As Peacock Turns 2, the Streamer Looks to Fly Even Higher

Laura Molen wasn't a part of the meetings where Peacock officially got its name. However, the NBCUniversal president of advertising and partnerships knows the moniker "rose to the top" during focus groups, as the company searched for the title of its fledgling streamer.. "It seemed obvious to everyone that that was the perfect name," Molen told Adweek. Now, almost two years since its national launch on July 15, 2020, more than 28 million monthly active accounts—and what the company says is 60 million monthly active users—seem to endorse that sentiment. In just its first couple of years, Peacock has grown its audience to include 13 million paid accounts, expanded its content from 20,000 hours to more than 70,000 and recently finished a wildly successful upfront, doubling investment in the service to more than $1 billion. The streamer even brought in CPMs (cost per thousand viewers reached) on par with broadcast TV, according to NBCU CEO Jeff Shell. NBCUniversal Wraps Its ‘Largest’ Upfront Ever, With More Than $7 Billion in Commitments "It's been quite a journey because, from the very beginning, we saw a bright future in AVOD versus SVOD. And we believed in it from the beginning. We said advertisers and consumers were going to be at the heart of everything we did," Molen said. Still, Peacock's subscriber numbers are much smaller than most of its streaming rivals, including Paramount+ (nearly 40 million subscribers), HBO Max (78.6 million HBO and HBO Max subscribers globally; 48.6 million of which are in the U.S.) and Hulu (45.6 million U.S. subscribers). Peacock also significantly trails the other streamers in this year's Emmy race, landing just three nominations on Tuesday. NBCU's president of advertising and partnerships said that Peacock launched "at a time when many were saying, 'Oh, consumers don't want advertising.'" "We've been proving that, with Peacock, the best premium content and advertising can really both live alongside one another and thrive. And so, I think if there was one headline, that—to me—is the proudest accomplishment we have," Molen said. An ad-supported leader Though Peacock has been in the AVOD business since 2020, recently several other major players have thrown their hats into the ad-supported streaming game. Disney+'s ad-supported tier will debut later this year—and Netflix is trying to speed up its entry into the ad world to deliver a lower-priced option before the end of 2022. Molen calls the sudden rush to ad-supported offerings "the highest form of flattery." "We had no idea what would happen between all of the entrants into the AVOD space, whether it was a small and short-form entrant that no longer exists, to bigger companies who started an AVOD now joining in. We see that the CTV market share and supply continue to grow exponentially and that consumers, particularly post-Covid, are really changing their consumption habits," Molen said. "At NBC alone, streaming already represents one-third of our total video consumption. And we predict that within the next couple of years, it'll be more like 50-50 between the linear and digital split." In a letter to clients Wednesday in honor of the anniversary, Peacock president Kelly Campbell and Molen touted the platform's growth, saying, "We’ve accomplished in only two years what we expected would take five." Molen expanded on that statement to Adweek, explaining the milestones that stood out from the platform. "To grow our audience the way that we've grown it in such a short time, to be able to deliver 70,000 hours [of content] and triple the number of original titles that we have to offer was beyond expectations. Also, having the most successful upfront and bringing in hundreds, if not thousands, of advertisers to Peacock in such a short time," Molen said. Partners playing a role NBCU's Streaming Council, a group of advertisers working in tandem to determine the best advertising and sponsorship approaches on the service, played a big role in the streamer's success. "It is a chance for our biggest and most involved clients to lean in and be part of, not just running advertising, but actually help us create the most impactful and powerful commercial experience that exists in the marketplace," Peter Blacker, NBCU’s evp of agency partnerships and head of DEI for advertising, told Adweek about the Streaming Council. "We often refer to it as sort of a mixture of fandom and brandom. We know that brands also have their fans—and they have a certain way they want to get their messaging and their products into unique aspects of a streaming service." Input from the Streaming Council has led to some of the service's most successful innovations, including the pod bounce ad, highlight ads and the digital product placement in-scene ad. Blacker notes that the Streaming Council has become so popular among advertisers that it's already grown by 33%. "This is not just the financial commitment. There's a commitment by these partners to spend time, energy and resources on collaboration with us to continue to evolve and grow in the streaming space—and really lead the entire marketplace," Blacker said. And the commitment has paid off. Peacock's advertising impact has brought a 9% lift in brand familiarity, a 28% lift in brand favorability and a 50% lift in purchase intent to outperform CTV norms, according to Molen. "From a selling perspective, our strategy with Peacock was to bifurcate the products and give marketers more of the premium experience that they wanted, as well as reach, by combining it with our other streaming products. And it really works because marketers could have the best of both worlds. They could have exclusive access to our ad product or best content with Peacock Premier, but they can also expand their reach and buy together all of our streaming products with Peacock AX," Molen said. Looking to the future NBCUniversal and parent company Comcast have refined their Peacock strategy since the platform's debut—and this year shifted their focus from the streamer's free tier to its paid one. In January, Comcast CEO Brian Roberts told investors that Peacock's paid subscribers have “much lower” churn and “significantly higher” engagement. Going forward, more of Peacock's offerings, including the Winter Olympics coverage and a Sunday morning Major League Baseball package, are exclusive to Peacock Premium subscribers, who pay $5 a month for the platform. Molen says the platform's subscriber strategy will continue to evolve. "We're continuing to lean into our consumers, as well as consumers of premium content across the board, to try to understand what they want—so you're gonna see the evolution continue," Molen said. "I think that the strategy that we have right now where there's a free tier with a certain amount of content, more content with advertising and then pay for no ads, will continue to be the way that we move forward because it's working. It's giving us an opportunity to play in all pools." And though other streamers are taking the opportunity to get into the AVOD space, Blacker notes that Peacock's "culture-defining moments" set it apart. "We're literally playing in every single corner of the space, so that just allows the chance to grow our audience that much quicker and faster. And no where was that more obvious than last quarter, when we add what we refer to as our super quad, having the Olympics, the Super Bowl, Marry Me with J.Lo—as well as our runaway hit Bel-Air—all happened within a small window," Blacker said. "Being able to have those culture-defining moments just allows the chance to really aggregate audiences and scale them up very quickly." The streamer will have more of those opportunities for culture-defining moments in the future, as the service—which is ending its content sharing deal with Hulu—will be the exclusive next-day streaming home for Bravo and NBC in September, just a month before the fan-centric event BravoCon. Peacock: What’s Coming in July 2022 Peacock also adds Telemundo's Tplus to the platform in the fall, just in time for the Spanish-language coverage for The World Cup. The service is also the exclusive streaming home for Universal Films after they debut in theaters. In addition, Campbell and Molen's letter to clients mentioned two new, innovative ad formats coming in 2023, which the company isn't yet revealing. So where will Peacock be in another two years? Molen has the answer. "You'll see with our investment in data and technology that we'll create more personalized experiences both for consumers and for marketers. And so the terrific twos will turn into the fabulous fours," Molen said.

Streaming & OTT

As Peacock Turns 2, the Streamer Looks to Fly Even Higher

NBCUniversal's streaming service continues to outperform the company's expectations

Bill Bradley

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