The USOC sold out of its entire digital advertising inventory for the Sochi Games and delivered record-setting traffic for advertisers. The organization's official website and new app have combined to deliver more than 16.2 million page views during the first 10 days of the Olympics, nearly as much as the 17 million total page views that it netted from the '10 Vancouver Games and '12 London Games combined. USOC Managing Dir of Marketing & Productions John Pierce said the traffic reflects the rising consumption of digital media on mobile devices and the popularity of U.S. athletes, whose stories and bio pages attracted the most views. "It speaks to the popularity of the Games," Pierce said. "Twitter's become easier to use. The way tech is being used to serve fans is making it easier to consume content, but it starts with the athlete. People want to know more about our athletes." The USOC hosted a digital "newsfront" last year to pitch digital ad buyers and sponsors on advertising on its site during the Games. Sponsors Airweave, Smuckers, Folgers and Deloitte took advertising positions. It also sold inventory to non-sponsors J.C. Penney, Endless Pools, Oberto and the Springfield Convention & Visitors Bureau. "We had a high bar for revenue expectations and we've met it," Pierce said. "We met it because we hit the sweet spot for us, which is to tell the athlete stories and drive people to consume live streaming and TV coverage at NBC."
BIG JUMP FOR SOCIAL MEDIA NUMBERS: The USOC's Twitter audience more than doubled from 270,000 before the Opening Ceremony to 570,000, and the number of Facebook likes and shares it has received, which is multiplied by how many people see those likes and shares, jumped from 400,000 to 4.5 million. Pierce said the USOC digital team's effort to be more timely with information it is sharing on social channels has helped drive those increases. He pointed to a Facebook post after ice dancers Meryl Davis and Charlie White won Gold as an example. It netted 105,000 likes in less than 12 hours. "In London, we weren't as active," Pierce said. "We weren't posting as much." Pierce said the USOC's digital platforms are getting twice as much traffic from tablets and phones (10.9 million page views) as they are from computers (5.3 million page views). More than 360,000 people downloaded its "Team USA Road to Sochi presented by Smuckers." The total is nearly 100,000 more downloads than the USOC netted for its "Road to London" app. Traffic is up on the app from London, too. It has generated 7.6 million page views. Pierce said that is a result of modifying the app to emphasize athlete information. "We learned from London and we made a conscious decision to focus the content on the athletes themselves," Pierce said. "It was built as a companion app. If you're watching the NBC broadcast or live streaming and you say, 'Oh, who is (snowboarder) Nate Holland,' you can go and find out. We know it's working because the page views are through the roof on it."
