GetGlue has signed past partnerships with HBO, Fox and Showtime. In February, GetGlue announced that it is seeing 12 million checkins and ratings per month.
The new NBC Universal deal continues the longstanding relationship GetGlue has with the brand and its networks. In December, the hit USA Network series Psych introduced a second screen iOS app that featured tight integration with the GetGlue service. Universal Pictures was actually one of the very first partnerships that GetGlue signed back in February 2010.
In the past year, the GetGlue service has undergone a major transformation. The primary focus of the service used to be to help users discover movies, books and TV shows from across the web. As recommendation engines go, GetGlue is one of the best that I have used. Still, the service had a hard time building traction with users.
That changed last summer with the release of GetGlue for iPhone. Like apps from Miso and Philo, the GetGlue mobile apps let users check in to media content and then share that checkin across their social graph.
Usage of the service exploded after the iPhone app was released -- a trend that has continued with the subsequent Android and iPad app releases.
GetGlue incentivizes users with its deal partnerships but the added social layer of seeing what friends are watching and getting recommendations from the apps themselves also drives repeat usage.