By Krystal Scanlon • October 25, 2024 •
The long-standing partnership between X and the NFL is about to expand once again.
By the end of the year, the professional football league will have an even bigger presence on the social network with the launch of the “NFL Portal,” according to an executive with knowledge of the plan.
Details are still under wraps, but CEO Linda Yaccarino revealed the news on a call yesterday (Oct. 24) with both current and prospective clients, said the exec.
She was joined by X’s new global head of marketing Angela Zepeda, head of Americas Monique Pintarelli and global head of strategic partnerships Amy Elkins, who all touted the portal as the “premier second screen experience” that offers everything from scores and standings to schedules and videos from the games. Naturally, posts from players, teams and NFL insiders will round out the mix.
All of this content will be accessible through the dedicated sports tab for users, who will also be able to access it through the explore tab or search for it, later this year.
This extension builds on X’s current content partnership with the NFL, which had been renewed with a new multi-year agreement in April. But deals like this between the platform and the league stretch back even further — to 2013, in fact.
Given the NFL’s massive popularity in the U.S. and its strong presence on X, the expanded partnership seems like a no-brainer — giving the platform more content to hook users and attract advertisers back into the fold. Meanwhile, the NFL benefits from even more exposure on the platform.
On the call, Yaccarino and her team emphasized just how mutually beneficial this partnership, backing it up with a handful of carefully selected stats.
According to the exec, listeners were told that there have been around 272 billion sports-related impressions on X over the past 12 months, which is 5% more than last year. The ubiquity of the NFL on X has meant that conversation about the league accounts for nearly 40% of all sports content on the platform. Video is a big driver of this, with one out of every three sports-related videos watched on X being about the NFL. The first few weeks of the new season have brought this all into sharp focus. X saw 19% more NFL-related posts and 29% more views for NFL-related videos compared to the same period last year.
Whether Yaccarino and her team can replicate deals on this scale again is hard to say. Content deals are tough for any platform — especially one owned by Elon Musk. His divisive reputation may complicate things for sports content owners who might struggle to reconcile his values with their own. Still, this type of content is essential for any potential turnaround story. After all, ad dollars follow attention — and few things command more of it than sports.
“One of the most cathartic uses of X is during live sports, especially if your favorite team is winning big and you want to relish in the smack talk, or if your team is getting destroyed and you want to see which coaches the fans most want to see get fired,” said eMarketer principal analyst Ross Benes.
That connection with the real-time, emotional nature of sports has come up repeatedly in X’s recent meetings and pitches to marketers. There’s a renewed focus on sports — and news, for that matter — as Yaccarino works to turn around the platform’s struggling ads business. Put another way, the NFL and the new sports tab are part of a bigger play.
The platform is exclusively showing a documentary series called “The Program: Bama” — six episodes, each 22 minutes long — as well as four highlight clips per episode, all about the Alabama Crimson Tide football team.
From this month, X is also exclusively showing another six-episode series (30 minutes each, along with 24 highlights and clips) called “The Offseason,” which features 11 national women’s soccer league players in one house during the offseason.
The platform has also taken to showing live games, real-time highlights and exclusive content of the Women’s National Basketball Association league.
Added to that, X has also introduced the Big3 — the three-on-three pro basketball league — to the platform, by featuring livestreams, video-on-demand and exclusive content, which has been available to access both in the U.S. and internationally.
And in January 2025, X will also showcase a new 12-episode vodcast series (30 to 60 minutes each in length), along with 120 short-form videos (10 per episode) of American former tennis player Serena Williams.
https://digiday.com/?p=558831
