The Qatari World Cup is close to audience records on TF1, which is taking advantage of this to maximize the prices of its advertising space. BeIn Sports claims 500,000 additional subscribers.
Will France-Argentina be the best audience in the history of French TV? Sunday, TF1 will certainly hope to exceed the absolute record, that is the France-Portugal semi-final of the 2006 World Cup and its 22.2 million viewers. She has a good chance, even if the schedule of the final – at 4 p.m., and not in prime time – does not work in her favor. On Wednesday, the first channel was already not far away with the semi-final against Morocco, followed by 20.69 million viewers according to Médiamétrie.
“It is a very big audience success, argues Augustin Pénicaud, vice-president at the communication agency Havas Play, about this 2022 World Cup. The reality is that the French are not boycotting it, at least less and less. To temper these figures, it must also be said that the competition has a specificity in its audience measurement compared to the 2018 World Cup: for two and a half years, Médiamétrie has also been counting audiences away from home, in bars or at the office for example. A modification that would have increased audiences by about 10%.
Be that as it may, the course of the French team allows TF1 to make a winning bet from start to finish. The prices of its ads on Sunday are thus maximized: the most expensive spots, at half-time of the final, are marketed at the price of 330,000 euros per 30 seconds, according to figures posted online by its advertising department. Without the presence of France, the prices would have been different: the advertising spaces would have been sold for half as much, at 180,000 euros, according to the price list communicated by the channel before the competition.
Amounts, however, up compared to those practiced for the 2018 World Cup, where the price of the most expensive spot had been 280,000 euros. According to Augustin Penicaud, “The increase in sales prices has been around 20% since the last World Cup. It’s not surprising given the inflation.
According to a study by the Kantar institute on the 16 matches of the first group phase broadcast on TF1, 120 different advertisers communicated and generated 75.8 million euros gross, i.e. an average of 4.7 million euros per meet. However, the comparison with 2018 is not always timely. “The fact that this competition is held in November and December changes things from a commercial point of view, explains Augustin Pénicaud. For example, certain sectors such as the automobile do not have a TV campaign at this time. Among the main advertisers identified by Kantar: Apple, Burger King or Ferrero.
Despite everything, the retransmission and production costs around competitions of this kind are still not profitable for a channel like TF1. If we do not know the amount of TV rights for this World Cup, they would be closer to those of the 2018 World Cup, which had cost more than 71 million euros for 28 matches in the clear. For TF1, the interest then also lies in terms of image, as a broadcaster of the main events, and sports, and especially of the Blues, all the more so if they win at the end.
BeIn Sports and even Molotov at the party
For its part, BeIn Sports, co-broadcaster in France, which broadcast the entire competition, has gained 500,000 subscribers, according to the team. The pay channel would thus have increased from 2.2 to 2.7 million subscribers thanks to this Mondial. A good operation for the Canal + group, which manages the exclusive distribution of BeIn. Before that, on Tuesday, the Franco-Qatari channel was pleased to have reached average audiences of 3.1 million viewers per day. For the Brazil-Croatia quarter-final, broadcast exclusively, BeIn notably recorded an audience of 2 million viewers. A rare performance for a pay channel.
Finally, other players adjacent to traditional broadcasters claim audience successes during this World Cup. This is the case of the Molotov streaming platform, which offers the channels of the TF1 group in a paid offer. The Mondial has thus boosted its number of subscribers by 148%, according to figures communicated by the platform. The latter also noted that on match days, 35% of the audience share on its service was dedicated to sport, compared to 3% usually. Like what, among broadcasters, it’s not just TF1 that benefits from a World Cup effect.