Study: More U.S. TV Viewers Combining TV With Social Media

U.S. TV viewers are getting more used to combining TV with
social media, or at least with seeing the two linked.

A survey of 1,000 viewers/Internet users by Accenture found
that 64% recall seeing social media symbols like Facebook "likes" and
Twitter hashtags while watching TV. And even more important for the TV
programmers trying to promote social media, a third of viewers have gone online
to interact after seeing the symbol.

According to the company, "participants were shown
images of various social media symbols and asked a series of questions about
their familiarity and use of them while watching television." The March
2012 poll was an online survey, so it was already geared toward a net-friendly
audience.

The figure for those who interact jumps to 63% for ages
18-24 and 46% for 25-34. Interestingly, the 55-64 demo (24%) topped the 45-54
(19%), while the 65-plus trailed at 11%.

There were lots of reasons given for following up on the
social media TV cues. The top (43%) was to get more info about a show or
product. That was followed by getting coupons or promotional codes (32%),
entering contests (31%), watching a video (26%), socializing (21%),
recommending/sharing video with others (20%) and buying something (16%).

The vast majority of respondents said they got what they
expected out of their TV-prompted online visits, with 74% saying it met
expectations, with 10% saying it did not and 15% saying it exceeded those
expectations.

The biggest barrier to even more interaction with social
media was disinterest in the content or info they would find (60%), uncertainty
about how to interact (23%), inability to access it (15%) or that the symbol
was not displayed on TV long enough to access (11%).

The sample was of people 18-plus, weighted by age, gender,
geography, race and education.

John Eggerton

Contributing editor John Eggerton has been an editor and/or writer on media regulation, legislation and policy for over four decades, including covering the FCC, FTC, Congress, the major media trade associations, and the federal courts. In addition to Multichannel News and Broadcasting + Cable, his work has appeared in Radio World, TV Technology, TV Fax, This Week in Consumer Electronics, Variety and the Encyclopedia Britannica.