The Challenge: Engaging NBA Fans on TNT.tv Online Sports fans are social. Whether they are watching a game at a stadium or a bar, fans chat about players and stats, high-five each other and cheer together when the momentum swings. To bring these “real-world” activities online, Turner Sports implemented Gigya’s Socialize technology to make it easy for fans to engage with friends from the top three social networks while watching the NBA Eastern Conference Finals on TNT.tv.
The Approach: Driving Engagement, Viral Promotion through Social Activity Using Gigya Socialize, Turner became the first TV network to take an agnostic approach, letting users sign into any or all of the top three social networks: Facebook, MySpace and Twitter.
"We were going to allow the Facebook guy to chat with the MySpace guy to chat with the Twitter guy," said Matthew Hong, VP-general manager of sports digital at Turner Sports.
Fan messages about the game drove engagement on the TNT.tv site, and were also published to the newsfeeds of Facebook, MySpace and Twitter users, effectively promoting the event real-time to their networks of friends and driving traffic back to TNT.com.
The Result: Demonstrable Fan Engagement The results clearly demonstrate the value of making social features accessible to all users. According to Turner, “We were pleased with the better user experience and higher engagement. The early return is it gives people an opportunity to participate in our content.”
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