Twitter Buys Bluefin Labs To Develop Social TV Products

Twitter confirmed late Tuesday what several news outlets had already reported: its acquisition of Bluefin Labs, a company that helps brands measure and connect social media conversations with TV shows and commercials.

Twitter says the buy will help the company “create innovative new ad products and consumer experiences” in social TV.

The acquisition follows on the December announcement that Twitter is partnering with Nielsen to create the “Nielsen Twitter TV Rating,” the first industry-standard metric for second-screen activity. In today’s announcement, Twitter says it’ll work with Nielsen “on product development and research to help brands, agencies, and networks fully understand the combined value of Twitter and TV.”

Bluefin’s products haven’t been solely Twitter-based, but in its announcement, the company says that’s where the vast majority of real-time social TV activity happens.

While our products have always included data from multiple social media services, the reality is that Twitter is the platform where the overwhelming majority ­– about 95% – of public real-time engagement with TV happens. So we couldn’t be more excited to join Twitter.

Sunday’s Super Bowl broadcast was evidence of Twitter’s stronghold on social TV, with the vast majority of ads that mentioned social media using hashtags and several brands taking to Twitter to gain attention by “newsjacking” the power outage that occurred during the game.

Bluefin’s core team will continue to be based in Cambridge, Mass. Twitter says it’ll honor existing Bluefin contracts, but won’t add any new clients.