Twitter has unveiled plans to further imbed itself into the TV viewing experience of Australians as it hopes to create the “world’s biggest couch” and “fundamentally changes the way people watch television”.
At its “upfront” in Sydney last night, Twitter unveiled research from Nielsen that showed 50 per cent of Australian Twitter users described TV as a primary interest. One-third of them follow accounts related to TV and one in five of them joined Twitter to follow TV content.
As part of its Nielsen TV Twitter Ratings (NTTR), unveiled last November, Nielsen also showed that people who tweet during programs were more engaged and 50 per cent less likely to switch channels than those who didn’t tweet. Further, tweeting TV viewers showed nearly three times as much brand affinity as non-tweeting viewers.
“Our job starts when you create amazing moments,” said Fred Graver, head of TV at Twitter. “Television has always started the water cooler conversation . . . people talk about television.
“Now with the NTTR ratings, you can actually measure that conversation. You can reach in and understand that audience,” he added.
Both Nine and Ten have signed up to the new measure, which Nielsen’s Scott Gillham went to pains to explain was a complementary rating to OzTAM’s and not a replacement.
Twitter was also encouraging television networks to incorporate split screen advertising; with live Twitter data from the program sharing the screen with TVCs, thus keeping people engaged while the adverts were airing.
Other innovations that Twitter has been working on specifically for TV was allowing broadcasters to share up to 10minute videos (regular Twitter users are limited to 30 second videos).
Snappy TV, which was acquired by Twitter last year, was also touted as a great way for broadcasters to share live content of sporting matches via Twitter and draw viewers into an event as the action heated up.
