Coverage of the Rio 2016 Olympic Games will be shown on video messaging application Snapchat after the signing of an unprecedented deal with American rightsholders NBC. But Snapchat “really effectively reaches a very important demographic in the United States, and is very important to our efforts to assemble the large, massive audience that will show up to watch the Olympic Games”. Snapchat isn’t paying for access.
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Los Angeles has also partnered with Snapchat in its bid for the 2024 Olympics and Paralympics to offer local citizens in select neighbourhoods special geofilters which will allow them to decorate their photo and video snaps with their newly-launched bid logo.
The report on the deal also included information on how NBC will be compensated for sharing its content, as it will not be charging Snapchat for video rights. He’s not looking to livestream games anywhere besides NBC, despite social media platforms keen on such deals.
“Through this partnership with NBC Olympics, we’re able give our Snapchat community the opportunity to dive in and experience the world’s largest sporting event right on their phones”, said Ben Schwerin, director of partnerships at Snapchat.
NBC is in talks with both Facebook and Twitter to strike similar deals, an NBC spokesperson told Re/code.
But they watch less and less traditional TV. The content will be featured on the app’s list of Discover channels, which now hosts content from other multimedia companies like BuzzFeed and ESPN. “We know Snapchatters will love being a part of the Live Story action and learning more about the Games while browsing the Discover channel”.
Users submit content for stories. Snapchat has now 7 billion video clips every day viewed by its users.
Snapchat presently has partnerships with Major League Baseball and the NFL, which allow it to stream exclusive behind-the-scenes video rather than game footage.
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It’s a youth-audience grab for NBC, whose parent Comcast has been investing in BuzzFeed (most recently a $200M round that spurred ideas for an Olympics deal). The media company’s team met with the sports department and considered how to make the Olympics more social.
