By Sheila Dang
(Reuters) – Because the July opening ceremony for the 2024 Paris Olympics attracts nearer, U.S. broadcaster NBCUniversal is seeing renewed curiosity from main company sponsors within the premier world sporting occasion as followers are anticipated to fill Olympic stadiums for the primary time for the reason that COVID-19 pandemic.
Comcast-owned NBCU mentioned on Tuesday it has bought $1.2 billion in promoting for the Paris video games and is on monitor to attain a brand new gross sales document in Olympic historical past. The corporate paid $7.65 billion to resume its broadcast rights deal by way of 2032, the biggest deal on this planet for the video games.
Advert spending from Worldwide Olympic Committee (IOC) sponsors is at present up 18% from the earlier summer season Olympics in Tokyo that came about in 2021, mentioned Dan Lovinger, president of Olympic and Paralympic gross sales at NBCU, in an interview.
The announcement represents a rebound from earlier years. In current Olympics, IOC sponsors diminished their advert spending with the media firm, in keeping with a former NBCU government and a second individual acquainted with the advert gross sales.
IOC sponsors, which embody main manufacturers like Visa (NYSE:), Toyota (NYSE:) and Procter & Gamble (NYSE:), pay upwards of an estimated $100 million for the precise to make use of the well-known Olympic rings of their advertising and marketing supplies.
The expansion may be attributed to Paris being the primary Olympics to permit all spectators for the reason that pandemic, and with a extra favorable time zone for U.S. audiences after three Olympics in Asia, Lovinger mentioned.
“Only a few properties will help (manufacturers) construct attain and know precisely the place their promoting is operating. That’s the reason the Olympics continues to garner help from main advertisers,” he mentioned.
As viewers, significantly younger folks, more and more eat content material on-line and thru social media, NBCU has taken steps to comply with the shift. It introduced final month that in a summer season Olympics first, each Paris occasion could be accessible on its streaming service Peacock. Advertisers will have the ability to purchase adverts for the primary time utilizing automated expertise, quite than salespeople, and NBCU has additionally inked agreements to submit clips on X and Snapchat.
NBCU’s digital promoting income for Paris has already surpassed any previous Olympics, Lovinger mentioned.
‘GETTING HARDER’
In earlier Olympics as prime IOC sponsors diminished their advert spending, NBCU solid a wider web to promote to manufacturers that weren’t Olympic companions so as to make up the distinction, in keeping with the previous NBCU government and the second supply acquainted with its adverts gross sales.
The previous government mentioned the media firm bought to about three-times as many advertisers to succeed in gross sales targets for Tokyo and the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics, including that the hassle was “getting tougher and tougher.”
In March 2020, NBCU mentioned it bought $1.25 billion in adverts for the Tokyo Summer time Olympics. The media firm restarted the gross sales course of when the video games had been delayed to the next yr as a result of pandemic. NBCU mentioned in mid-2021 that Tokyo was on monitor to exceed the $1.2 billion in adverts bought for the 2016 Rio Summer time Olympics, however declined to say whether or not it will beat the $1.25 billion bought earlier than the Tokyo video games had been postponed.
NBCU has booked $350 million in income from manufacturers promoting for the primary time throughout the Olympics, Lovinger mentioned, including that the expansion within the variety of advertisers supporting the video games is a constructive for the Olympics.
Procter & Gamble was beforehand spending within the tens of thousands and thousands of {dollars} with NBCU for the Olympics, however minimize its spending by about 50% over time, the previous NBCU government mentioned.
NBCU declined to touch upon P&G spending. P&G mentioned its manufacturers can have tv commercials throughout the Paris video games.
Chipmaker Intel (NASDAQ:) and tire model Bridgestone, two IOC sponsors, advised Reuters they’ll forgo tv adverts and place their Paris advertising and marketing campaigns on digital platforms.
“The times of huge TV campaigns are behind us,” mentioned Bridgestone’s chief advertising and marketing officer Sara Correa.
Bridgestone filmed a video showcasing the way it makes use of its rubber expertise to assist Paralympic athletes with tires for his or her wheelchairs and rubber soles for operating blades, which it posted on its YouTube, Fb (NASDAQ:) and Instagram accounts.
Intel mentioned it was exploring billboards and so-called out-of-home promoting along with digital and social.
Digital is usually a draw for manufacturers with an eye fixed on reigning in prices. “Absolutely the price of digital is decrease. Digital is less complicated to trace and simpler to measure,” mentioned Martin Sorrell, founding father of promoting companies S4 Capital and WPP (LON:).
Visa mentioned it continued to imagine within the energy of TV for stay sports activities, however added that the “center-of-gravity for followers, particularly comparatively younger followers, is social media,” mentioned Frank Cooper, Visa’s chief advertising and marketing officer.
Toyota mentioned it will promote on TV, together with throughout the opening and shutting ceremonies, whereas working with celebrities and athletes to attach with audiences that aren’t conventional sports activities followers.
“It is an attention-grabbing manner of increasing a standard Olympic advertising and marketing base and join with folks by way of influencers,” mentioned Dedra DeLilli, Toyota’s head of sponsorships.