Public Relations & Social Marketing Insight

Apple has more than $1 billion budgeted for original programming, Facebook wants its own version of “Scandal” and Google is ready to spend up to $3 million per episode on a drama.

 

The three digital giants have signaled to Hollywood that they are serious about entering a television landscape that Netflix and Amazon shook up just a few years ago. Their arrival will make an already hypercompetitive industry even more ferocious. This year, there are expected to be more than 500 scripted TV shows, more than double the number six years ago.

 

Although there have been some signs that the industry’s output may plateau — cable companies like A&E and WGN have said they are getting out of the scripted television business — the entry of Apple, Facebook and Google into the fray almost guarantees that the volume of shows will continue to grow, even as viewers grapple with a glut of programming and an expanding number of streaming platforms.

 

With the prospect of a flood of tech money about to rush in, Hollywood has welcomed the news....

For a while, it seemed like television was being supplanted by online video as cord-cutting increased dramatically. However, it’s becoming more clear that TV and social media are perfect partners, as tweets and other social posts spike around event television. New data from Nielsen Social demonstrates how much activity surrounds broadcast TV, streaming and cable.

Twitter users are highly engaged during popular shows and live television events, both in terms of hashtags and @mentions. #SB50, the official Super Bowl hashtag, received more than 3.7 million tweets. Other live events like the #Oscars also fared very well, with 2.9 million tweets. And scripted television events scored, with #Empire generating 702,000 tweets and @kanyewest receiving 489,000 tweets during his Saturday Night Live performance.

Whether it’s online streaming, cable TV or broadcast TV, recurring series seem to have remarkable staying power on social. Empire received an average of 387,000 tweets from 95,000 authors each episode, while cable-exclusive The Walking Dead received 435,000 tweets from 150,000 authors on average....

Defy Media found that youth preferred digital over cable "because it better suits their lifestyle and has more relatable content."

The study also saw cable/satellite TV consumption decrease with age, noting a spike in free digital video consumption.

Young people are turning to streaming services because they simply offer the freedom of choice — and more appealing content, the report said.

"For TV, you have channels but you're limited to that. On YouTube I can just look up what I'm interested in," 16-year-old Leah said....

It helped to develop all the new ways we watch TV — on-demand, bingeing, mobile. But the Silicon Valley company still has to keep reinventing itself.