Reaching the Olympics is any athlete’s dream. Just qualifying for the Games is a significant achievement, with the potential to seize not just Olympic gold and a place in history books, but also lucrative sponsorship opportunities. Now influencers are getting in on the action with a first-of-its-kind initiative from NBCUniversal in partnership with Meta, Overtime, Snapchat, TikTok and YouTube.
NBCU announced its “Paris Creator Collective“ this spring, a multi-platform social creator program that will give 27 creators unprecedented on-the-ground access in Paris to tell the stories of the Olympic Games through their eyes. Advertising partners have been working with NBCUniversal to create sponsored posts with select creators while they are in Paris to — hopefully — reach the next generation of fans.
READ MORE: NBCUniversal to Send 27 Creators to Olympic Games Paris 2024 in Partnership With Meta, Overtime, Snapchat, Tiktok and YouTube (NBCU)
The Games, kicking off on July 26 with a glitzy opening ceremony along the Seine river, have traditionally been the territory of the International Olympic Committee and its media partners. NBCU’s unusual move signals that some of that gatekeeping might be a thing of the past when it comes to harnessing the might of creators to reach previously untapped audiences.
“In the past, the idea of NBC giving media credentials to TikTokers and YouTubers would have been unthinkable,” Les Carpenter writes at Business Insider. “The network is early in a $7.6 billion deal for the American rights to broadcast the Olympics through 2032 and has protected its investment with vigilance, constantly pushing viewers toward its telecasts.”
NBCU, says Carpenter, “is scrambling to adapt to an evolving media world, adding multiple streaming options for the Paris Games on Peacock in addition to a traditional prime-time telecast. Still, the network’s executives have realized that streaming won’t be enough to get younger viewers.”
Enlisting creators, with their millions of highly engaged fans, is a savvy move in a media ecosystem where creators are increasingly proving their power to brands, securing bigger deals and more creative control than ever before.
IOC president Thomas Bach anticipates a surge of social media activity in Paris. He said Olympic organizers estimate that there will be more than 500 million generated during this summer’s Olympics “and that looking at each one for just one second would take a person 16 years without stopping.”
READ MORE: More people plan to watch the Olympics on social media than on TV this year as influencers are set to dominate the games (Business Insider)
Deadline’s Max Goldbart and Jesse Whittock report on the data, which found that a nearly equal share of US consumers planning to watch the Olympics will do so via streaming platforms (67%) versus broadcast (66%), with more than three-quarters (76%) saying they have more access to content away from the traditional TV screen compared with the last Summer Games in 2021.
Eighty percent of viewers plan to engage with the sport on social media platforms, with YouTube (81%) top, followed by Instagram (75%), Facebook (68%), and TikTok (58%).
“UTA sees this as a significant opportunity to partner with creators who dominate those platforms,” Goldbart and Whittock note. “Olympics content from celebrities, influencers and digital creators will be consumed by three-quarters (75%) of viewers in the US, the research predicts.”
UTA will have roughly 20 clients at the Games, and has planned a broad range of activations for each of them, as detailed by Deadline:
“Podcast megastar Alex Cooper will host a series of Watch With Alex Cooper shows on Peacock during live events such as women’s soccer, gymnastics and swimming from a studio at the International Broadcast Center in the Olympic Village.
An interview with [Simone] Biles will release on her Call Her Daddy podcast and she will be seen on NBC primetime and on The Today Show in the mornings.
“UTA sees this as a chance for her to super-serve her existing fanbase and be introduced to new ones through broadcast TV. The same applies to the likes of YouTube and Twitch streamers Kai Cenat and Duke Dennis, who will be capturing content for Snapchat alongside the likes Olympic gymnast Livvy Dunne, who has a social media following of more than 10 million, and Too Hot to Handle reality star Harry Jowsey.”
That’s just a taste of the action. Clearly, this year’s Olympic Games represent a previously untapped opportunity to engage fans in more places than ever, but this is only the start of what will undoubtedly become a major new media trend for years to come.
Creators continue to demonstrate their value not just to brands, but to traditional media companies looking to maintain their dominance.
The gates are finally opening, and there’s plenty of room for everyone.
