Check YouTube to Predict Movie Ratings, says Reports

How can you confidently say if a movie will be a hit? Well, you can sit and wait for ticket sales data, or maybe wait for the official reviews and ratings. But there’s an easier way, says Google. Just check out its YouTube searches. According to the company’s new white paper, blockbusters that are killing it at the box office tend to be searched like crazy on the video streaming site.

Well, put it on yourself and confess that you ‘Youtube’ the movie trailers as soon as it is announced. Isn’t it? All of us do.

Hence, this report actually makes sense. There’s usually a flurry of content surrounding releases, including snippets or previews, marketing clips and interviews with the stars. And, reports Google, viewers are taking full advantage of that. Apparently searches done on the streaming site are pretty good indicators of how well a movie will do, as early as four weeks before its release, which is much more accurate than standard search engine queries.

[pullquote]For movie studios, this can reveal valuable data, like which actors or scenes are searched the most, how often a title is searched and other queries.[/pullquote]

The study also points to a growing phenomenon on the audience side. It suggests that people are more likely to go see a particular film after they have researched the heck out of it. And you know what that means — as an information seeking, video-obsessed, movie-watching culture, we really need to be vigilant about spoilers. Because again, all of us hate spoilers!

Photo Source: Thomas Van De Weerd, The Inspiration Room