In early 2014, renowned director Steven Soderbergh announced he was coming out of retirement to helm a series for Cinemax called The Knick. Set in the early 1900s, the series follows mad genius Dr. Thackery, played by Clive Owen, as the head doctor at a downtown New York hospital called The Knickerbocker. The show plays on themes of modernization and innovation, which called for a Twitter strategy that showcased the same.
Success on Twitter meant inspiring curiosity, driving tune-in and stimulating conversation/engagement all while growing the @AtTheKnick fan base. To accomplish this feat, The Knick shared eye-catching and thought-provoking social media content focused on real facts from the era and topics like race relations and women's rights.
Soon after the official Twitter handle launched, #TheKnick became the communications wrapper for all digital and social media content coming from the show. It allowed opportunities to present the shocking truths and complex characters which make The Knick an enticing world to visit. Real facts and images provided by historical archivist, Ken Burns were also shared to further draw people into this world.
Within the first three months, @AtTheKnick gained 14K Twitter followers and has grown to 17K in the months following. During this time The New York Times, Time, The Wall Street Journal, The Huffington Post, Rolling Stone, The New Yorker, EW, Vanity Fair and other top media outlets helped put the show on the social map by sharing weekly recaps and glowing reviews of The Knick. Social mentions from influential viewers such as Jordin Sparks, Julianne Moore, Dane Cook, Jon Favreau, Michael Ausiello, Dr. Drew and Josh Groban also bolstered conversation.
In order to break through the crowded television landscape, tapping into the right audience became key for gaining awareness for The Knick. Bypassing "traditional" online influencers, The Knick instead targeted those who showed an interest in things like 1900s medicine, historical New York and gore/horror. An influencer kit was sent to each individual influencer to lure them into the world of The Knick and entice them to share their new wares on Twitter.
While The Knick was in-season, the Twitter strategy shifted to content that would "surprise and delight" fans, while also providing them rich, real-world facts from the 1900s. The Cinemax social team worked with The Knick's on-set archivist and historian, Ken Burns who curated the best images from The Burns Archive for the team to live-tweet during new episodes. The images used were astonishing, sometimes shocking and aimed at sparking conversation and invoking an emotional response. The most widely shared images and GIFs were those that explicitly showed the real-life gore, blood and guts of an operation or procedure reenacted on The Knick.
Live-tweeting real facts during the episodes became a weekly ritual where fans could watch and learn along with The Knick. Partnerships with key influencers like New York historical podcasters The Bowery Boys sprang from these live-tweeting sessions and blossomed throughout the season. Tweeting along with @AtTheKnick Friday nights was a one-stop shop for fans to learn about what inspired certain scenes in the show while also satiating their need for the real facts from not just The Burns Archive, but a plethora of knowledgeable partners.
To piggyback on the success of the live-tweeting, the social team enlisted the writers and creators of the series to host a live Twitter Q&A immediately following the Season 1 finale. Jack Amiel and Michael Begler shared interesting tidbits from the show and titillating facts about medicine in the 1900s. Fans ate it up, and flooded The Knick's streams with questions during the East Coast and West Coast airings.
By season's end, the official show handle, @AtTheKnick, drove a higher percentage of program buzz than the owned handles for recent HBO dramas like @TrueBloodHBO and @TheLeftoversHBO. During the season, the show averaged 1.5K tweets per episode, making The Knick Cinemax's second most social original series and beating out many HBO Comedies and some dramas in terms of online buzz.
Within the first three months, @AtTheKnick gained 14K Twitter followers and has grown to 17K in the months following. During this time The New York Times, Time, The Wall Street Journal, The Huffington Post, Rolling Stone, The New Yorker, EW, Vanity Fair and other top media outlets helped put the show on the social map by sharing weekly recaps and glowing reviews of The Knick. Social mentions from top influencers such as Jordin Sparks, Julianne Moore, Dane Cook, Jon Favreau, Michael Ausiello, Dr. Drew and Josh Groban also bolstered conversation.