Air apparent: Ratings go from TV to Sina Weibo

CSM Media Research, a leading television ratings analysis company, announced on Wednesday the official launch of China's first social media-based big data system to evaluate TV shows in partnership with Sina Weibo, a Twitter-like microblogging platform in China.

The system, also called the Weibo TV index in the beta version, was based on the product system and structure co-developed by Twitter Inc and Kantar Media - CSM's foreign parent company - and then was tailored to China's TV industry.

In 2012, Twitter teamed up with The Nielsen Co, the major TV ratings system, in creating the Nielsen Twitter TV Rating in the United States market. It is a social measurement of TV programs' popularity.

"The index is an indicator of TV shows' influence of word-of-mouth and user coverage on microblogging platforms," said Dong Wenjun, Sina Weibo Corp's director of operations.

With the growing integration of TV stations and the Internet, as well as the development of social media, the connections between TV shows and social media have become intertwined. Microblogging platforms have become a major venue on which viewers can discuss TV shows and post their opinions.

Of the respondents who have expressed their opinions on TV shows through social network platforms in 2013, more than 50 percent said they chose microblogging platforms for making such comments, according to a survey conducted in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen by CSM Media Research.

By the end of January, there were more than 7,000 certified official TV Weibo accounts, of which 6,107 were dedicated to TV shows, according to Sina Weibo.

So far, the released Weibo TV index has covered more than 20 hit series, including Dad, Where Are We Going? and I'm A Singer. But the index will be extended to evaluate the popularity of TV dramas and sports programs.

CSM Media Research and Sina Weibo will periodically release statistical research findings with specific analysis of certain hit shows.

"This new TV index serves as a supplement to the traditional audience rating, as the traditional viewer rating is far from enough to assess how much the audience is engaged in a specific TV show. But it needs more time to get widely recognized among the general public," said Peng Kan, research and development director of Legend Media, a Beijing-based consultancy.

Dong said the new index will develop derivative services, such as in-depth analysis and the facilitation of interactions between television channels and the Internet.

"It also has promising commercial value for the country's entire TV industry and for the advertisers," Dong said.

"The idea of this index is good for the media and broadcasting industry, but how far it can go has to do with how transparent it is willing to be with the data process of its rating system," Peng said.