CROSS-PROMOTING RACING WITH TV AND TWITTER

Twitter users send out about a half billion tweets daily.

Some 32 million people tweeted last year about specific television programs, with the Super Bowl being the topic of 24 million tweets and American Idol 5.8 million. The recently launched Twitter Amplify capitalizes on this latter trend by enabling companies, including many with commercial ties to horse racing, to coordinate social networking on Twitter with television advertising.

Here’s an example of how Twitter Amplify works. Delicioso, a fictitious national fast-food chain, employs a digital-fingerprinting device referred to as a “TV ads dashboard” to automatically detect and catalogue the exact dates, times, stations, and programs its numerous television ads are shown on across the United States. Twitter is also able to identify the exact people who tweeted about the TV shows sponsored by the restaurant chain.

This information allows Delicioso to zero in on Twitter users who tweeted about–and thus most likely watched—television programs its commercials appeared on, and to send the individuals a follow-up message embedded with an ad. Multiple exposures increase the likelihood of an advertisement being noticed and remembered.

ESPN is placing college-football highlights, or instant replays, from telecasts into Twitter feeds that include an eight-second ad for Verizon Wireless. The National Football League is following suit by creating a steady stream of custom content for tweets. On game-days, the NFL sends out tweets of advertiser-sponsored clips from action that has aired on CBS, Fox, and the NFL Network.

Horse racing has a significant television audiences and a great deal of Twitter chatter fit the profile for cross promotion of products and services on TV and Twitter. Companies that sponsor horse-racing telecasts have the means to reinforce their advertising messages with the people who were interested enough to tweet about what they viewed.

Copyright ©2013 the Blood-Horse. Used with permission.