Just over a month since their debut as a domestic broadcast partner of the top-flight English Premier League, Amazon has already been a hit with fans.
The Merseyside Derby between Liverpool and Everton peaked in popularity as the match reached approximately two million viewers, according to online media outlet Digiday.
That number is comparable to the amount of people using pay-TV broadcaster Sky Sports when the two clubs previously played each other in March.
To put into perspective how Amazon has taken off, Sky announced earlier this week that Liverpool’s 3-1 victory over Manchester City in November drew an average of 3.36 million viewers, a figure that made it the third most-watched Premier League broadcast in the network’s history.
With Amazon already close to what Sky is achieving, it goes to show where the future of broadcasting may be heading.
According to Digiday, the US technology giant’s first year as a Premier League broadcaster was relatively well received by advertisers. Major brands such as Coca-Cola, Duracell, Heineken, Mercedes Benz and Papa John’s joined on as partners, though buyers have concerns about the data they have received from the streaming platform thus far.
Amazon did not release its viewing figures publicly, while agency executives reportedly received reporting on their specific campaigns from the company this week.
Digiday reports that Amazon’s starting prices offered to advertisers were a cost per thousand impressions of UK£50 (AUD$94) for a broadly targeted adult audience for ‘Tier A’ games, UK£45 (AUD$84) for ‘Tier B’ and UK£40 (AUD$75) for ‘Tier C’ matches. These are understood to be two to three times the price of ads that Sky has sold for similar Premier League games, although in both cases the final prices were subject to negotiation.
When it came to ad performance, the buyers who spoke with Digiday gave a mixed verdict, with below – by as much as 30 per cent – and above expectation impressions reported against Amazon’s initial forecasts.
Going forward, buyers told Digiday that they would like to add access to Amazon’s first-party data, and the option to add their own tags to ads for attribution purposes.
Despite reaming coy with its viewing figures, an Amazon spokeswoman said the 3rd and 4th December were the ‘two biggest Prime sign-up days in UK history’, adding that ‘millions’ of customer streamed the live broadcasts, without clarifying the exact figure.
