With host Samuel L. Jackson and performers Nicki Minaj, Usher and Chris Brown, the July 2012 BET AWARDS was “Too Big To Miss.” And with the launch of BET’s first ever BET AWARDS App, viewers and fans literally (and virtually) missed, well—nothing.

BET Networks set a new bar for coviewing apps in 2011 with its award-winning 106 & PARK App for Android, so we recognized our challenges with this project from the jump. Not only were we going to have to deliver a product that provided the viewers of a high profile show with a more innovative and engaging mobile application experience than ever before, but we were also going to have to provide additional servers to support the app’s extensive interactive functionalities and expected high user participation. So, what does a big-name awards show app need? A big-time mobile app developer that can deliver. And oh did we deliver.

Including highlights from the impressive 12-year history of one of the most watched awards shows on television proved to be beneficial in gaining fan participation weeks before the show aired, which we achieved through our unique media gallery timeline feature. The interactive timeline allows users to easily navigate their way through an entire historical archive of high-quality photos and videos from previous awards shows by simply panning left and right. This feature also transitioned users to the live show by visually organizing past show performances alongside the current and future content as it was fed into the timeline.

We drove massive fan participation prior to the live broadcast through our performer prediction and gamified voting features. BET told us early on that they wanted to create two fun, gamelike experiences in the app – a fantasy game to predict the order of the performers, and a gamified voting experience where fans would be rewarded with more votes for their favorite artists the better they fared at the game. BET ultimately named the first feature The Lineup, and we designed a fun drag-and-drop experience that kept the users deeply engaged – over 150,000 lineups were created in just over 2 weeks. By selecting and dragging a performer’s image into one of the available performer lineup slots, users were able to lock in their lineup selection (and unlock to change at any time prior to the show); compare their selections to that of BET Stars, Twitter followers and Facebook friends; and then share their lineup for a chance to win autographed merchandise, tickets to a BET sponsored show and more.

The second feature evolved into our awesomely interactive hockey shuffle game, which allows the user to simply select which performer or group they want to vote for and then use their finger to slide the puck-shaped image toward the goal, which glides back and forth across the screen. Every goal made counts as a vote for the user’s favorite artist! Who knew voting could be so fun!

And it doesn’t end there. As the show went on, users were presented with real-time Lineup updates, supporting content, trivia, surveys and more., etc, ensuring that users remained tuned in and engaged from pre-show until the last award was handed out.

Our team was also challenged with enhancing the Twitter experience to top the 2011 show’s hashtag #BETAWARDS remarkable 21,000 tweets-per-minute. Luckily, we happen to be legitimate real-time experts, so we developed a Twitter map that aggregated Tweets from fans and stars alike into a map view of the US so that users could see where Tweets geographically originated. Users could tap on a Tweet to transition into a list view (which is visually rich and branded with the BET AWARDS show theme and colors), zoom in on specific regions of the country displaying the number of Tweets in that area, track down their specific Tweet, hone in on the Tweets directly from the BET stars, artists or hosts (which were more prominent on the map), and much more. Not only is this a super awesome way for followers to track Tweets, but it also allows us to instantly see the trends and participation level in each region.