Audience fragmentation
03/8/10
At the recent Revolution awards in London, the UK version of The X Factor was awarded the best Social Media Campaign.
The X Factor isn’t a cool trainer or a quirky soft drink brand, it’s a television entertainment brand dominating social media.
It's a great example of just how fragmented audiences have become and The X Factor provides an excellent bird's eye view to highlight the blending of TV, social media and the new opportunities for advertisers in a multi-platform environment.
Through the ‘official’ The X Factor social channels 1.1m+ fans get regular updates via Facebook, the Twitter- fan base is at 60k+ followers dominating Twitter trending topics every week and The X Factor YouTube channel is now bigger than the BBC.
Did I mention there are 500 unofficial The X Factor Facebook pages!
The Dubs provides digital strategy and technology for The X Factor brand and has done so for the last six seasons so we’ve seen first-hand how audiences are changing from a controlled structure governed by linear scheduling and 30 second ad slots to a dynamic ‘relationship’ driven landscape.
Initially the opportunities for advertisers outside the standard inventory placements were not obvious, but now, we are seeing how relevant branded content is becoming in this space. So where does that leave traditional thinking when Facebook & Twitter are carving out existing ‘above the line’ TV audiences?
Major brands such as Sainsbury’s and L’Oreal have jumped on board using branded content extensions as vehicles to build genuine relationships with the The X Factor audience.
Branded content vignettes are created and pushed out engaging audiences across the series. This has proved incredibly popular because the audience views this as entertainment and we see much higher engagement levels than stunt based advertising.
TV is still delivering reach, but the online and social channels are building a more significant, deeper emotional relationship with the audience who in turn create a frenzied buzz online about the brand. This questions the traditional model of ‘above the line’ for reach and ‘below the line’ for tailored engagement, with social media blending these channels, building advocates and empowering the audience.
These numbers prove that the audience is interacting with content and brands through these channels and therefore are a credible alternative.
As social audiences continue to grow, television is being challenged by real time buzz, comment, user generated content and internet TV apps and the battle for dominance is only going to become fiercer as Internet-connected television makes TV into a social medium.
So that then begs the question, whose line is it anyway? And our answer is: yours!
The X Factor isn’t a cool trainer or a quirky soft drink brand, it’s a television entertainment brand dominating social media.
It's a great example of just how fragmented audiences have become and The X Factor provides an excellent bird's eye view to highlight the blending of TV, social media and the new opportunities for advertisers in a multi-platform environment.
Through the ‘official’ The X Factor social channels 1.1m+ fans get regular updates via Facebook, the Twitter- fan base is at 60k+ followers dominating Twitter trending topics every week and The X Factor YouTube channel is now bigger than the BBC.
Did I mention there are 500 unofficial The X Factor Facebook pages!
The Dubs provides digital strategy and technology for The X Factor brand and has done so for the last six seasons so we’ve seen first-hand how audiences are changing from a controlled structure governed by linear scheduling and 30 second ad slots to a dynamic ‘relationship’ driven landscape.
Initially the opportunities for advertisers outside the standard inventory placements were not obvious, but now, we are seeing how relevant branded content is becoming in this space. So where does that leave traditional thinking when Facebook & Twitter are carving out existing ‘above the line’ TV audiences?
Major brands such as Sainsbury’s and L’Oreal have jumped on board using branded content extensions as vehicles to build genuine relationships with the The X Factor audience.
Branded content vignettes are created and pushed out engaging audiences across the series. This has proved incredibly popular because the audience views this as entertainment and we see much higher engagement levels than stunt based advertising.
TV is still delivering reach, but the online and social channels are building a more significant, deeper emotional relationship with the audience who in turn create a frenzied buzz online about the brand. This questions the traditional model of ‘above the line’ for reach and ‘below the line’ for tailored engagement, with social media blending these channels, building advocates and empowering the audience.
These numbers prove that the audience is interacting with content and brands through these channels and therefore are a credible alternative.
As social audiences continue to grow, television is being challenged by real time buzz, comment, user generated content and internet TV apps and the battle for dominance is only going to become fiercer as Internet-connected television makes TV into a social medium.
So that then begs the question, whose line is it anyway? And our answer is: yours!
© Copyright 2010
Comments
blog comments powered by Disqus