Young people are spending more time on social networks. Our aim was to exploit this behavior and reach this audience. #SkyRec is a simple way of achieving this objective. SkyRec uses the hashtag (something users already know and use normally), but now it offers a function that is relevant and useful to them: recording TV programs. How does it work? Every day Sky tweets the highlights of its programming. If the user wants to watch a program that was tweeted, he just needs to retweet with the hashtag #skyrec and the program will be recorded automatically at his home.

The #SKYREC was created in order to achieve a greater customer interaction via SKY Twitter and eventually it turned into a new service of program recording schedule. To do this we used an existing technology (checked the Twitter API) to locate the hashtag and the program code, and integrated it with the SKY internal systems that activate the recording through satellite. The technology is in beta, with the public release version available on April 25th. The interaction can happen anywhere on the planet, provided the user has an active Twitter account and is linked to his SKY TV subscription.

This innovation was designed exclusively for SKY TV customers and ended up creating a new service for them. It also gave a new meaning to SKY Twitter, making it more relevant and useful. The recording process works as follows:

1. SKY tweets with the hashtag #skyrec and the program on Twitter.

2. There is a servicethat checks, at a predetermined time, the Twitter API and locates the retweets from users interested in recording a certain program. Then, it looks into its database whether the user is valid and if the requested program is available.

3. The system sends the recording request to the satellite queue.

4. The user receives a notification via Direct Message stating the success or failure of the schedule.

The entire available infrastructure is hosted at the client’s. It was developed at .NET 4.0 with SQLServer database. The technology team involved in the project development consisted of 6 people, including technology managers, developers and infrastructure team.

This is the first step to start integrating social networks with SKY TV in a relevant and useful way. Our intention is to create products and services that can improve the TV experience nowadays. It’s the first integration with Twitter that allows transforming it into a "REC" button. It is a way to reuse APIs already established in the market as services, besides turning every retweet into spontaneous media for the brand.

In the first month, we increased the number of followers on Twitter by 20% and created a new habit for many of our clients. Until now, all retweets paid off $300K in earned media.