The future of second-screen content production is integrating with main show production from the get-go, and Univision is leading the charge. The No. 1 media company serving Hispanic America partnered with Israel-based social TV company Applicaster in February, intent on enhancing the “ability to deliver a unique and innovative cross-screen TV experience to its audiences.”

Utilizing Applicaster’s innovative CrossMates platform, look for future Univision show apps to engage viewers at a more direct and personal level than ever before. The technology first appeared late last year, around the telenovela, “Lo Que La Vida Me Robó,” bringing fans deeper into the storytelling via personalized messages offering exclusive videos, photos, plot points and contextualized commercials.

What makes CrossMates unique is that “personalized” element, as users of apps built on the platform can only follow one character from a show. The inherent limitations of this experience are intentional, according to an Applicaster promotional video, because getting just one piece of the second-screen story “drives the viewers to share information with each other, making sure your show is all they talk about, all day.” Interacting with one’s chosen character via a mobile device resembles corresponding with a friend, with the character themselves sending personalized texts, images, videos, questions, and even voice messages. Somewhat creepily, the characters can “even learn personal details about their viewers and integrate them into the conversation.”

Discussions of a brewing robot uprising aside, the most valuable element of this new technology may lie in the pipeline Applicaster is creating for integrated second-screen content production. The company claims to work closely work with show creators and writers early on to ensure plot points are written into the app experience to coincide with and supplement the storyline of the on-air episodes. Additionally, the platform facilitates combining digital content with commercial offers and sponsorships that are woven into the plot, creating new revenue opportunities.

Sophisticated second-screen experiences “should not come at the expense of main screen advertising revenues,” Applicaster announced in a recent statement, “but rather magnify it; adding social, interactive and commercial layers to the TV experience creates a new synergy broadcasters want to leverage.”

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