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Constantly looking for a new way to engage fans, TV networks have reached out to Twitter followers, Facebook fans, Tumblr fanatics and live audiences to increase engagement and hopefully in the end, ratings. But as technology changes and new platforms are constantly introduced, broadcasters always have to be thinking outside the box to keep engaging those same audiences.
At Friday’s Lost Remote: The LA Show, representatives from Fox, CBS, NBC and Univision each provided examples of what they have planned at their networks and what social initiatives has worked for them in the past.
The session’s four participants in this session, all past finalists or winners of the Shorty Industry Award, spoke on Lost Remote’s “The Future of Social TV: What Networks are Planning for the Spring and Summer TV Season.”
Cait Hood, VP of social media at Fox Broadcasting, presented the fan-made trailer for “Almost Human,” a new series that premiered this fall. Fans of “Fringe” and the futuristic genre had already begun spreading the word about the show, but Fox wanted to play on their excitement and further activate them in the social space. With this in mind, Fox created a cinematic trailer, and then asked fans to turn in their versions of the video. With the submissions, Fox then released a shot-for-shot trailer comprised of pieces of the fan-made videos, and presented it side-by-side next to the real thing. The “Almost Human” fan trailer involved real show footage, kid actors shooting with hair dryers, computer animation, paper cutouts, cats…
Fox has also planned an upcoming “Glee” episode in which fans will choose their favorite songs to appear in the show, resulting in an entirely fan-programmed episode for the musical series.
“CBS had a pretty epic summer,” according to Rob Gelick, SVP and GM of digital platforms at CBS Interactive Entertainment.
The broadcaster’s “Big Brother” is already an interactive show, so Gelick says moving that interactivity into a social place came naturally last summer. CBS set up live feeds where fans could follow along and chat online. The project also involved more voting on the show, which ranged from polling about what food the housemates would eat to who would be the house’s next MVP.
“It takes the storytelling process and makes that production exercise a constant, three-month long project,” according to Gelick. “People are dangling, wanting more. Creating an environment for that engagement really becomes a catalyst for that.”
NBC’s “The Voice” is already popular on Twitter, and this year the show took one step further toward online interaction with the instant save function.
The instant save is an opportunity for fans to get in one last vote during the Tuesday telecast using #VoiceSave on Twitter. Those votes are then collected and used to save one contestant who finds him or herself at the bottom. The artist with the most mentions and retweets will be saved. There is only a short window in which to vote, but fans paying attention have their voice heard for five important minutes.
According to Jared Goldsmith, VP of digital marketing at NBC Entertainment, “’The Voice’ has certainly been a tremendous ratings success, but also a real leader in digital and social in the television experience.”
And for “The Voice,” voting is the clearest way to encourage that kind of interaction. “It’s the power to create a moment and use social media to really drive immediacy and real time impact,” he said.
When it comes to measuring social success, Goldsmith says, “it really has to do with the show and the content and the storytelling. And the reason the instant save worked is because it created drama. The fate of these contestants’ careers were hanging in the balance, and it created really exciting television. It has to start there – is it going to make the story better? Is it going to create drama?”
Univision’s recently launched UVideos has given the network a chance to further its interaction with fans online, using novelas and their characters.
One thing Univision noticed with its novelas, according to David Beck, SVP of social media at Univision Communications Inc., is that “there are clearly times when you’re watching content when you don’t want to tweet.”
To recognize this and take advantage of Univision’s viewers who wanted to follow along in different ways, the network has made use of UVideos to create a call to action. While watching a novela, fans can go to UVideos where characters invite them to connect and interact about their story. Characters provide insight and personal videos, then ask questions to decide on a fan of the week.
“Fans want their voice to be heard,” said Beck. “They want to be rewarded.”
After presenting, panelists also spoke to the recent acquisition of Topsy by Apple and the direction they see social metrics going in 2014.
“It’s been a challenging year to be able to quantify all the work we do,” said Beck. “I just don’t know what to expect, telling our executive team they have to get comfortable being uncomfortable with metrics.”
“Not all platforms are measured, so it’s a constant challenge to figure out what we’re going to measure,” added Hood. “And what really is success is the even bigger question.”
“We just are trying to ride these changing waves and figure out the best way to use this information,” said Goldsmith. “I don’t think data tells the whole story.”
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