A funny thing showed up in TV Land in recent years--the hash-tag.
Check Twitter on Tuesday nights for #dwts and you're likely to find a river of tweets about the performances on "Dancing With The Stars." During football season, follow #mnf and you'll find rival NFL fans jawing in 140 characters.
While television used to be an experience shared only with those on the other end of the couch, today, with the advent of social media, it's an experience that can be shared with another viewer on the other side of the world. That trend opens the door for new products to help connect the television screen with a second screen, which is what several companies who have recently grabbed venture funding intend to do.
A few examples of companies working on changing the television viewing experience include AdaptiveBlue Inc., maker of Get Glue; Philo Media Inc., and TweetNGo Inc., the company behind Miso. All have raised funding rounds north of $1 million.
These start-ups are all considering various business models, but the revenue potential is huge. The platforms have a direct connection to the massive advertising budgets gracing television screens, while providing the high-engagement with consumers that brands value. The companies can sell ads themselves or work with networks for cross-platform ad campaigns. And, those campaigns can be far reaching - from banner ads to brand specific trivia contests to exclusive sponsored content for a particular show. There's also an opportunity to sell the data gleaned from consumers' engagement with television. For instance, knowing which shows a consumer likes to comment about or what time of day they're most engaged in content is highly valuable to advertisers.
If second screens continue to become more ubiquitous, it's possible these social television platforms could began to steal share of advertising budgets devoted to traditional TV. Nielsen recently reported that 59% of U.S. Internet users browse the Internet and watch TV simultaneously, a trend that's likely to increase as more tablets and smartphones enter the market.
Get Glue is the most heavily funded of the social TV platforms, having raked in $10.5 million from investors including Time Warner Investments, RRE Ventures and Union Square Ventures. The company's scope is broader than simply television, allowing users to "check-in" to any type of entertainment experience. The company currently has 900,000 users and claims more than 12 million ratings and check-ins for TV shows, movies, music and books every month.
"The size of the opportunity is huge," Adaptive Blue Chief Executive Alex Iskold said. "It touches everyone from teenagers to senior citizens."
With Get Glue, users build a social network where they share the entertainment they're engaged in--not conceptually different than the popular Foursquare Inc. service that allows users to check in to venues. When a user logs in to Get Glue they can see which friends are watching "Mad Men" and which are watching "Glee." Users are served recommendations based on their entertainment tastes and can "thumbs-up" or "thumbs-down" things they like or dislike. The company had its biggest check-in day ever on Jan. 27, counting 100,000 check-ins in one day.
The Get Glue check-in can then be pushed to other networks like Facebook and Twitter. The plan is to keep it simple. "My sense is deeper engagement is a great idea, but not everyone wants it," Iskold said. "We need to see if the lightweight concept works."
Get Glue also has a rewards system based on game mechanics tied to content. Rewards are in the form of stickers, which are mailed to users. For example, "The Ellen DeGeneres Show" provides stickers for users who check in to the show frequently. The deal is Get Glue's first partnership with Warner Bros. Television. "It's official recognition of being a fan and it's coming from their beloved brands," Iskold said.
The company has partnered with more than 25 entertainment companies including 20th Century Fox, AMC, ABC Family, Disney Theatrical, Discovery, ESPN, FOX, Food Network, Hachette, HBO, HGTV, MTV, MSNBC, Showtime, Penguin, PBS, Random House, Simon and Schuster, Syfy, Sony Pictures, Travel Channel, USA Network, Universal Pictures and Warner Brothers.
"Every major media company is literally tearing us apart," Iskold said. "They wanted this yesterday."
Kelly Day, executive vice president and general manager of digital media and commerce at Discovery, said social television is still in its infancy, but networks and advertisers are excited about its potential. The network has used Get Glue for campaigns around shows like "MythBusters," "Sarah Palin's Alaska" and "Storm Chasers."
"Social media is the thing that is a huge priority for us, not just for the sake of collecting fans," Day said. "We think that activating that fan base and rewarding that fan base is a critical factor in the success of media. You have to have that one-on-one with fans."
The Get Glue application, available for the iPhone, iPad, Android and the Web, is pre-revenue, and Iskold is keeping monetization plans close to the vest.
Not Just Check-Ins
While check-ins are a phenomenon that seem to have worked for Foursquare to the point of attracting copycats like Get Glue, other companies believe social television needs to go beyond the check-in.
"In the next six to nine months there's going to be a clear understanding of the difference in these products," TweetNGo CEO Somrat Niyogi said. "People think of this as a check-in space. We think a check-in is a small feature. What we're focused on is delivering an experience that enhances the way you watch TV. We think that focus will be the key differentiator."
TweetNGo's Miso applications are available for iPhone, iPad and Android. The application aims to make watching television content more social and fun by providing additional information, games and community features.
Much of Miso's design revolves around conversation. Users with experience on other popular social networks like Facebook will find familiarity in watching a stream of posts about what friends are viewing that allows commenting and link posting. Following a specific show brings the latest news, pictures and related multimedia to the user's stream.
Niyogi admits honestly that he doesn't know what direction the product will eventually take. As the user base and corresponding interaction grows, the company is learning how best to add value to the television viewing experience.
"We have to continue to experiment," Niyogi said. "We're all inventing things. It's clear there will be a second-screen experience, but we have no clear idea what that will look like."
To help drive the direction of the product, the company has released a Miso application programming interface (API) that enables developers to access relevant information in real time about shows, movies, users and check-ins. The idea is that a new application developed on top of the Miso platform will take off and give a better understanding of what users want, even if they didn't know before using the service. For example, a developer could create popular television trivia applications or other games that plug into the Miso platform.
The Miso team has attracted $1.5 million from Google Ventures, Hearst Interactive Media and angels.
Hearst Interactive Media's Scott Wolfgang began his career at International Creative Management, one of the world's largest talent agencies. He was charged with finding scripts to put on television and remains to this day a big fan of television.
In his current gig as an investor for Hearst, he aims to stay on top of digital media trends and distribute capital to companies that can become leaders in their space. In following social media phenoms like Facebook and Twitter, Wolfgang saw an opportunity to "highjack the stream."
"You started to see verticalized platforms crop up," Wolfgang said. "People were taking a conversation and bringing it on its own platform, leveraging Facebook and Twitter as distribution. I started wondering what activities lend themselves to their own platform. TV is something that popped out."
Wolfgang said he "played around" with nearly every product in the space and ultimately selected Miso for an investment. "Miso was the most easy to understand and the most elegant way of interacting with television," he said.
Bringing Competition To Viewing
While Miso believes check-ins are a part of the bigger picture, Philo Media believes the check-in is a big opportunity for television and is layering on interactive games for TV viewers to drive engagement.
"The game is getting crazy," Chief Executive David Levy said. "Some folks are looking at this as a way to competitively watch television."
Philo offers iPhone, iPod Touch and Android applications that enable users to tune in and comment on shows with other users, no matter if they're recorded shows or live programming; receive push notifications when friends tune in; see how friends and other viewers are tuning in; receive awards for watching shows; participate in virtual television scavenger hunts; and compete in a game that provides credits for watching a show, allowing a fan to rise in the ranks from "production assistant" to "executive producer."
Philo, which has raised funding from DFJ Gotham Ventures, Eniac Ventures and North Bridge Venture Partners, announced last week a partnership with TV Guide Magazine where users interact with 10 featured shows to earn a chance to attended TV Guide's Hot List Party in Los Angeles.
The company plans to monetize through promotions bought by brand advertisers or television content owners, but Levy declined to say how much response the company is receiving for the plan.
On paper, these services seem like a win for everyone. Consumers get a better viewing experience, content owners attract more engagement and reap the benefit of viewers promoting content through their social graph, and advertisers gain access to new, highly targetable marketing real estate.
Players in the social television game believe that they're at least a year away from attracting meaningful revenue. Still, there are a host of other companies trying to build businesses around social television such as Clicker Media Inc., ClipSync Inc., Orca Interactive Ltd., Starling, Comcast's Tunerfish, Yap.tv Inc. and others.
"As we head out of this year, there will be one or two clear leaders," said Wolfgang, of Hearst Interactive Media. "Next year we'll see the scale and leadership where advertisers can invest in real campaigns."
The rise of social media has created new ways for TV viewers to connect in real time and for programmers to build loyalty and viewership. That has opened to door to companies such as Adaptive Blue, Philo Media and TweetNGo, which are searching for ways to monetize around the "second screen."