Want To Get Paid To Read Tweets? Work at Hulu

Published by Andrew on August 9, 2009

Hulu, now the number 3 video site on the web that offers free, full-length content like Lost, Arrested Development, The Office, and pretty much any great TV show online, for free. And apparently one of the perks of working at Hulu is being able to sit around and read Twitter all day.

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Twitter as Market Research

The team at Twitter is reading 2,000 tweets a day to gauge user’s opinions on their various advertising commercials. Hulu offers visitors the option of viewing one long commercial (about 2 minutes) before a show starts or to view multiple commercials throughout the show. Hulu also hired a firm to test consumers’ recall of the ads. The aim is to show that online ads are more memorable and worth what Hulu hopes to charge advertisers.

So by using the power of Twitter, Hulu is able to cut the cost of market research tremendously if you look at the huge overhead CBS has with their Las Vegas research center in the MGM Grand.

According to Business Week, every year since 2001, CBS has recruited up to 70,000 Vegas tourists, who sample pilots or upcoming promos for CBS shows in exchange for discounts on Nathan’s Famous hot dogs and CBS kitsch. The testers twist a knob to the right if they like the show, left if they hate it. Over the years, the lab results have helped CBS muster a stream of hits.