Within the broadcast and social-media-analytics worlds, as well as the broadcast-obsessed agency and marketer universe, the term “social TV” is uttered and heard endlessly these days. But not everyone understands the meaning of the term.
The short answer is Millions of people are now partaking in “dual-screen” experiences — watching TV while using a smartphone (or tablet) to share (primarily on Twitter and Facebook) their thoughts about what they’re viewing and to “check in” to shows (on services like GetGlue). The result: a massive and rapidly expanding real-time focus group (and promotional force).
Here are four good reasons, highlighted by Ad Ag
e, of why social TV actually matters:
Social TV can increase ratings.
At the 2012 Social TV Summit, Deirdre Bannon, VP-media analytics at Nielsen, shared the result of research the company has been conducting during the past year. (It began releasing research on the social-TV-to-ratings connection last October.) The main takeaway: For key demos, social buzz surrounding shows can increase ratings.
For instance, Nielsen says a 9% to 14% increase in buzz volume (depending on where a particular show is in its season) correlates to a 1% increase in ratings in the 18-to-34 demo. That’s obviously not enough to make or break a show, but it’s enough to matter. It’s also worth noting that ratings seem to be most susceptible to social influence when it comes to season premieres and finales — i.e., the pivot points that are heavily marketed in traditional, nonsocial media (especially network promos).
Social TV can make TV better.
Chris Stephenson is both a hard-charging new-media executive as president of Viggle — the “loyalty program for TV” that launched in January — and a pop-culture addict who takes naked delight in making what’s fun TV even … funner. “People talk a lot about ‘social TV,'” Stephenson told me over coffee in San Francisco, “but we don’t think that way at Viggle. We think more about ‘better TV.’ We want to add a layer of enjoyment to television-watching which enhances the experience and rewards people for their loyalty and engagement. While many of the social-TV apps rely on the basic principle of ‘sharing my check-ins,’ we think about deep engagement, polls, trivia, mood-o-meters, etc.”
Social TV can get consumers to engage with shows (and brands) far beyond the broadcast window.
“We provide custom metrics depending on what our sponsors are looking for,” said USA Network senior VP-Digital Jesse Redniss, speaking of the various social-TV programs he and his team have devised over the past few years. “Nobody is really saying, ‘We want to get clicks.’ Nobody cares about the click anymore; the click is pretty much dead. Marketers really want engagement over time: ‘People viewed our vehicle for X amount of time.’ Or, ‘We want people to experience all the cool attributes of what our brand represents.'”
In the case of its hit show “Burn Notice,” for instance, USA Network produced two “seasons” of the “Burn Notice: A New Day” digital graphic novel (aka tablet comic book), sponsored by Hyundai, whose vehicles are featured in beautifully drawn, interactive storylines that have baked-in Twitter and Facebook connections. Fans of “Burn Notice” might watch every episode — hardcore fans might even watch reruns, too, to catch nuances they missed on first viewing. But that’s about it. Through TV alone, USA and its sponsors have a hold on viewer attention for a finite set of hour-long chunks for its dramas. But done right, social-TV initiatives like the “Burn Notice” comic book can strengthen engagement by deepening the narrative pre- and post-broadcast.
Social TV can provide tons of new ‘hooks’ for marketers.
Earlier this month in his company’s headquarters Watchwith CEO and co-founder Zane Velthe revealed the system his company has developed to provide what he calls a “time-based metadata” platform to power social-TV apps.
“We’re creating a world where every frame of TV is rich in possibilities,” he said, sounding every bit the on-pitch evangelist. But the proof is in the pop-ups — the visual manifestation in Watchwith’s back end (not visible to viewers) that creates second-by-second data bubbles that display what the database “knows” about every given scene. In an episode of social-TV (and ratings) hit “The Big Bang Theory,” for instance, a character walks into a room and the Watchwith database serves up information (which in turn feeds into social-TV apps) about exactly which model of Jansport backpack he’s carrying.
Consider that Watchwith — which just rebranded from its nerdy previous incarnation, Related Content Database — has been working with major broadcast and cable networks, social-TV startups and e-commerce players including eBay.
Now consider what can happen when such product-smart metadata gets synced with the crowdsourced data that more and more TV viewers are producing themselves during every scene of all their favorite shows. You can begin to understand where the whole social-TV phenomenon, and media engagement in general, is going.
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