NBC Olympics And Twitter Team Up For Bigger Audiences, More Diverse Content In Expanded Partnership

In 2019, NBC Olympics and Twitter
TWTR
announced a partnership ahead of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics that would see the former produce a 20-minute daily studio show live from Tokyo, among other, more bite-sized content, to stream exclusively on the social media platform.

Now, the two media companies have announced an expanded content partnership that will include not only the postponed Tokyo Olympics in 2021 but the Beijing Winter Olympics in 2022.

In addition to the daily studio show, NBC Olympics and Twitter will work together on content such as a daily Twitter poll in which fans decide which athlete, sport or moment they’d like to see in a live look-in to NBC’s Primetime or Primetime Plus broadcasts each night and real-time video highlights throughout each competition day.

NBC Olympics worked closely with Twitter in past Games, streaming behind-the-scenes photos and interviews with athletes during the 2018 Pyeongchang Olympics. But this partnership would see both the scope and the amount of content expand.

A heavy emphasis will be placed on the athletes and the goings-on in the host city of Tokyo in the daily live studio show. Many of the most memorable and engaging moments of each day of competition will be published on Twitter as they happen, including some Spanish-language clips. Highlights will include medal-winning performances and podium ceremonies, as well as the Opening and Closing Ceremonies.

The agreement also includes pregame content. Starting in June 2021, NBC Olympics will provide Twitter with real-time highlights, including the U.S. Olympic Team Trials, until the Tokyo Opening Ceremony on July 23, 2021. Similar content will be made available for the Beijing Games.

“Few events bring to the world together like the Olympics and we truly anticipate that both the upcoming Summer Games and Winter Games will be massive global celebrations like no other,” says Twitter head of sports partnerships TJ Adeshola. “We can’t wait to join forces with a fantastic content partner like NBC Olympics to pair real-time Twitter conversation with premium sports action to give fans a unique real-time Olympics experience they won’t find anywhere else.”

The benefit for both sides is clear. NBC Olympics has the bandwidth to create more content hours than could possibly air on the network, and with television viewers falling off (in 2018, the NBC audience hovered around 19.9 million, the smallest since 1992), it needs to find a new way to attract eyeballs. Twitter, on the other hand, is virtually unlimited in how much content it can provide users, which now number 330 million active monthly.

“Extending our now multi-Games relationship with Twitter to Tokyo for the Summer Games in 2021 and Winter Games in 2022 from Beijing will again put NBC Olympics’ coverage in front of the vast and very active Twitter audience with great Olympic moments, great Olympic programming and a nightly peek into our primetime broadcast for those not yet in front of their televisions,” said NBC Olympics president Gary Zenkel. “This agreement also allows us to extend the reach of our Olympic advertisers to those audiences that view the content we have custom produced for Twitter.”

All Olympics exclusive content will live on the @NBCOlympics handle, sold as Twitter in-stream sponsorships by NBC Olympics.