Smart Screen Exclusive
Olympics-Related Search Spikes on Google Reveal Symbiotic Relationship with First, Second Screens
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By Lyndsey Schaefer
A post by Google on its online blog this week showed that the 2012 Summer Olympics have indeed proven to be a shining example of the relationship between the first screen and second screen.
Google said that viewers of the Olympics regularly participate across multiple platforms such as smartphone, tablets and computers while simultaneously watching the events on TV.
According to Dai Pham and Adam Grunewald, Google Mobile Ads Marketing, who authored the posting, the London games are clearly “the first multiscreen Olympics.” They highlighted the opening ceremony of the Olympics, where viewers used their second screens to find out more information about performers appearing on the first screen. For example, Google found a jump in searches for Paul McCartney during his performance of “Hey Jude.”
The timing of the surges in online searches also coincided with respective time zones, Google said. In the U.S., spikes in searches for McCartney hit during the East Coast and Pacific time-delayed repeat of the ceremony. The Google posting also revealed that the spike in searches also carried over to the athletic competition. The posting said, “… as users watch TV, or watch their laptops at work, they’re searching for information about athletes, sports, events and records on their tablets and smartphones. In fact, at some moments during the Games, there have been more searches performed on tablets and smartphones than on computers.”
Globally, the mobile search volume in Europe was unsurprisingly strong. According to Google, one-third or more of Olympics-related searches in Europe were done with a tablet or smartphone. In the UK, the percentage of Olympics searches on mobile devices reached 46 percent. The statistics also showed that Japan led the mobile search spike with 55 percent. Australia reached 45 percent of such searches on mobile devices, while South Korea saw 36 percent search with mobile technology, the posting said.
It will be interesting to see how the second screen continues to compliment the first screen as the Olympics come to a close.
