#SocialTV Highlights from the Fall Television Season
By: Mike Girard
This is not meant to be a by-the-numbers top five list. It’s a handful of examples of shows and networks that pushed the envelope in terms of integrating social media engagement within their properties. Social TV has been largely defined by the development of second screen applications and the market is buzzing. Less has been said about the value of engaging with the communities of fans that exist. This list highlights some examples of the growth of social media engagement during the fall television season.
I want to say thank you to my followers on Twitter, Facebook, and Google+ for their suggestions – a few of which ended up on this list.
1. Community on Hiatus? What about #SixSeasonsAndAMovie?
When NBC announced it was putting Community on hiatus, fans of the show flocked to social media sites to politely (and sometimes not so politely) suggest that the network had most definitely “Britta’d” that decision. There isn’t anything new about fans banding together to put pressure on a network to bring back a cancelled program or keep them from cancelling it altogether. What is different about this example is that the stars of the show have taken part in the social media campaign, reaching out to some of the Twitter accounts trying to keep the show on the air like @SaveCommunity.
2. CBS Social Premiere and Sweeps Week
CBS carried out two promotional events this fall season. They started off the fall season with a series of premiere live-tweets allowing fans of the shows to chat with the talent. I blogged about this during the premiere week as it showed a spike in social conversation volume during the premiere of the Big Bang Theory in relation to other programs that aired in the same time slot. During November sweeps week, CBS turned their social media properties over to their stars and creative teams. The result was a whole lot of behind the scenes and candid photos, live-chats as well as question and answers sessions. (I blogged about this experiment as well.)
3. Prominently Displaying and using Hashtags
This year, every television program had an official Twitter account and an accompanying hashtag. This helped facilitate conversations among fans and has also made it much easier to find fellow fans of your favorite TV show. More interesting – as this New York Times article points out – is the number of shows that are teeing up an Internet afterlife with meme-ready content. The New York Times notes Parks and Recreation’s “Treat Yo Self” episode as an example. One can just as easily point to Community’s use of memes and hashtags like Troy and Abed wearing t-shirts printed with #AnniesMovingDay when the three characters became roommates.
4. Twitter Voting on The X-Factor
At the end of October, The X-Factor announced that it was partnering with Twitter to allow fans of the show to vote for their favorites signing contestants on FOX’s talent show beginning November 2nd, 2011. Voting via Twitter for shows like this was inevitable but I’m including it as a social TV first.
5. Using Character-based Twitter Accounts
Ok, so technically for this one I’m stretching back to the summer. HBO’s True Blood created a number of Twitter accounts based on the characters in the program. The accounts were incredibly social and added to the viewer experience. I thought the program took a risk on something that could have gone either way but the experience was great. It definitely deepened one’s immersion in the show’s storyline and the world these characters inhabit.
While these were social TV highlights, there are lots of examples that I didn’t include here. What social TV events and moments caught your attention this fall?
