MIAMI BEACH — Still not convinced that the National Football League dip, attributed by some to former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick and mediocre on-field play, was momentary?
Ad revenue growth of 10% was seen for telecasts of NFL games through the end of November, according to freshly released data ahead of NATPE Miami from Standard Media Index.
The newly released SMI data show unit rates during NFL matches showing healthy increases — rising 8.6%, specifically.
There was also a 2% increase in paid units during the games, SMI finds.
The power of live sports programming was also seen for the Major League Baseball World Series telecasts. This year’s seven-game series, won by the Washington Nationals, put nearly $149 million in FOX’s catcher’s mitt.
That’s up from about $134 million the last time there were seven games in the championship series, in 2017, when the Houston Astros were the victors.
There were five games in 2018, which pulled in about $119 million, according to data from SMI’s AccuTV ad intelligence platform, powered by Nielsen Ad Intel. The Boston Red Sox won the ’18 Series.
The average paid unit rate for 2019 World Series telecasts was $329,700, slightly lower than the average $336,500 FOX garnered in 2018 (when there were five games), but higher than 2017’s average of $289,900.
“The NFL and World Series results are a testament to the growing importance of live sports,” said SMI CEO James Fennessy. “The NFL telecasts account for 17% of season-to-date revenue across all programming on major linear channels, and 70% of FOX’s ad revenue during the current broadcast year.”
FOX’s broadcasts of NFL games scored the largest volume of revenue, and NBC’s average paid unit rate was the highest, among the four networks airing the games.
[This information was provided incorrectly by SMI and was updated at 1pm Eastern.]
NBC enjoyed a 4.7% paid unit lift over results for the same period in 2018. FOX’s paid unit rates for NFL games were up 13.6%; CBS’s rose 7.4% and ESPN’s increased 6.0%.
SMI’s season-to-date NFL numbers include the first three months of the football season, September, October and November 2019.
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