Hawaii Five-0’s Cool Foray into Social TV and Viewer Voting
Remember “Choose Your Own Adventure” books? Have some love in your heart for those skinny little paperbacks that helped distract you in social studies by flipping to page 45 if you do follow the wizard down the cave or turning to page 116 if you open the genie’s bottle and make a wish?
OK, fine, dating myself here. Maybe you don’t know about the wonder that CYOA books hold, but you’re participating in them now, live and in the social flesh… it’s called Social TV and it’s giving all of us couch-surfers the opportunity to weigh in and participate in the shows we love.
Last night, Hawaii Five-0 gave its viewers the opportunity to choose how the show ended. The setup was simple: there were three potential murderers for the show’s victim: The Boss, The Teach Assistant (TA), and The Student. Starting at 9pm EST, viewers were invited to vote for who they think did it via Twitter, using the hashtags #theBOSS, #theTA and #theStudent. Voting would last for ½ hour, upon which time the suspect with the most votes would have their ending revealed.
Promotion, Promotion, Promotion
Since this was CBS’ big foray into Social TV and viewer voting, they promoted the event over the past two weeks. Multiple trade and Entertainment websites, as well as social media blogs picked up their show release and helped spread the word. CBS also took to Twitter, Facebook and their website, continually reminding viewers to tune in and vote for their ending in an “unprecedented” event. Reminders followed the promotional “pattern” for Twitter and Social TV, with anticipatory reminders going out several hours leading up to the show (as you’ll see caused spikes in pre-voting) as well as reminders during the show and Tweets after the show (and to encourage people on the West Coast to participate after the East Coast submitted their votes).
Here’s the Website with Promos for the Voting:
http://www.cbs.com/shows/hawaii_five_0/
Participaton: 8700 votes (Source: hashtag.org). While that number may not seem impressive when we think of how many millions of people tuned in (Hawaii Five-0 has had 10 million viewers as of last year’s mid-season premiere), it shows that interest in Social TV is there. When you consider that viewers had only a ½ hour window to Tweet their vote, that’s not a bad number to start.
What They Could Have Done Better… OR What Other Shows Can Do To Make Social TV A Success:
I’ll admit, I tuned in the entire time last night. Not just because I love social media, but I’m a huge fan of the show (Dann-O… CALL ME). While of course no plan is without flaws, there are a few things that CBS didn’t do to ensure greater numbers of participation:
- The Hashtags should have been present at all times. While CBS ran promos, I noticed that they opted to only have the hashtags present when they told people to go Tweet their vote (unless I missed something while Tweeting my vote). Studies from Twitter show that the best practice is to leave the hashtags up the entire time, to constantly remind viewers to participate. Since they had three suspects, CBS should have had each suspect’s hashtags present every time they were on-screen in the lower corner of the screen, as a reminder. If you’re not savvy, Twitter has a whole guide espousing the proper integration of hashtags on-air.
CBS should have responded to viewer Tweets. It’s one thing to ask for input, it’s another thing to engage your viewers. While CBS kept reminding viewers to participate, they failed to respond back to their Tweets, thanking them for voting, egging them on or Re-Tweeting their votes. Yes, the Re-Tweeting might have skewed a couple of votes, but it also would have made the voting viewers more likely to alert their friends on other social networks that they got exposure, hence causing a more viral spread of voting. By responding back to viewers, they’re also keeping the conversation going and creating loyal viewers who would have helped them spread the word. Other networks have made a priority to have their stars and social media managers Tweet and correspond with fans during shows and have had great results. One great role model for Social TV is ABC Family’s “Pretty Little Liars” which used Twitter to tease special video that viewers could “unlock” with clues dropped by one of the characters on Twitter… which resulted in the show accounting for over 52% of all Twitter traffic on its premiere last Tuesday. Check out this article for some amazing stats on how PLL owned Twitter interactions during its show last week.
Why yes, yes the RT example above is from me… not that I watch PLL or anything (pssst…shameless plug: follow me @brookeissocial)
Hawaii Five-0 Should Have Posted More Engaging, Teasing Content via Facebook and Twitter Before the Voting. While they did post two “reminders” just before voting, most of H50’s Facebook and Twitter posts were boring, canned content at best. A scan of their Facebook account leading up to the show has very little engaging content, with tons of photo scenes and reminders for apps on their wall, but very little question asking, teasing and good content to get their fans going. Social media research shows that asking questions is key to engaging your audience… yet never was the basic questions, “Who’s voting on Monday?” or “Who do YOU think murdered the professor?” occur on their wall with calls-to-action to vote via Twitter. Fans get desensitized to the same old Post-A-Photo-Post-Content-Asking-Viewers-to-Tune-In jargon. They want engaging questions, polls, special fan-only content and extras that make their time and fandom worthwhile. https://www.facebook.com/HawaiiFive0CBS?fref=ts
For example, the post to the left… sure 5800 people liked it and it got some shares, but what has the “tossing of the can” have to do with audience participation?
BLAH CONTENT + CAN TOSSING = MEH
WhoDunit? Here’s the Stats from Last Night’s Show…
Hashtags for viewers choosing #theBOSS (East Coast Winner: 3700 votes)
Hashtags for viewers choosing #theTA (2500 Votes)
Hashtags for viewers choosing #theStudent (West Coast Winner: 2500 Votes)
The results show us what we know… that the highest amount of Tweets and votes happens during the show, after a strong call-to-action both on-air and via Twitter. Of course, this was when voting was going on…duh! But we also see the peaks before and after, which mimic viewer behavior in the “anticipatory” stage (where viewers are nestling into their couches and buzzing over what will happen) and the wrap-up stage (when viewers are sharing reactions to big moments, sharing their opinions and weighing in on what will happen next).
Understanding user behavior is key to integrating social into television watching and we’re just on the cusp of networks getting it right. And the very first step to getting it right is that the viewer is king. You can’t force a viewer to Tweet, post, pin or engage in behavior when it’s convenient for your network- you have to shape your efforts around their behavior. Pretty Little Liars is a great case study in how you don’t tell your viewers when to show up at the party, you make sure you’re invited to theirs…and bring punch (evil, sneaky, catty, Mona-infused Twitter Punch). Instead of asking viewers to Tweet at a certain time then walk away and “let it happen,” you follow user behavior and create a buzz, then interact with fans, stir up drama, react along with them, then ask their thoughts, retweet their opinions and invite them back next week (or whenever your next show is).
While the Hawaii Five-0 event has areas to critique in retrospect, CBS did a good job of leading the way in Social TV by having the guts to try. We’re going to see a lot more engaging ideas and networks testing out ideas that let viewers participate with their shows via Twitter and other social networks this year just to get in on the whole “Social TV” buzz, all of which would do well to study what CBS did right -and wrong- before formulating their plan of attack. Even though there is room for improvement, CBS deserves kudos for putting themselves out there and at the very least providing a simple model that gives viewers the least amount of steps to “Choose Their Own Adventure.”
And those CYOA books have a lot to teach TV: keep it simple, let users know how the game is played and, above all, interact with them by throwing them a curve-ball every now and then (pg. 52 You encounter a snake… You’re Dead!) and, above all else…make it fun.
Wanna Tweet with me during Pretty Little Liars to follow my social media insights? Follow me at @brookeissocial
The Socialite 