Nine’s viewership numbers from Paris 2024 – more than 18 million across Total TV nationally so far – has meant advertisers are feeling “overwhelmingly positive” about their investment, according to Nine’s chief sales officer Michael Stephenson.
Stephenson said that every one of the 20 major partners - sponsors and package holders – as well as the additional 15 partners who made commitments to 9Now are “ecstatic” about the ROI they’re seeing.
“For those that bought those packages, there was guarantees around the audience or impressions that we would be delivering to them, and we have far exceeded anyone's expectations as a result of the overwhelming success of the Games,” he said.
“What’s been so pleasing is the impact that being a part of the Olympic Games broadcast has on their business. Whether it’s NRMA, Woolworths, Harvey Norman, Toyota or other companies – they’re all proud to be part of Nine’s broadcast.”
Nine's premium partnership positions were fully subscribed six months out from the opening ceremony, with the broadcaster offering a total media promotional campaign that stretches from the Winter Youth Olympic Games Gangwon 2024 all the way to the Paralympic Games Closing Ceremony on September 8.
Nine Entertainment recently announced a lift in its advertising revenue for its Paris Olympic and Paralympic coverage to more than $140 million, up from the $130 million before the games started.
From a free-to-air perspective, the first week of the Olympics saw the broadcast television offering reach a national TV audience of 15 million, the highest ever weekly reach for Nine.
Stephenson says that the power of total television – the combination of broadcast TV with live streaming and on-demand - is the way that both marketers and media buyers must be thinking about television into the future.
“The foundation of every schedule should be live broadcast television - it does all of the heavy lifting and it delivers the foundation of reach, which you then build on by adding live streaming and on-demand television through the BVOD apps, whether that’s 9Now, 7plus or 10 Play,” he told AdNews.
“While Netflix is interesting, it's not really interesting if you're an advertiser, because their reach is too small and they don't have a free to air business to be the foundation of any schedule. It’s the same for all of the SVOD platforms - the advertising opportunity on all of them is tiny relative to BVOD and minuscule relative to live broadcast television.
“Free-to-air has a competitive advantage because of the underlying strength of live broadcast television and there's been no greater example than the Olympic Games to prove that. When the Olympics is complete, we'll be going into normal programming and if marketers want to grow their business and get better results from their media buying, then they need to use total television, and they need to use live broadcast as the foundation of that.”
With more than 40 live streams available, 9Now has seen a 17% incremental reach with 2.6 million viewers solely watching the Olympics via the platform.
The first week of the Games saw 9Now record the highest weekly reach against all broadcasters in VOZ history, reaching more than 6 million Australians.
Almost 7.5 million total people were reached nationally in July on 9Now - the highest monthly BVOD reach against commercial broadcasters in VOZ history.
Younger Australians are also tuning in, as the first week of the Olympics saw 9Now attract the highest daily share in VOZ history in the key demographic of people aged 16-39, and a weekly National Total TV Reach for this demographic of over 4.8 million.
Stephenson says when you think about the impact of viewership numbers through the lens of live streaming, it's all about emphasising that its television for today's landscape.
“It looks and feels exactly the same as it always has been, except it's coming through the internet, not through an antenna. It's just the plumbing that is different,” he said.
“In saying that, it does give you so much more - there's interactivity, there's addressable advertising, there's really interesting things that you can do from a creative point of view. Those that compete with us, like YouTube, might have criticised the user experience or the advertising experience over the years, but we've spent so much time doing an enormous amount of work on that.
"It has culminated in these Olympic Games and as a result, the experience for brands and audiences, from an advertising point of view, has been seamless.”
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