Social media platforms are fast evolving, and newsrooms that have come to rely on them are turning to new tools to keep up. From more granular analytics to better tools for incorporating social content into stories, newsrooms — and the vendors they work with on social — are moving along a sharp learning curve.
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With 2017 behind us, Share Rocket is taking a look back on our data from the top 10 markets in the country to track the performance of the top local broadcasters for our fourth quarter social review. Compared to the third quarter, in which natural disasters around the country helped contribute to huge spikes in engagement, the fourth quarter saw reductions in total engagement in most of the top 10 markets as the spike subsided. Here are markets 6-10.
With 2017 behind us, Share Rocket is taking a look back on our data from the top 10 markets in the country to track the performance of the top local broadcasters for our fourth quarter social review. Compared to the third quarter, in which natural disasters around the country helped contribute to huge spikes in engagement, the fourth quarter saw reductions in total engagement in most of the top 10 markets as the spike subsided. Here are markets 1-5.
Video is still the most-engaging content on the site by a very wide margin. The average video had more than 160 more engagements per post than the next-closest form of post, links. Link posts have been impressively steady over the last six months, staying between 255 and 276 engagements per post in every month. Photos saw a large increase in average engagement from May through September, but took a slight downturn in October (as did all other forms of post).
With another quarter in the books, Share Rocket tracks the performance of the top local broadcasters. 2017’s third quarter featured several major news events, but perhaps the biggest stories in the U.S. were centered on natural disasters including Hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria. Coverage of those events and the fallout after the storms had passed led to overall increases in engagement compared to the second quarter of the year.
With another quarter in the books, Share Rocket looks at the top five U.S. markets to track the performance of the top local broadcasters. 2017’s third quarter featured several major news events, but perhaps the biggest stories in the U.S. were centered on natural disasters including Hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria. Coverage of those events and the fallout after the storms had passed led to overall increases in engagement in the country’s top markets compared to the second quarter of the year.
Study: $1.4B Local TV Revenue Opportunity
Share Rocket says it determined the total estimated value for sponsored premium social content for 2018 will exceed $1.4 billion. “Armed with this valuation, TV news broadcasters can more easily quantify their social media equity for advertisers,” the company said.
Social media is arguably the best tool for broadcasters to reach a large audience these days and they all need the help of their staffs and on-air talent to amplify their voice on social media and create compelling content to build the same brand loyalty on social that they built over the airwaves for decades. Just dipping a toe into Twitter or posting plain links to your work on your Facebook Page won’t cut it. With the speed of news at an all-time high and the time allowed to produce it at an all-time low, journalists need to maximize their return-on-effort to make their time spent on social worthwhile — for both themselves and their employer. Here’s how.
Just because a station is in a larger market doesn’t necessarily mean its social performance was “better” than those in medium or small markets. In fact, larger-market stations often can’t come close to the mid- and small-market stations numbers in terms of commanding the majority of their market’s attention.
Second-place WRC (NBC O&O) increased its total engagement by 44.7% in the last 30 days, which helped it increase its overall share by 28.8% and make the race for first in the nation’s capital much closer. WTTG (Fox O&O) held on to first place in the market with a 33.9 overall share, while WRC had a 30.1 overall share, WUSA (Tegna-owned CBS affiliate) had a 20.0 overall share, and WJLA had a 15.0 overall share.
With another quarter in the books, Share Rocket looks at the top 10 U.S. markets to track the performance of the top local broadcasters. Local newsrooms are reaching the largest audiences they ever have and their reach continues to grow, quarter after quarter. In fact, 40 stations in the top 10 markets now have social media audiences of 1 million or more followers.
