video content to their followers that lasts for a 24hour period. If you have an Official Story others, based on geo location (refer to my previous post), are able to contribute video content. For example next time you Snapchat in a major city, such as London you will be given the option to add to ‘The London Story’.

So this is clearly a great B2C initiative, increasing authentic fan engagement through their experience, and an opportunity to monetise by planting a few pieces of content to include your sponsors or chosen brands. With minimum effort (apart from a moderator) you have a very effective digital marketing tool, potentially reaching millions on a global scale.

However, there is a B2B content marketing strategy here too. Why does Fly Emirates spend £20m annually sponsoring Real Madrid each year? There are football experts such as Dan Jones of Deloitte or Darren Heitner of Heitner Legal P.L.L.C. who can explain this in more detail, at a high level it is because of the exposure they receive through appearing on Ronaldo or Bale’s shirt and being internationally showcased. So where does Snapchat play a role?

Real Madrid is a business, it is selling the opportunity to appear alongside its brand to sponsors and as mentioned above this is directly correlated to the amount of exposure the sponsor receives. Thus by being able to market to prospective sponsors the opportunity available and also offer the exposure to current sponsors to their own prospects (who are on Snapchat) is similar to when Real Madrid signed Ronaldo from Manchester United, a game changer. In the first 12 hours since launching the Official account each story post has received 200,000 views (I got excited with my 500 views from snapping Jamie’s 30min Meals). I would relish the chance to watch Snapchat’s analytics dashboard as the initiative roles out to the 450million worldwide fans.

There is a lot to learn from Rafael de los Santos and Real Madrid but they key takeaway is first mover adoption in your market. This weekend the El Clasico takes place (FC Barcelona v Real Madrid) it is going to be slightly awkward for Barcelona as they watch all of their fans sharing their experience of the game on the official Real Madrid Story. 1-0 Real Madrid.