Two years ago, I read an article about the media company, ABC. They discovered that a significant number of viewers watched their hit show, Scandal, while concurrently tweeting about it. I discovered a similar phenomenon, when I watched the live broadcast of The Experience Lagos concert, on YouTube.
For some reason, instead of watching the concert on cable TV, I chose the live stream on YouTube. The comments were hilarious! It was like the live audience had unlocked a second dimension of entertainment. They were tuned to it, via the comments section. That was when I understood the ABC data. The second channel phenomenon wasn’t driven by ABC. It was created by consumers. At the time, ABC even worried that the split attention might bring down their TV ratings. They were wrong. Online interaction improved the popularity of ABC’s shows.
The moral for me is that consumers will always choose how they want to use a product or service. They may create a new application altogether. Smart companies pay attention to these trends and adjust, to derive even more value from the new application of their product.
Consumers choose how they want to use a product. They may create a new application altogether. Share on X