Cash Investigation: Does the show generate more engagement on social networks when it is broadcast online or on TV?

For the first time since its creation, Cash Investigation put online on January 28 the program “Nos Très Chères Banques”, a program essentially devoted to banking incident fees, before airing it on television, a week later, again on France 2.

Although the show has generated a large number of reactions on Twitter and articles before and after its broadcast for years, we decided to study the mechanics of this special edition, which gave Internet users the opportunity to watch the show in its entirety before viewers of France 2.

Cash Investigation broadcast online before being broadcast on TV: on Twitter, the TV show remains the main catalyst for commitments on the show

According to the graph above, the launch of the show exclusively on the france.tv site a week before it was broadcast on TV had little impact on the tweets or RTs generated on Twitter on the 28th and the day after the broadcast on January 29, 2021.

On the other hand, the peak concerning this program of Cash Investigation corresponds again to the day it was broadcast on TV on February 4, 2021 with more than 8,000 tweets and RTs on the subject. The day after the broadcast, more than 1500 tweets and RTs were recorded, 3 times more than the day after it was posted online.

Cash Investigation broadcast online before being broadcast on TV: the replay of the show generated almost as many shares and interactions during its online and TV broadcasts

On Facebook, it is mainly the official pages of the program Cash Investigation, of Elise Lucet but also of France 2 that will have generated engagement when sharing the replay of the show.

As we can see on the graph above, the shares, on the day the replay went live, generated a lower total number of interactions (reactions, shares, comments) certainly lower, but quite close to the interactions generated on the day the replay was broadcast on television.

To go further, we analyzed the comments published under the Cash Investigation Facebook post that generated the most interactions. It is clear that the vast majority of the comments published concern a debate between pro and anti-Elise Lucet, and more generally, journalists.

The most liked comment, which got 155 likes, points directly to the fiscal advantages of journalists. “Look, Élise has nothing to worry about, she gets the hang of bank fees. Why not talk about the tax benefits of journalists.”

In short, the broadcast of the program Cash Investigation remains the main catalyst for interactions on Twitter, in the press but also on Facebook. As for the replay of the show, the sharing of it generated more or less the same number of interactions when it was put online on January 28, 2021 and when it was broadcast on TV on February 04, 2021.