For all the fire that is being generated in Twitter over the tape-delay stuff, NBC executives couldn’t be more ecstatic in London.
Ratings for the Olympics have been huge. So big in fact, NBC Universal CEO Steve Burke told analysts the network, which projected nearly $200 million in losses, may break even on the Games.
I had a chance to talk yesterday to Alan Wurtzel, NBC research president.
The basic question: Why are the numbers so big when the network anticipated as much as a 20 percent decrease from Beijing, which had live coverage in primetime in 2008?
Here’s a link to the piece I did today in the Chicago Tribune.
Here’s Wurtzel:
Women and children first:
There are a couple of factors (for the high ratings). No. 1, it’s women (accounting for 17.5 viewers per night, half of the audience). And it’s young women. There’s been a big increase in kids 6-12 and teenagers 12-17.
They grew up as digital babies. By putting the games on all these digital platforms, and have it be combined with social media, which the kids do every day, it has made the Olympics an incredibly relevant event. To be honest, that wasn’t the case that long ago.
Essentially, we’re cultivating the next generation of Olympic viewers.
On live streaming of events at NBCOlympics.com:
We know the people who are watching the streaming are more likely to watch in primetime. Some of them want to see the movie again. Some of them want to hear the comments and analysis. In an interesting way, streaming has served as a barker. They watch and tell their friends, ‘I can’t believe what I just saw.’ Basically, it’s 1 + 1 = 3.
On the ratings validating NBC’s primetime strategy:
Approximately 50 million Americans attended sporting events in the last six months. In five days, 158 Americans watched the Olympics on NBC. That’s says something.
What the primetime show tells us is what the audience wants. We try to give insights into sports they don’t know about. During the men’s relay, the analyst talked about the strategy involved. That was all planned. The audience love the idea of somebody putting it into context.
It’s about sports, but it is so much more than sports. Over 17 days, so many people who never engaged in sports are mesmerized by it.