Simon Staffans: How To Develop Television Shows For A Social And Multiplatform World

written by: Simon Staffans

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Published on Wednesday, 04 July 2012 09:14

The other day I spent 23 minutes watching a video from the BBC. It was 23 quite well spent minutes, as the journalist in question – Rory-Cellan Jones – had devoted quite a lot of effort to his subject, that of the future of television. The video features interviews with people from Microsoft, Google, Dijit, even Robert Scoble. The talks are all about how to harness the allure and the pull of television in a social and connected context, and in the end of course how to make money from it all.

1. Create the foundations for success. For many companies the first step will be to pull down the silos between different departments and make people talk to each other and actually make an effort to understand each other and see everything in the same light. For a successful multiplatform TV-based project to work, the program development people must make themselves understood to the tech people and the marketing people, and the tech and marketing people must make their realities stick with the development people. All else is simply counterproductive.

 2. Do a lot of research and build on success (or failure). Andrea Phillips is quite rightly adamant in insisting that one does oneself a disservice by not looking at what has already been produced and distributed. There is absolutely no shame in standing on the shoulders of others; indeed, many of the best innovations, also in the media and television business, are projects inspired by earlier failures or successes. From my own experience I know that almost whatever you try to create, someone has already thought of it. Which is all good and well, as you can use this to make your own project better… 

3. Consider applying transmedia storytelling methods. Not every show should go transmedia, not every show should even be true multiplatform. They can still generate a buzz, still build a hype, but do not need to go all the way. But for the ones that do go multiplatform, applying transmedia storytelling methods will be of use to everyone involved in the development and production and distribution parts of the process. As transmedia is based on developing a thorough background, storyworld, mythology and narrative superstructure, this will help immensely when trying to implement point 1 above – getting everyone to see the same project and understanding the same thing and work together towards a common goal. It will help in the development process of any kind of television show, it will give pointers to where entry points can be implemented to invite an audience to participate, it will assist in developing story arches and characters, it will help when keeping multiplatform content coherent and logically connected between all parts… it’s all good, basically. 

4. Listen and respond. This is one strength that, say, a weekly game show has over a multimillion dollar drama series from HBO. It is possible to listen to what people say and discuss on social media and use that to tweak the show. Also make sure there is staff dedicated to the job – if someone has a great idea for the show on Twitter, respond! Drop a line to say ”hey, can we call you to hear you out on that idea?”. No one knows what gems might be unearthed…