Transmedia TV programme-making tips

TV was (is) the original social media. Whether it’s with a friend down the pub, a colleague in the office or your parents on the phone, a “did you see” conversation is a staple of anyone’s social life. Yet, although TV is naturally a social activity the integration of new social media channels beyond the straight broadcast model has been a fairly slow development for programme makers.

The main reason for this is possibly the historic disconnect between programme-makers and marketers – with social media being regarded as a marketing activity rather than a content creation activity. However, just as advertisers are recognising the importance of social content making, programme-makers need to do the same – as social media gives programme-makers the ability to influence the marketing potential (and success) of a programme.

In the last 18 months or so, we’ve been helping various programme teams within the BBC tackle this social programme-making transformation and their move towards “transmedia“, and have discovered there are broadly 3 main areas of opportunity to make the most of social media: before, during and after (something that maybe fairly obvious!)

Digging down deeper into what you could do in these spaces from a strategic programme-making perspective we’ve created this matrix of potential options:

I think we’d all admit that it’s pretty early days for transmedia in TV, however there are plenty of examples of programme-makers who have been trialing ideas in this space. Over the next couple of weeks we’ll be sharing more case studies / ideas from our experiences working with the BBC. And of course, any ideas / experiences anyone else has had would be happily shared too!

@Rubber_Republic