NBC to partner with Snapchat for video coverage, sponsored geofilters at 2018 Olympics

NBC and Snapchat have reached an agreement on a partnership for the 2018 Winter Olympics, the Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday.

Per the WSJ, Snapchat will share clips of the Games and team with BuzzFeed to produce exclusive coverage using NBC video, while NBC will get to sell sponsored geofilters and lenses on the Snapchat app. Advertising commitments related to the deal will reportedly fall between $50 million and $75 million.

Via WSJ:

In an interview, NBC Olympics President Gary Zenkel said Snap has never before allowed a partner to sell national filters and lenses to marketers, a sign of the deepening relationship between the two companies since NBCUniversal invested $500 million in Snap as part of its March initial public offering.

Mr. Zenkel noted that nearly 35 million people in the U.S. viewed NBC’s Rio Olympic coverage on Snapchat, consuming over 230 million minutes of content on the platform. He said the vast majority of that audience was under the age of 35.

“We will take to the market and into our Olympic discussions that unique opportunity to get in front of a very young audience during the period of the Games,” Mr. Zenkel said.

Snapchat has become a favorite social media app of Generation Z, making it an especially appealing outlet for advertisers looking to target teenagers. The company, which recently had an IPO, has a valuation of over $24 million and is expected to double its revenues in 2017, according to the WSJ.

[WSJ]