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Mark Marshall, Chairman of Global Advertising and Partnerships at NBCUniversal, joins Friend of TVREV, the ageless Justin Lebbon to discuss how the company plans to sustain its growth following a blockbuster year for sports. Marshall explains how NBCUniversal aims to win advertising spend from social platforms, why expanding demand through the "messy middle" is critical, and what that strategy entails. He also explores why diversification has become a key driver of growth, with initiatives such as BravoCon and other branded extensions helping to create new revenue opportunities. Finally, Marshall addresses the measurement challenges facing the US market, arguing that they are making the entire TV industry look bad.
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A "legendary February" and a sports-led year: All-Star weekend, Super Bowl and the Olympics ran roughly 285m people through NBC, with the World Cup mid-flight. NBCU uses tentpoles to promote programming (Olympics → Traders, Love Island; Super Bowl → Sunday night sports).
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Year-round Sunday nights: Football, then basketball, now baseball: a strategy to move views to live sport and stop viewers defaulting to social clips.
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Performance Insights Hub: A dashboard combining linear and digital on one plan - reach, frequency, first- and third-party KPIs - rolling out in Q4. A Domino's test claimed 38% more pizzas sold for the same spend on an optimized schedule.
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Cross-industry ambition: With FreeWheel, the goal is an industry-wide solution for premium video, not just an NBCU tool.
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Chasing the "messy middle": Universal Ads targets advertisers currently only on search and social; launched ~18 months ago, now generating "tens of millions" per quarter from a zero base. Marketing was reformatted to a digital/social-first approach; James Burrow (ex-Snap) leads product.
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Diversification: BravoCon has become a meaningful revenue stream - 30,000 tickets sold out in ninety seconds - plus a LA28 Olympic partnership bundling sponsorship with media.
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All impressions aren't equal: Marshall argues Love Island carries social currency that a decades-old rerun on a FAST channel does not, driving a bifurcation in streaming pricing.
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The measurement mess: Sharp criticism of Nielsen's Gauge report as a great marketing tool with wrong numbers, and a warning against clients using it as a spend guide. Marshall's fix: real first-party data, industry-wide.
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Advertisers left linear before audiences did: ~40% of US budget has shifted to CTV while ~89% of impressions still run on linear; some advertisers — notably a pharma brand — came back after missing reach curves.
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