Tampa Bay Buccaneers Tight End Rob Gronkowski (87) celebrates after getting a first-quarter touchdown during Super Bowl LV between Kansas City Chiefs and Tampa Bay Buccaneers on Feb. 7, 2021, at Raymond James Stadium of Tampa, Florida.
Cliff Welch | Sportswire Icon | Getty Images
Amazon has its eyes set on being more than just a website to stock up on phone chargers and paper towels and stream the latest episode of “The Wonderful Mrs. Maisel”.
Amazon is in talks with the National Football League to hold Thursday night games exclusively from 2023, CNBC reported Thursday. As part of the deal, Amazon would be responsible for production costs and the games would continue to be broadcast on local television in the local markets of each of the teams playing.
Winning exclusive streaming rights would mark Amazon’s most aggressive push into sports content. It also has the potential to add even more value to Amazon’s Prime Video platform, while serving as an added benefit to its Prime subscription program, which now has more than 150 million paid members across the board. world.
For Amazon, its streaming video service has always served a greater purpose than just being a tool to compete against rivals like Netflix and Hulu.
Prime Video is part of Amazon’s long-flown “investment steering wheel” of compelling consumer offerings. The idea is that Prime Video attracts more people to be part of its Prime subscription service, which costs $ 119 a year, leading to more interaction and more shopping on the site.
Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos succinctly explained why Prime Video is a good business model for the company in a 2016 interview with Recode: “From a business POV to us, we manage to monetize this content in an unusual way. When we win a Golden Globe, it helps us sell more shoes. “
Sports content and NFL games, in particular, reinforce this value proposition for existing and aspiring Prime subscribers. Sports content could also attract the rapid acceleration of the number of cord cutters away from other services.
The company already has a service called Amazon Channels, which allows customers to pick and choose the channels they want to subscribe to, such as Starz and HBO, without having to sign up for a package of programs or contract.
Reaching an agreement with the NFL could make the Amazon Channels service even more engaging by helping it stand out from similar offerings that don’t offer sports.
In the longer term, if Amazon manages to bring NFL games exclusively, which would mean taking them away from traditional television, it could serve as a winning field for advertisers. Amazon has a wealth of consumer data, from user interactions with devices linked to its vast Alexa ecosystem to the millions of purchases on its e-commerce site.
Amazon not only has visibility into what buyers are looking for and buying, but also what ads they click on and whether they bought an item after seeing it. Therefore, you can assure the brands that their ads will be presented to the right people.
Advertising has quickly become a key profit engine for Amazon’s global business. According to a Cowen survey released in January, Amazon is expected to be the top shareholder among the dominant digital ad companies in 2021 and 2022, with advertising revenue rising to $ 85.2 billion in 2026 from $ 26,100. million projected in 2021.