Channel 4, Stephen Fry & How TV Loves Hashtags

I was getting the most out of my bank holiday monday by kicking back and watching some great telly this week – who could resist Channel 4’s Stephen Fry and his 100 greatest gadgets?

I noticed that on each ad break, Channel 4 were showing the hashtag for #greatestgadgets in the corner of the screen. How crafty I thought, and not for the first time either. Channel 4 has a history of innovation in the area of TV/Social media integration – shown to great aplomb with their Feb outing this year, when they used Twitter to great effect in conjunction with a 4 part drama set in Palestine in the ’40s “The Promise”.

Given the weighty subject matter (wartime Palestine) Channel 4 realised that it would be a great opportunity to piggyback on the discussions that were bound to be taking place anyway, by setting a specific hashtag for community users to display in their posts. Using #c4thepromise, they were able to get all the discussion going in one place – which allowed greater access and control when moderating the feedback and interaction. It also facilitated the use of a handy little tool which Channel 4 put together for this, which tracked and visually displayed the components of the discussions online.

So, why, apart from getting all the chat in one place, would Channel 4 be so keen on integrating their Twitter and TV offerings? Well, research tells us that TV audiences are becoming increasingly more distracted by their smartphones, tablets and laptops. How many of us sit down to watch our fav soap with one eye on the TV and the other on that all important game of Angry Birds? Indeed a recent study by Yahoo and Nielsen has revealed that a jaw dropping 86% of US mobile phone users watch TV while interacting with their phones in some way. So, to make sure that they are getting in front on their audience at every opportunity, Channel 4 are inviting their audience onto social media. In works the other way too – when users see trends emerging on Twitter (countless world events have broken this way) they are very likely to switch on their news channel of choice and see what is happening. With the growing strength of social media sites, the more traditional forms of media (like TV) need to adapt, and this is a great way of doing it.

Channel 4 are embracing hashtags this side of the pond, if we look stateside, we see TV stations like Fox moving in the same way. Since April of this year, Fox have been serving up hashtags on a number of their most popular shows – popping up in the corner of the screen when shows like Glee and Breaking in are airing. Fox’s president of marketing Joe Earley has said, “We’ve noticed shows like Glee and Idol trend while the show is on, but fans often use different hashtags. We thought if we provided the official hashtags, then more posts would aggregate.”A clear plan on behalf of Fox to gain traction from any social mentions of their shows.

Twitter’s own Chloe Sladden commented at the 2011 NAB Show in the States, discussing 2 specifics ways of using hashtags on TV – a “canonical hashtag” (where you use the programme name in the tag, like what Channel 4 have been doing) and “madlib” (where different hashtags are used for different episodes that are being shown or ad hoc topics that come about by community discussions, influenced by trending).

So, its a natural progression – channels like Channel 4 (and the BBC it has to be said, using hashtags to direct political discussion and news) are harnessing user behaviour to bring audiences back to TV and create discussion online. Hashtags give them greater control over where the discussions happen and keep them bang up to date when important topics or points are raised through social media feedback. Social brand monitoring and moderation at its finest, and good for everyone – from Channel 4 to all the online users involved.

So lets finish where we started, with Stephen Fry – one of the UK’s best and most outspoken proponents of the benefits of social media. Did you agree with his list of top gadgets in the end? As a non-smoker, I was a little disappointed at the cigarette lighter being crowned number one. Personally, the world does not need to see this gal without the benefit of a hairdryer and curler each morning, so more fool them for not counting these items higher in the list…