Menu
Online & Digital
 

Watch What Happens Next

Bravo

Issue 44 | September 2017

Agency

360i

Creative Team

Group Creative Director Fabio Seidl Creative Director Dustin Glick Sr. Copywriter Evan T. Atherton Sr. Art Director Gabriel Guedelha Integrated Producer Jenna Birkenstock

Production Team

Production Embassy Row Producer Zara Findlay-Shirras Production Manager John Meier-Conroy Digital Producer T Kyle MacMahon

Other Credits

Group Account Director Taleah Mona-Lusky Account Supervisor Dani Calogera Account Manager Carolyn Fine SVP, Strategy & Social Marketing Orli LeWinter Strategy Director Kyle Hoedl Social Strategist Marie Goldstein Sr. Social Marketing Managers Tim Greene, Sarah Wanger Social Marketing Manager Kristina Lintz Social Marketing Associate Susan Choe Group Media Director Krista Jansen Associate Media Director Dan Kernkraut Sr. Media Manager Corey Teich Sr. Designer Ivan Burguete-Gonzaleis Motion Designer Pat Rawson Bravo EVP Marketing, Bravo & Oxygen Media Ellen Stone VP Social, Bravo & Oxygen Media Adam Zeller Director Social, Bravo & Oxygen Media Courtney Fleischman

Date

May 2017

Background

After 14 seasons of "Watch What Happens Live" with Andy Cohen (WWHL), Bravo's live, unfiltered late night show, Bravo wanted to attract new viewers and position Andy Cohen as the 'Late Night King of Fun.' WWHL was the only late night show that truly aired live.

With live content exploding across social platforms, Bravo saw an opportunity to reach new viewers right where they were: in social media. To show potential viewers the truly live, unfiltered nature of the show, Bravo launched "Watch What Happens Next"— a full week of live after-shows on five different social platforms.

Idea

'Watch What Happens Next' was a never-before-attempted week of live social programming. For five consecutive nights, Bravo broadcast unfiltered, live after-shows on Reddit, Snapchat, Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, each with a special, platform-specific spin. On Sunday, the campaign kicked off with the first-ever Reddit AMA IRL with Andy, Kim Zolciak-Biermann, and Gabourey Sidibe. Fans had the opportunity to ask questions via a livestream directly on Reddit, and Andy chose questions from the AMA to answer live on the platform.

On Monday, Snapchat users were led directly to a livestream of Andy, Jim Parsons, and Diane Lane playing a game of "Bravologues," a re-enactment of scandalous Bravo moments using Snapchat lenses.

On Tuesday, Twitter Live users could watch a livestream of Andy, Christopher Meloni, and Patti Lupone performing dramatic readings of tweets from notable Twitter 'divas'.

On Wednesday, Andy threw an exclusive after-party which went live on Instagram with Andy, Carole Radziwill, and Anthony Atamanuik. Premium Instagram influencers @ girlwithnojob and @betches asked Andy's guests live, hard-hitting questions.

On Thursday, Bravo partnered with Entertainment Tonight to go live with Amy Schumer and Goldie Hawn on Facebook.

Throughout, Andy asked fan questions directly from each of the platforms, integrating social conversation even more into the show.

Results

Andy's charm and skill as a TV host led to 2.4 million total video views; 50 million total impressions; 742,000 engagements; a ratings increase of 8% from the weeks prior to the campaign and a ratings increase of 13% over the 2017 average.

There were 17,000 new subscribers on the r/television sub-Reddit; comment volume was 69.5% greater than the average text-based Reddit AMA and watch-time on Twitter Live was 340% higher than average.

Our Thoughts

At first the big broadcast TV networks saw digital as the enemy, a threat to their ratings. But then Ellen DeGeneres and Jimmy Fallon began to show how YouTube could drive viewers to the TV shows. What they also did, though, was create material specifically for online platforms so fans could get more of the stuff they loved. For instance, Ellen has "Show Me More", which only runs on YouTube and which allows the programme makers to test ideas they can then explore further in the TV version.

TV and online video platforms, including Instagram, Facebook and, of course, YouTube, can have a symbiotic relationship.

Okay, so Bravo's foray into content extension here with Andy Cohen is not new. But it is still relatively rare and we wanted to feature it in Directory because you'll soon be seeing a lot more of it as the networks see how digital can complement what they do.