Creativity & Storytelling
The best ideas are only as good as their delivery. To make an effective point, one must tell a story that their audience finds compelling and engaging.
During my time at an unscripted production company, we were encouraged to bring forward ideas for new shows, of which the owner’s may bring out to buyers if they saw promise. Below is a deck for one of my pitches, along with notes of my associated presentation, which was passed along to commissioners at NBC in 2024.
The Show’s Logline: For the first time, the romantic magic of the Olympic Village will be re-created for the public to experience and see if they too can find love like the Olympians.
Slide 1
Pop culture is fragmented. From social media to multiple streaming services, the trend has been for people’s attention to split into smaller and smaller pools.
Very rarely does a moment capture the public’s attention bringing the world together to watch as one.
There is one place where that still occurs, The Olympics.
NBC spends billions of dollars on the rights and production of The Olympics to capture that attention, and the advertising dollars that go with it.
But what if I told you there’s a major opportunity that they are missing, and it’s one that we can fill?
Slides 2-3
Here are the viewership figures for the last two Olympics, split out between men and women. The general trend shows a peak during the initial days of the games following a steady decline as the games continue. This is from a multitude of factors outside of NBC’s control from key events ending, stars getting eliminated or just general fatigue of the games.
However, there is one trend that requires a closer look.
These four key dates show a major variance between the number of men and women watching the games. When looking closer at what is causing that, this variance is being caused by a major alternative live sports event drawing male viewers.
But what does this mean? It means that while male viewership in The Olympics is more directly correlated to live sports, female viewership is instead driven by being a part of a cultural moment.
So while male viewership during the second half of Olympic coverage is hard to retain, female viewership is just ready for the taking. You just need to offer them something fresh that keeps the cultural conversation going.
Something loud, something relevant, and something that will capture the attention of millions of female viewers during Olympic coverage.
I am talking about...
Slide 4
Sex at The Olympic Games
I know it may sound crazy, but this is a very real phenomenon that captures the world’s attention like clockwork every two years.
Slide 5
From 2012 to 2024, the story of Olympic athletes hooking up in the Olympic Village has piqued public interest no matter the medium.
From magazines and cable of 2012 to YouTube and TikTok of more recent games, the trend’s virality remains steadfast in pop culture.
In 2022, event the official Olympics account poked fun at their “dirty” secret.
With this in mind, here is the next evolution of NBC’s Olympic coverage.
For the first time, an Unscripted Companion Program to the 2024 Paris Olympic Games will leverage the brand and public interest of the Olympics to capture the audience who loves the pageantry of the Games, but might not want to watch live sports that night.
One elegant solution brings the possibility of keeping a wider audience engaged in the Olympic discourse, attracting new potential advertisers, creating a replicable unscripted franchise, maximizing NBC’s Olympic Investment and much more.
Slide 6
