Image via CrunchBase

Via Techcrunch

ComScore has just released data from its Video Metrix service, showing that 170 million Internet users in the United States watched online video content in February for an average of 13.6 hours per viewer.

According to the audience measurement giant, the total U.S. Internet audience engaged in more than 5 billion viewing sessions during the course of last month.

Google Sites (read: YouTube) again ranked as the top online video content property in February, with an impressive 141.1 million unique viewers.

Microsoft notably surged from the seventh to the second place in the ranking with 48.8 million viewers. It was followed by Yahoo and Facebook, who both logged 46.7 million viewers. VEVO ranked fifth with a decent 45.9 million viewers.

Hulu only came in ninth with 27.3 million viewers in February, but according to comScore did generate the highest number of video ad impressions (more than 1.1 billion).

Looking at the top online video content properties last month, Google attracted as many viewers as the three challengers that make up the rest of the top 4 of the ranking, combined.

According to comScore, Google Sites also boasted the highest number of viewing sessions with 1.8 billion, and average time spent per viewer at 262 minutes (or 4.4 hours).

Related articles

• Google continues to dominate online video (news.cnet.com)
• Is Online Video Dying? Comscore’s Video Metrix Fizzle in Feb (reelseo.com)
• 7 in 10 Watch Online Video Every Month in India (penn-olson.com)

Share/Bookmark

David A. Yovanno is the CEO of Gigya, Inc., a leading social optimization platform for online business. He can be found on Twitter at @daveyovanno or e-mail dave(at)gigya(dot)com.

Now that most social networks are supporting functionality on third party sites — via Facebook Connect, Sign in with Twitter, Yahoo! Open Strategy, MySpaceID, and other similar technologies — entertainment companies are experimenting with a variety of approaches.

While movie promotions on Facebook, top sports moments on YouTube, and MySpace music pages remain key fixtures, many entertainment companies are also now actively focused on how to apply social strategies to their own sites to deepen relationships with fans and become more relevant. Here are four ways on-site social features are benefiting both fans and the entertainment industry today.

1. Making TV Participatory

---

TV has historically been a “lean back” form of entertainment -– just sit back on your couch and let your eyes and ears take it in. Reality TV shows like American Idol broke new ground by making TV participatory -– fans can take action and influence the outcomes — and social technologies are now helping to make TV a “lean forward” experience.

In the most recent season of Dancing with the Stars, ABC made the voting process social. Fans could sign-in to abc.com with a Facebook or Twitter account to cast a vote for their favorite couple, and then donate their status to help support that pair. For example: “Vote to keep Louie Vito and Chelsea Hightower dancing on ABC!”

In the realm of real-time engagement, another example comes from MTV, which enabled live chat for previously aired episodes of the popular show 16 and Pregnant on MTV.com, where viewers could discuss the often controversial content with other fans.

Benefit for fans: Viewers are empowered to not only vote, but get out the vote among friends. Voting with a Facebook or Twitter identity makes voting a personal, rather than anonymous, experience. For 16 and Pregnant, teens have a live forum for sharing thoughts and experiences.

Benefit for TV networks: Fans are highly engaged with the show online, and the shows gain significant exposure on social networks from donated status updates. Traffic is generated back to the show online and off. Offering users a choice of networks for participation appears to boost engagement. For example, data from Gigya shows that for a single episode of 16 and Pregnant, tens of thousands of messages were sent by chat users to their social networks with the following distribution: 40% to Yahoo, 29% MySpace, 24% Facebook, and 7% Twitter.

2. Bringing Live Sporting Events to Life Online

---

In the real world, sports fans experience events together, whether live at the stadium, with buddies at a sports bar, or with family in front of a new 50” LCD TV. Recognizing this, sports media are trying to make online viewership a bit more like the real world.

A slew of sports media added live social chat to their event webcasts this year, enabling fans to participate online alongside the event using their Facebook, Twitter, MySpace or Yahoo identity. TNT used it for the NBA Eastern Conference finals and NASCAR Race Buddy series, CBS for its College Football series, NBA.com forongoing games, and the PGA for the summer tour events including the PGA Championship. Fan messages about the game were syndicated to the social networks as news items in the feed. Even Roddy White of the Atlanta Falcons has gotten into the act on his own website.

Benefit for fans: Live social media integration provides an opportunity to chat about stats, players, and highlights, and to virtually high-five other fans or friends –- almost as if they were watching together in person.

Benefit for sports media: Fans participating with real identities adds authenticity to the socializing. Interactivity means fans are highly engaged, generating more page views, and messages shared to the social networks drive more traffic back to the online event, creating a virtuous cycle.

3. Giving Music Lovers an Outlet for Self-Expression

---

MySpace proved years ago the power of grass roots social efforts to take an artist from obscurity to household name, with Sara Bareilles one of the poster children for resisting the traditional label model. Now music companies large and small are putting social channels to work, and taking a number of new approaches in the last year.

MuchMusic, a music channel on Canadian cable TV, incorporated celebrity tweets and live chat into theirMuchMusic awards, bringing fans “backstage” to a behind the scenes interview room. Similarly, MTV incorporated live social chat into its webcast of the “Hope for Haiti” telethon with the aim of further engaging viewers for a special cause.

Reverbnation, a music marketing platform that helps individual artists manage promotion, fan relationships, and other aspects of the business, built a feature enabling fans to register on the site using their social network identity, then build and share their favorite playlists into the feed on Facebook, Twitter and MySpace. Rather than help the artists build a presence on the social networks and send fans away, Reverbnation has integrated their own site directly with those key platforms to make themselves a one stop shop for the social music ecosystem.

Benefit for fans: Social integration creates an outlet for communicating with other fans, and sharing passion for artists and music –- whether in the form of a comment or their own playlist creation.

Benefit for music sites and artists: Integration provides greater exposure for artists and tracks as well as increased page views for the site.

4. Driving Word-of-Mouth for Movies

---

Word of mouth is everything in the movie industry. Buzz puts fans in seats, and is the benchmark by which the industry gauges traction for marketing efforts. It’s no surprise that studios are experimenting more with social media far beyond basic trailer promotion.

The movie Paranormal Activity broke new ground by using grass roots efforts and word-of-mouth to build buzz and gain a wider distribution for the film. They also took advantage of social media promotion, enabling fans to invite their friends from social networks to join them at the same time that they purchased movie tickets.

Twentieth-Century Fox, together with MTV, got fans directly involved to promote Avatar. They put on a first-ever live interview with James Cameron and the Avatar cast, answering questions from fans, who in turn shared their reactions in a real-time chat via Facebook, Twitter, MySpace and Yahoo.

Benefit for fans: Movie goers receive greater access to their favorite films and celebrities.

Benefit for movie studios: The campaigns generate new and widespread buzz before and during the theatrical release.

Conclusion

---

When fans connect to a company using a social network identity, they are establishing the basis for a longer-term relationship. The data shared by these connections will allow companies to better segment and serve their fans.

For example, in addition to awareness-generating efforts for individual films, a movie studio could gain greater insight into the specific demographics of those that are responding early to a release and adjust efforts accordingly. They could also more easily continue the dialog by remarketing to users around sequels or films in the same genre.

Whichever path entertainment companies choose, integrating social technologies on their own sites to deepen relationships with fans is a blockbuster opportunity.

Via Mashable

Related articles by Zemanta

• Gigya Keynote Plugged In N Y C011210 (slideshare.net)
• Gigya’s Gamble: The Feed Will Surpass Search (readwriteweb.com)
• TNS, Gigya Release Web Optimization Tools (marketingvox.com)
• Gigya 4 Social Optimization Platform Unveiled for Online Business (eon.businesswire.com)

Share/Bookmark

More than ever before Internet users in the United States want to be able to connect their TV to the Internet. Research firm Deloitte says 65 percent of Internet users want online content available on their televisions, with Millennials (14-26 year olds) leading the way; some 74 percent said they want to connect their TVs. But they weren't alone in their desires, said Deloitte in its “State of the Media Democracy (4th edition).” Gen Xers (71 percent), Boomers (59 percent) and Matures (46 percent) also contributed to the 7-percentage point uptick from a year ago.

The economic downturn that has plagued the nation may have contributed to an increase in TV viewing by Internet users as well, with viewing topping 18 hours per week in 2009. Deloitte said about 4 percent of respondents said they watched some of their favorite shows on sites like Hulu, with another 3 percent saying they watched post-broadcast episodes of their favorite shows on the show’s website.

via Survey shows increased desire for TV-Internet convergence – FierceOnlineVideo.

Related articles by Zemanta

• Clicker – The Complete Guide To Online TV & Movie Shows (makeuseof.com)
• Samsung delivers Blockbuster, Amazon on-demand video (news.cnet.com)
• Rippol – A Personal Video Search With An Intelligent Discovery Engine (makeuseof.com)

Share/Bookmark

When your website first reaches a million visitors, it’s a great milestone. However, one billion views per day can only be attained by the selected few, and YouTube is now one of them.

According to the official blog, YouTubeYouTubeYouTube is serving “well over a billion views a day”. That’s at least 11,574 views per second, 694,444 views per minute, and 416,666,667 views per hour. Imagine the web server farm that can withstand that much traffic, and then remember that YouTube is just one of Google’sGoogleGoogle many properties.

As we wrote earlier this week, YouTube still may not be making enough money to justify the 1.65 billion dollars Google has paid for it, but it definitely makes it up when it comes to visitors.

To celebrate the occasion, YouTube has a special logo today, accompanied with the text “1 billion views per day”. Yes, they’re bragging, but one has to admit they have a lot to brag about.

via YouTube Reaches One Billion Views Per Day.

Related articles by Zemanta

• YouTube’s New Logo Shouts From The Rooftops: ’1 Billion Views Per Day!’ (techcrunch.com)
• YouTube hits one billion views a day (telegraph.co.uk)

Share/Bookmark