Between Facebook’s boycott, TikTok’s privacy issues, the rise of podcasts, the fierce comeback of newsletters, and the entire craziness of the streaming wars – the options for branding, advertising and general communication that the landscape offers marketers are far from being a set list.
The Stock is Alright
Only a month after HBO Max was launched, and as Quibi is still licking its wounds, a new animal entered the room. Welcome, Peacock!
The newest Over-The-Top service, from media behemoth NBCUniversal, was officially launched last week. Comcast’s (owner of NBC) stock was almost 10% higher last Friday (two days after the launch) compared to where it was a month ago. This green trend brings it closer to its all-time peak(ock) – achieved this past January. In a world before the coronavirus crisis, and the 2020 Olympics’ cancellation – the biggest event in the world, which was meant to be Peacock’s official coming out party.
When it comes to branding, a couple of things jump out immediately.
Branding in Times of Chaos
First, while the service inherited its name from NBC’s world-renowned logo, its own logo is just “six colored dots. Both the name and the palette are meant to invoke Peacock’s parent company NBCUniversal, itself under the umbrella of cable giant Comcast. But at the same time, it’s not supposed to remind viewers too much of its corporate cousin,” noted Alison Herman on TheRinger.
And why wasn’t it just named NBC Plus? Chairman Matt Strauss told Volture it was “[a] strategic decision not to [do it]. “It’s simple: Peacock is the NBC streaming service, but it’s not just the NBC streaming service; it wants to leverage the brand on its back without being constrained by it. Simple!”, continues Herman.
Confused? You are not alone. And while it is not as unclear as the point of HBO Max, HBO Go, and… the third one, “Peacock seems built to be an in-house host for lucrative titles in lieu of leasing out to third parties like Netflix—and yet Peacock itself is leasing outside offerings,” writes Herman, as she’s trying to explain it all here.
The second thing, is this cake recipe they hid inside the service’s Terms and Conditions:
The jokes were running wild on the tweet that revealed it. We would only argue it really should have been a cookie recipe. Right? No? No. Okay.
Marketing Strategy: One to Everyone
But seriously, and especially if you throw into the mix (another recipe pun why don’t ya) the fact content on the platform that is available now may not be on it very soon, if you get the feeling that branding- and communication-wise, this launch has been all over the place, we hear you.
On one hand, it makes sense – as NBCU had to completely rethink their launching plans when the 2020 Tokyo Games got postponed. And on the other hand, it may be part of the strategy. As Patricia Hadden, head of growth marketing at Peacock, said in a conversation with Beet.tv, “We are going after everyone.”
The service’s pre-launch, to parent company Comcast’s subscribers back in April, played a huge role in helping Hadden and the people around her to reshape their plans. “We have found, [as part of our CRM] that our email campaign had more than double industry average open rates […] y exposing existing subscribers to different parts of the product, especially in the email channel, e have seen that it’s driven accelerated rate back to Peacock, and we’ve found similar results with our paid engagement and retention campaigns”. Find the video interview here.
And while everybody’s scrambling – from customers to advertisers to the streaming services themselves – to see where things are going, one main last thing that is crucial to mention right now is that the service also comes with a free (ad supported) version. In times of a global recession and tens of millions of Americans out of job, offering more than 10,000 hours of content for free is something we surely see as following best-practices right now.
Oh, and this is what a peacock sounds like.
