ESPN’s Nielsen Results Show Streaming, Out-of-Home Boost Millennial Audience
Story Highlights
Comprehensive results from ESPN’s first seven weeks of Nielsen Total Live Audience are in, and the data shows that streaming and out-of-home (OOH) are contributing significant incremental audience. Specifically among Millennials (Persons 18-34), ESPN saw a 23% increase in Total Day and a 28% increase in Prime Time over ESPN’s traditional viewership. As a result, ESPN saw 4% and 13% year-over-year growth in Total Day and Prime Time viewing overall, respectively, among Millennials during that time period.
Additionally, Millennials drive nearly half of all ESPN streaming (46%), while females specifically make up a sizable 34% of all Millennial OOH viewing. Furthermore, Total Live Audience among Millennial females increases by more than 12% with the inclusion of OOH measurement.
“These early findings from Nielsen tell us that Total Live Audience is the only meaningful way to understand sports consumption, including key insights into our Millennial viewers,” says Cary Meyers, SVP of Fan and Media Intelligence, ESPN. “We will continue to mine this data to not only inform us on how best to serve fans with our content, but also to guide advertisers on how best to optimize their brand on our platform with specific audiences.”
From Sept. 25 through Nov. 12, 2017, the inclusion of streaming and OOH added 14% more audience overall to ESPN’s traditional viewership across both Total Day and Prime Time. Other lifts over traditional audiences from streaming and OOH include:
· Among Adults 25-54, C3 ratings received a substantial 18% increase by including streaming and OOH.
· ESPN’s college football, Monday Night Football and NBA audiences specifically saw 16%, 13% and 18% lifts, respectively. For Millennials, the lifts were even larger – 33% for college football, 26% for Monday Night Football and 27% for the NBA.
· Streaming and OOH also boosted ESPN’s Millennial audience for College GameDay (33%), Monday Night Countdown (28%), First Take (19%), SportsCenter with Scott Van Pelt (14%) and Sunday NFL Countdown (16%).
