Just as many have been saying for the past year, Nielsen has launched a new ratings metric that includes Twitter posts into it’s ratings. Shows that have more people talking about it in real time will now be rated higher than their non-techie counterparts.
According to this release from USA Today:
“The Twitter TV Ratings will measure the number of people tweeting about TV programs as well as how many Twitter users are viewing those messages.
Nielsen says an analysis of the Twitter TV rating found the audience of users viewing tweets about a TV show is about 50 times larger than the authors firing off tweets.”
Cable shows will possibly benefit the most, as anything that can boost their numbers will help. Network television can also seize upon this opportunity as well to incorporate social media into the program (even more than they already do). With the increase in visibility into this rating, however, you can be sure Twitter will be incorporated into every new show pitch.
The challenge will be for content creators to show advertises these metrics still matter. Just because someone tweets about a show, doesn’t necessarily mean they should be more ad revenue.
What do you think? Do you think shows with heavy Twitter use matter more than without?
Chris Murman 