The power of social media continues to loom large over the Middle East’s television industry, especially throughout the Holy Month of Ramadan. We previously delved into the importance of leveraging social media chatter – surrounding the region’s top Ramadan TV programmes – to create agile marketing operations and deliver real-time, meaningful content to consumers. And, when Ramadan overlapped with the FIFA World Cup 2014 finals, this proved to be more relevant than ever.

After all, in this day and age, brands understand that measuring the true impact of Word of Mouth (WOM) is pivotal to the development of their brand messaging and media planning. They know that the region’s most-watched TV shows trigger constant, insightful social media buzz that should be explored, studied and listened to. Lastly, they recognize that the rise of the ‘social living room’ has brought forth a new planning metric – a social currency. That is precisely why brands are turning to Social TV, VivaKi’s real time proprietary tool, to tap into crucial data on today’s most trending TV topics and obtain invaluable consumer analysis.

In fact, thanks to Social TV, we found that, this past week, viewers across the region were struggling to divide their attention between their favourite Ramadan TV series and the World Cup 2014 matches. On days when high profile football matches were taking place, the volume of conversations around Ramadan shows decreased significantly. The programmes most affected by all the World Cup noise on social media were Wifi, Saray Abdeen and Bab el Hara.

Our Social TV findings also revealed that Bab el Hara still ranks number one in the eyes of consumers – many of whom are completely immersed in the story and comment on every move made by the main characters. For example, social media conversations peaked when the protagonist Khairiya first announced her pregnancy or when the beloved character Abu Issam returned to the series.

Viewers are so invested in the show that they no longer simply tackle current plot twists – they also spend time predicting future events or potential cliffhangers. As for Saray Abdeen, another top show, social media users generally discuss the characters’ spoken dialect; they are particularly fascinated by Yousra’s way of speaking.

Khawater remains a popular show amongst viewers and one that has, over the years, become deeply embedded within audiences’ Ramadan traditions. Similarly, from 6-10 June, Ramez Kirsh al Bahr received a large number of mentions (62,148) across social media platforms. This specific Ramadan genre garners strong interest as people typically love seeing celebrities getting pranked as this means they will show their true colors. Wifi is still a Ramadan fan-favorite; this week, the episode featuring Sami Al Jaber was the most talked-about on social media.