Universal McCann has released its latest Trendmarker report, which is part of series intended to highlight and discuss a trend from a communications perspective. This time around, the research covers ‘The Entertainment Conversation’.

In short, this means looking more closely at those ‘watercooler’ conversations about the latest blockbuster or game, that once stayed within the confines of a circle of four people but now can be extended onto forums, blogs and social networks. It’s not just about new technology, but more about how fans discussing the merits or flaws of something can contribute to the success of films, games, books or albums.

The entertainment industry, like many other businesses and brands, has been slow to engage online and is now well behind consumer uptake in terms of communicating through this medium. It knows it needs to be doing it, but hasn’t quite grasped that it can’t be restricted to the ‘launch period’ alone.

One of the key outcomes of the report is the need for longer-term relationship building, as movie studios, games developers or record labels currently dip in and out of the social media landscape but rarely remain. As such we see reams of abandoned Facebook fan pages, Twitter streams with no updates and blogs stripped of content.

In comparison, for the entertainment sector, nearly 60% of active internet users have left an opinion about a new game, film or book and nearly a third of consumers have read such comments. A further 55% of active internet users have sought product and brand info based on other people’s feedback via social networks and 51% on blogs. People talk, and people listen.

Like so many other pieces of research we’ve seen in the past few years, this shows that fans once kept behind the fences at premieres, or isolated online, have now been given the power they crave. As the report says: ‘fans will take the story forward by creating their own scenarios, analyse the storylines to check for inconsistencies and generally obsess about the franchise.’

The entertainment sector needs to realise that it’s now easier than ever to find out what people are saying about a game and to truly build profitable relationshipswith new customers. Reaching out can’t just be a flash in the pan – it requires something more consistent.