Why We Trend - Or How Millions Can Learn to Love CHUCK

 
First off, to maximize Twitter trending potential and keep it simple, from here on in we will only try to trend one term and hashtag:

#Chuck or simply the word Chuck

While I am at it, you might as well follow @ChuckMeMondays on Twitter (if you don't already).

We had a lot fun over the last 8 months trending many different terms but we are now in the big time!  And we need to make sure everyone, including anyone not reading this site, is doing the same thing.

During the 2-hour premiere on Sunday, January 10th, we trended #Chuck and/or Chuck for over 6-hours and went as high as 5th place on an extremely busy night.  I counted over 25,000 tweets in that time.  It took us until we reached 4,000 tweets before we trended.  Great job.

However, on Monday we seemed to split our hashtags and terms across too many options and that caused us not to trend.  So, keep it simple.  #Chuck (or Chuck).  An example tweet would look like:

I love this show! #Chuck is adorable!


But why is trending important?  Does it really matter if we trend?  Many media types like to say that it is not important since a few thousand fans can do it and therefor it gives the illusion of interest.

What these people fail to realize is this:

• Trending on Twitter means MILLIONS see the topic and click on it to find out what it is about.
• Those who click may be fans or may have never heard of the show.
• Fans who see it may not even be aware the show is back or when it is on.
• Non-fans may feel the need to check the show out since people seem to be talking about it.
• Even people who say they have no interest in the show are more likely to check it out because they keep seeing the topic trend.
• It can also act as a reminder to people who otherwise don't watch NBC that the show is on.
• Nielsen family viewers, who are in the thousands but represent a hundred million homes, could see the trending topic and make it a point to watch, immediately increasing the ratings of the show.

To give you an idea of how important that last point is, ONE Nielsen family home in a major metro area can represent hundreds of thousands of people in the 18-49 demographic.  That means a SINGLE HOME could be the difference between CHUCK season 3 being it, or the show carrying on for many more years.  That is right, the system is ridiculous but that is how it works.


So, do your best every Monday night to help trend #Chuck or Chuck so that we may reach out to the people who will keep our show on for a long time.  The survival of our show depends on it.  Thank you.


SPREAD THE WORD!  TWEET ON MONDAYS!

Chuck Me Mondays Sept. 14th until March 1st STRATEGY

First! NO HASHTAG for September 14th. Instead, we will type out  We Heart Chuck as three separate words, in honor of the American Heart Association fund raising effort by the campaign of the same name.  That is right, absolutely NO HASHTAG for this week.  It is time we test to see if we can trend common words as opposed to hashtags.  Might as well start now.  So, your tweets could look like:

Chuck and Sarah are so cute together in this episode! We Heart Chuck

Second, we may be changing terms every week.  So, check back here every Tuesday or Wednesday for the new strategy.

Third, now for the strategy:

Based on the poll, the majority want to continue into Season 2 of CHUCK in order.  So, we will do that.  However, since there are some people who can't find it in their wallet to spend $2 to $3 a week on CHUCK (I spend more than that a day on tea), I am going to offer up alternate strategies for them.

MAIN STRATEGY

We watch Season 2 in order from First Date to Ring.  You can purchase the episodes via iTunes, Amazon, Playstation Network, and XBOX Live or find some other method I don't want to know about (well, not publicly at least).

AMAZON - $1.99 per SD episode; $35.02 for the whole season (savings of $8.76)

AMAZON - $2.99 per HD episode; $52.62 for the whole season (savings of $13.16)

iTunes - $1.99 per SD episode; $39.99 for the whole season (savings of $3.79)

iTunes - $2.99 per HD episode; $59.99 for the whole season (savings of $5.79)

Playstation Network - $1.99 per SD episode; no full season price offered; no HD offered (no link either)

XBox Live - 160 points = $2.00 per SD episode; no full season price offered; no HD offered


ALTERNATE STRATEGY #1 
Watch any random episode from the second half of Season 2 on NBC.com, selected from Third Dimension to Ring.  Fans will watch at the same time as the main strategy group and tweet as normal.  You will likely annoy the rest of us with your tweets about Best Friend and Colonel every week, but whatever.  If you can't afford the episodes, or find some other way of acquiring them (I told you!  I DON'T WANT TO KNOW!), then this is at least a way that you can join us and help the trending. :)

Alternate Strategy #2
Watch Season 1 over again.  I don't care in what order.  Just tweet like a maniac.

There you go.  I do not recommend buying the entire season yet, unless you really want to own it now.  NBC and WB might have the correct order of episodes coming for online viewing (looks like NBC's license for the second half runs out on the 20th of this month).

Chuck Me Mondays FINAL Strategy for August 31st

#FREECHUCK is the new hashtag for this coming Monday. Please let everyone you know who participates in Chuck Me Mondays know about it.

We are watching THREE Season 1 episodes on Monday as we wait for NBC to correct the Season 2 episode issue. We are attempting to trend for 3+ hours and this is also a good test for future efforts.

Based on your votes, the episodes we will be watching are:

Episode 8: CHUCK VERSUS THE TRUTH
Episode 9: CHUCK VERSUS THE IMPORTED HARD SALAMI
Episode 10: CHUCK VERSUS THE NEMESIS

Viewing starts at the NORMAL time of 9PM ET and ends at 11:43PM ET (we will start each episode at the top of each hour so everyone has a chance to tweet, eat, and whatever else comes to mind).

This will give a majority of people in the other time zones the ability to participate, though it does ask those on the east coast of the US and Canada to stay up later. Hopefully, what we lose in east coasters will be made up for by the amount of people we retain in the other time zones.

[Redacted]

Chuck Me Mondays Strategy for August 31st

Based on the current poll count on August 26 at 7:33PM ET, next Monday, August 31st, it looks like we will be watching:

Truth
Salami
Nemesis


We will start at 9PM ET (so, the normal time) and take 15 minute breaks between episodes to tweet, eat, and whatever else comes to mind. [this is up for debate in the comments section]

We will finish at roughly 11:43PM ET.

We will be changing hashtags (we are still testing to see if Twitter is blocking us once we succeed in trending).

Next week's hashtag will be #FreeChuck.

If we succeed in trending that, we will consider changing hashtags each week. They will need to be simple and we will give everyone more than a day or two to learn of the change.

By the way, great job last night. We had over 2,000 #chuckmeout tweets in 43 minutes.

Welcome to Chuck Me Mondays HQ ;)

So, now that everything is straightened out. Again, we are using #chuckmemondays and chuck me mondays this week.

So, your tweets should look like:


I love Morgan! #chuckmemondays chuck me mondays

Thank you for your co-operation and enjoy the added value our promotional partners at ChuckTV.Net provide for this campaign.

ChuckTV.Net strategy issue

ChuckTV.Net has been a very helpful hub for Chuck Me Mondays and I have appreciated all they have done, but they should not be setting ANY strategy without first talking to the people who have been doing it for 2 months now. This is the strangest move by ChuckTV. No one from the site has said one word to me. Whereas I have been blogging about it since last week.

I even included a version of this idea in the blog. We are trying to figure things out and posting contradicting strategy is helpful to no one. Mel and I have never discussed strategy and I see no reason why she should begin to attempt to control it now without first contacting the campaign creator/manager first.

Edit: Apparently ChuckTV is removing their suggestion. Move along.

Chuck Me Mondays today and in the future

As I have said in the last two postings, our plan for today, August 10th, is to tweet both the hashtag #chuckmemondays and the non-hashtag chuck me mondays. So, your tweets should look like:


I love Sarah Walker! #chuckmemondays chuck me mondays

However, in the future, and perhaps NEXT WEEK, we will likely adopt a new strategy. tweeting the name of the episode we are watching. Therefor, in the future, we might be watching an episode and tweeting something like:

I love Chuck and Sarah in first date on chuck me mondays

Or:

I love Chuck and Sarah in First Date

Just know that this idea is out there and that it is in the pipeline for the future. This should suppress any belief that Twitter is banning our tweets and also be easy enough for people to remember to do as it is episode specific. Please comment on this idea. I have enabled anonymous comments for those who are too lazy to create accounts.

Chuck Me Mondays - Response and New Strategy

Based on the responses I received from various sources regarding my Chuck Me Mondays post, here is what we will do this coming Monday.

We will continue to use the #chuckmemondays hashtag (this will prevent total confusion from reigning over the effort).

We will begin to use chuck me mondays in every tweet (a space between each word).

Whether you capitalize letters or not makes no difference but for ease of use, make it as simple as possible.

So, your tweets during the next Chuck Me Mondays event should look something like this:

That fight scene was so awesome! #chuckmemondays chuck me mondays

Please pass this on to your friends and ask them to follow @ChuckMeMondays on Twitter for the most up-to-date direction on the matter.

Should this not work for whatever reason, do not worry. We are currently working hard to get more exposure on different fronts. Just keep joining us each week and we will rule the Internet again. ;)