Comcast\u2019s\u00a0NBCUniversal has a longstanding bet on the Olympics, but this summer the company threw all of its resources at the Games in a bid to grab more viewership \u2014 especially for its growing streaming platform, Peacock.<\/p>\n
It appears to have paid off so far \u2014 more than 30 million people\u00a0tuned in\u00a0to NBC\u2019s TV and streaming platforms to watch the games, and a record $1.2 billion in advertising revenue was generated.<\/p>\n
NBC executives, having touted the Olympics as a growth driver and differentiator in the increasingly crowded landscape of streaming and live sports, are now looking to extend the benefit beyond the Games and into future live sports.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe completely changed the game plan internally. We ripped up the playbook two years ago,\u201d said Jenny Storms, chief marketing officer of entertainment and sports at NBCUniversal. \u201cIt was very scary at the time to take the institutional knowledge that we had for so long and rip it up and start over. We really started new and fresh in totality, from production to company wide counterparts.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Olympics have long been key to NBCUniversal. Paris marked the 18th Olympic Games broadcast by NBC in the U.S. The company\u00a0renewed\u00a0the rights in 2014, agreeing to pay $7.65 billion for the Games between 2022 and 2032, amounting to more than $1.2 billion for each.<\/p>\n
Just before Paris, efforts had fallen flat. The 2021 Tokyo Olympics and 2022 Beijing Olympics drew the lowest-ever audiences for Summer and Winter Games, respectively.<\/p>\n
Storms noted there were factors at play in those last two Olympic Games that were largely out of NBCUniversal\u2019s control.<\/p>\n
Both of the Games were shrouded by the early stage of the pandemic. Tokyo was postponed by a year, and fans and families weren\u2019t present at either games. The time zone difference from Asia worked against the U.S. broadcast, too.<\/p>\n
NBC microphones sit on the field on July 30 in Marseille, France.<\/span>Brad Smith \/ ISI \/ Getty Images file<\/span><\/p>\n But notably the\u00a0strategy for Peacock\u00a0during those Games appeared to be the biggest misstep. In Tokyo, very few events were available to stream live on Peacock. In Beijing, the live content was there, but fans had trouble finding what they wanted to watch.<\/p>\n \u201cWe made a claim that Peacock would be the home of the Olympics, and we didn\u2019t exactly deliver,\u201d said Mark Lazarus, chairman of NBCUniversal Media Group. \u201cWe were nervous about how much content to put on there, how to program it and how to cross-deliver it [with traditional TV]. And we were rightly told by the fanbase that we didn\u2019t deliver what we said we would.\u201d<\/p>\n Executives across the company have credited Paris as a part of the success of this year\u2019s Olympics, between the eye-catching scenery \u2014 with the Opening Ceremony on the Seine River and beach volleyball played in front of the Eiffel Tower, to name a couple \u2014 and favorable time zone working in NBC\u2019s favor.<\/p>\n The company also began marketing the Olympics much earlier this time around, employing various parts of NBCUniversal to get the word out, from news programs and talk shows, to various forms of advertising, Storms said.<\/p>\n Both Storms and Lazarus also noted the success of airing the Olympic trials in the weeks before the games.<\/p>\n \u201cWe never really pushed hard with the trials before,\u201d Storms said. \u201cBut it was the most streamed trials ever, and it was important to warm America up.\u201d<\/p>\n And then there was the star factor of NBCUniversal\u2019s internal roster.<\/p>\n The company used its own talent more strategically in 2024, executives said. Besides airing promos for content, NBC A-listers were integrated into the events themselves, co-hosting and reporting from the sidelines. Fan favorite Snoop Dogg, a special correspondent for NBC Olympics,\u00a0generated social media buzz\u00a0and drew more eyes to the live events. And, his stand-out presence in Paris helped promote his upcoming role with NBC\u2019s \u201cThe Voice\u201d this fall.<\/p>\n Snoop Dogg at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games on Aug. 9.<\/span>Odd Andersen \/ Getty Images file<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cWe had a great experience with Snoop, we are definitely in the Snoop business with \u2018The Voice,\u2019 and hope to be in the Snoop business in the future,\u201d said Lazarus, adding NBCUniversal doesn\u2019t have a commitment yet with Snoop Dogg for future Olympics.<\/p>\n Other NBC talent attended the Games to promote their projects, too. Mariska Hargitay, who\u2019s played the character Olivia Benson on \u201cLaw & Order: SVU\u201d since 1999, was in Paris promoting the\u00a0show\u2019s 26th\u00a0season. A variety of \u201cSaturday Night Live\u201d cast members were present, including Colin Jost, who covered surfing in Tahiti and had to make an\u00a0early exit\u00a0due to health issues.<\/p>\n Shows from both NBC and Peacock were also promoted at the Games, and Universal\u2019s upcoming film, \u201cWicked,\u201d was highlighted often, with stars Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo appearing on the Opening Ceremony red carpet.<\/p>\n The \u201cWicked\u201d actors also voiced a promotional piece for U.S. gymnastics powerhouse Simone Biles, and an exclusive clip of the film was aired during the \u201cToday\u201d show from Paris. NBC said among moviegoers, \u201d\u2018Wicked\u2019 gained ground across measures during the Olympics, doubling our level of top of mind awareness, and increasing total awareness,\u201d according to polling.<\/p>\n Arguably no NBC property shined brighter during the Olympics than streaming platform, Peacock.<\/p>\n Due in large part to Peacock, 23.5 billion minutes of the Olympics were streamed, up 40% from all prior Summer and Winter Olympics combined, according to a release.<\/p>\n \u201cPeacock delivered in every way that we hadn\u2019t before,\u201d said Lazarus.<\/p>\n Besides having all live coverage, exclusive shows like \u201cGold Zone,\u201d hosted by Scott Hanson of \u201cNFL Red Zone,\u201d gave fans more options for all-day viewing. There were also features built solely for the Olympics, such as an artificial intelligence function featuring daily recaps in the voice of Al Michaels, a longtime voice of marquee NFL games.<\/p>\n Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande attend the red carpet at the Olympic Games Paris 2024 on July 26.<\/span>Matthew Stockman \/ Getty Images file<\/span><\/p>\n An\u00a0estimated\u00a02.8 million consumers signed up for Peacock during the first week of the Summer Games, averaging nearly 400,000 additions daily, according to data provider Antenna. This nearly matched the sign ups driven by Peacock\u2019s exclusive NFL Wild Card game in January, according to Antenna. The game is considered the most streamed live event in history with 27.6 million viewers, according to Nielsen.<\/p>\n While Comcast recently\u00a0reported\u00a0Peacock had 33 million paid customers as of June 30 \u2014 500,000 less than the prior period, and widely attributed to the loss of customers exiting after the Wild Card game \u2014analyst Craig Moffett of MoffettNathanson said it\u2019s worth noting the customers that remained since the Wild Card game.<\/p>\n \u201cI suspect they\u2019ll have the same experience with the Olympics,\u201d Moffett said. \u201cSure, some of those customers will leave but they will probably end up keeping a lot more than not.\u201d<\/p>\n Still, traditional TV made up the bulk of viewership during the Paris Games \u2014 nearly 90% of viewers watched on broadcast and cable channels, Lazarus said. Aided by the more favorable time zone, NBC aired live events on TV and Peacock during the day and rebranded the evening broadcast as \u201cPrimetime in Paris,\u201d replaying big events with sidecar programming and interviews.<\/p>\n The strategy used in Paris will serve as the roadmap for future Olympics \u2014 the Milan Winter Olympics in 2026 and Los Angeles Summer Games in 2028 \u2014 as well as other live sports aired on NBC\u2019s TV networks and Peacock, executives said.<\/p>\n Shortly after the 2024 Olympics comes the new seasons of English Premier League soccer, American college football and National Football League. NBC will also be the rights holder of National Basketball Association games beginning in the 2025-2026 season.<\/p>\n \u201cI think Peacock is getting much more sophisticated, as we\u2019ve seen with the Olympics, in how they can do sports coverage,\u201d said Shirin Malkani, co-chair of the sports industry group at Perkins Coie.<\/p>\n Disclosure: CNBC parent NBCUniversal owns NBC Sports and NBC Olympics. NBC Olympics is the U.S. broadcast rights holder to all Summer and Winter Games through 2032.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n Comcast\u2019s\u00a0NBCUniversal has a longstanding bet on the Olympics, but this summer the company threw all of its resources at the Games in a bid to grab more viewership \u2014 especially for its growing streaming platform, Peacock. It appears to have paid off so far \u2014 more than 30 million people\u00a0tuned in\u00a0to NBC\u2019s TV and streaming […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":8962,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8961","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8961","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8961"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8961\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8962"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8961"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8961"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8961"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}