While the TV industry has its share of ups and downs at the moment — notably with ratings and advertising — there is an interesting bright spot at the end of the tunnel. And, oddly enough, it involves Twitter.
According to Re/code, a new research report from Ipsos indicates that Twitter users are actually more likely to pay for a subscription to a TV viewing service and watch traditional programming than those who don’t use the social site.
From those surveyed, 93 percent of users actually have access to some form of pay-TV subscription, compared to 86 percent of users that don’t use Twitter by any means.
As you can see from the chart below, Twitter users are higher in every category involving television than those who don’t use it, including watching broadcast and cable television, taking advantage of video-on-demand services, and checking out programming on the web, from video clips to devoted web series.
That’s not to say there’s a world of difference — cable TV only shows a one percent ratio between the two categories — but it’s interesting to see what viewing habits come from those who use social media. It just shows that people love talking about their favorite shows and other programming, even when it’s airing live.
That said, the report can’t be accurately gauged, as the social site carries 284 million users worldwide, with only 63 million of them in the United States. That makes it hard for certain networks to measure what kind of popularity would come from advertising with a certain program — although that didn’t stop some from trying, like SyFy with its sequel Sharknado 2: The Second One, which aired earlier this year. It got tremendous buzz on Twitter, and was popular enough to warrant a third Sharknado film, coming sometime next year.
For the time being, though, it looks like being social does have a slightly bigger payoff when it comes to TV viewing. (Just try not to tweet those Walking Dead spoilers so quickly, folks.)
