SocialTV Week In Review: On the Road to Revenue Twitter Turns to Social TV
Posted: July 29, 2012 Filed under: Social TV | Tags: Arktan, Dick Costolo, Discovery App, Fans.TV, Fiber TV, Fred Graver, GetGlue HD, Jump-in, Kred, Linear TV, NCTC, Olympics, Second Screen, Social TV, Social TV apps, SocialStreams, TV Everywhere, Twitter, Weather Channel App, Zeebox 1 CommentBy now it’s a well-worn path for startups: an ingenious idea, explosive growth, a fresh business model anchored to ad revenue, and, if you’re lucky, a wildly successful IPO. But just take it from Facebook, the growing pains won’t end there.
Before Twitter makes its public offering, it needs to prove its merits as a business, not simply its popularity among non-paying users. Although promoted tweets appear to be doing well, Twitter is hoping to tap the multi-billion dollar television industry to strengthen its position.
Yes, we’re talking Social TV. The stakes are high. As it shores up revenue, media experts are wondering if Twitter is reshaping its identity by moving from micro blogging service to a content creating, media company.
In May, Twitter’s UK GM, Tony Wang, urged broadcasters to adopt Social TV strategies for their own good. “Broadcasters are not the ones to choose whether to have social TV. It happens whether they like it or not. But they have a choice about how to harness that social TV energy,” he cautioned. Though his message was packaged as advice for broadcasters, it is clear that Twitter has real interest in cultivating its relationship with TV.
In June, Twitter appointed Fred Graver, creative director for Twitter partnerships, to focus on those relationships. That Graver is a well-seasoned TV executive did not go unnoticed.
Twitter has already made high profile agreements in recent months, notably with NASCAR and NBC for their coverage of the 2012 Olympics. In both instances Twitter is testing its editorial chops.
In the meantime, speculation regarding Twitter’s media ambitions continues to grow. Twitter CEO Dick Costolo recently told The New York Times, “Our business is an advertising business, we don’t sell technology.” He added, “I don’t need to be or want to be in the content business.” A few days later, Adweek came out saying Twitter is “in serious talks about the possibility of launching several original video series”.
For now, outsiders can’t be sure what to make of Twitter’s moves. One thing we do know is that Twitter is willing to experiment and it is sincere about pushing forward into the lucrative television market. Some are skeptical, saying that the company is deviating from its core service. Like any other business, Twitter will have to walk a fine line between turning profits and turning off customers.
Just yesterday it surfaced that Apple may be considering a stake in Twitter. While Apple hopes to leverage Twitter’s social aptitude, Twitter enjoys the privilege of being baked into the most popular “second screen” devices on the planet. A healthy relationship with Apple will ensure that Twitter remains an important part of the Social TV experience.
For these stories and much, much more please keep reading.
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Social TV Week in Review: What is Social TV? (And The New Terms of Service)
Posted: July 22, 2012 Filed under: Future TV, Social TV, TV Everywhere | Tags: AMC, Big Data, Death of the Cable Bundle, DigitalFlashNYC, DirecTV, Dish, Futurescape, Greg Yaitanes, HBO, HIS, IAB, Internet Week, IPTV, PEW, Sabrina Caluori, Screen Digest, Set Top Box, Sidecastr, Sina. Zeebox, Social TV, STB, Tapas TV, TiVo, TRA, TV a la Carte, TV Everywhere, Viacom 2 CommentsBack in May I went to DigitalFlashNYC’s Internet Week event “Social TV – What’s Really Happening?” The colorful Sabrina Caluori, VP Social Media, HBO, eloquently summarized her thoughts on the subject at hand: “Social TV is bullshit”. It was a calculated declaration, echoing the opinions of many experts who complain that TV is, and has always been, fundamentally social.
Does Social TV exist as something more than a redundancy? What’s in it for viewers, and what’s at stake for the industry? I address these questions in brief below:
What is Social TV?
Internet access and device proliferation are on the rise, moving forward in tandem with the next generation’s social media dependency and 360° entertainment demands. Semantics aside, ‘Social TV’ simply gives us a way to talk about new TV watching behaviors and the technologies that power them.
What does it mean for the viewer?
Your voice counts: Social media channels have amplified the voices of millions of TV viewers and delivered their feedback to content producers and show talent instantaneously. Additionally, the ability to build or join online communities around shows is getting easier and the experience is more rewarding than ever. Strong communities act collectively as brand advocates. In several high profile cases (Community, Fringe), fans have organized to bring programs back from the brink of extinction.
What does it mean for the industry?
Big data: When millions of viewers access TV through social media channels they leave behind a trail of data. Of the many byproducts of Social TV, Big Data are one most promising. TV brands and advertisers can use social data to develop campaigns and strategies. They can use data to personalize content and make it more relevant. Networks are using the data to complement ratings and help sell ad time. Entire businesses are emerging from second screen services, to ad sync programs, to analytics and SRM platforms.
New Terms of Service
Social TV is just one aspect of a changing television environment. Views are interacting with and consuming TV in new ways and starting to look for content on their own terms.
What does it mean for the viewer?
More control: Viewer’s have more ways to access content than ever before. My own TV diet is a balanced regimen of TV, DVR, Streaming, Netflix and Hulu. I’ll flip open my laptop as readily as I reach for the remote. For the first time, viewers can create their own pay-as-you-go packages for TV. They can hack together their own anytime, anywhere bundle. While these experiences may not be flawless (currently), they continue to improve.
What does it mean for the industry?
Consumers are no longer entirely dependent on the traditional providers. Recent disputes between cable operators and media holding companies (AMC vs. Dish, Viacom vs. DirecTV) had consumers caught in the middle, cut off to programs that they want or expect their bill to cover. Netflix, Hulu, YouTube, and Amazon are some of the big names aiming to deliver original, high quality content through new channels that could side step costly arrangements which leave consumers out.
Cable operators, networks, advertisers, producers, hardware/software companies and everyone else who has a stake in the TV industry is rightfully concerned with how today’s viewers are watching television. PEW, IHS Screen Digest, Futurescape, IAB are among the most recent organizations to release their findings on Social TV and viewing habits (for full articles and findings see below). Whether audiences are undermining business models or creating the opportunity to build new ones, the industry must know how to react accordingly.
Follow the jump for the top Social TV News from around the web.
socialtvnews.wordpress.com 