Twitter’s pitch to TV and ad land still leaves many questions unanswered
Last night saw a TV-style upfronts event for the launch of the Nielsen TV Twitter Ratings. Mumbrella’s Nic Christensen argues there are still big questions around Twitter’s number of users and levels of engagement in Australia.
The hashtag for Twitter’s event last night laid out the kind of thinking it wants local media buyers and TV networks to adopt: #TVxTwitter. But while the company might be keen to highlight how “Australians love using Twitter to engage with TV”, its motives in pushing into this space aren’t entirely altruistic.
In the first big public statement made by the social media platform in Australia, two years after opening an office here, the company was keen to push its place as a second screen app for TV networks, and how it can engage audiences and ‘multiply’ them, and the advertising experience for brands.
The problem is, when it comes the number of Australian using the platform, Twitter has steadfastly refused to release the data. Some reports suggest it is stalled at around 2.8m registered/active users. When asked last night about rumours of 4m local users a Twitter exec would only say “we hear so many numbers, very rarely are they in the vicinity”.
Great article on a subject most people don’t want to talk about.
And the 4m … that is probably cumulative users in a month.
Pick ANY minute between 6pm and 10pm for ANY typical night and you will find more than 4m people watching TV in just the 5 metros.
Long, long way to go.
so what do you do when twitter overcommercialises (like they all do) and crashes and burns (like they all do)?
it’s already happening, but i’m not going to be that arsehole who tips of adland to where the cool kids are hiding now.