BEYOND THE GAMES: HOW HAS COVERAGE OF THE OLYMPICS EVOLVED?
By Ella Jerman, Senior Social Media Manager
329 events. 32 sports. 16 days.
How do you cover the world’s biggest multi-sport event on social media?
That’s the challenge currently facing organisations, brands — and even the competing athletes — during this summer’s Olympic Games in Paris.
Looking back at recent years, to say a lot has changed since social media coverage of the Olympic Games began would be an understatement.
In 2008 for the Beijing Games, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) had no formally recognised social media presence. Fast forward to 2024 and more than 25,000 posts are planned across the IOC’s accounts over the course of the Games — across 40 different platforms, in 9 different languages.
It’s not just the volume of posts that’s increased either. The way viewers prefer to consume content is changing rapidly, with the emergence of TikTok significantly altering consumer behaviour towards short-form video content — fostering creativity and allowing anyone to be a creator.
So, how has the evolution of social media changed how we consume content from the Olympics?
A rise in personality-led content
Athletes aren’t just known for their accolades anymore.
Over the years, the IOC’s social media guidelines — designed to protect sponsors and television broadcast rights — have largely determined what Olympic-related content can be accessed by fans online.
Back in Rio in 2016, participants were only allowed to post photos from the Olympic village and competition venues, with all audio and video content requiring approval from the IOC before publishing.
At Tokyo 2020, the IOC relaxed these rules to allow athletes to share non-commercial video content on their personal platforms — but not from Opening/Closing ceremonies or competition areas.
This year, the IOC went one step further by allowing athletes to post video from the Opening and Closing ceremonies, training areas and competition venues (up to one hour before competing).
This has led to a significant increase in athlete-led content — particularly on TikTok — allowing audiences to see a different side of the participants and what their life is like during the Games.
We’ve seen GB canoe slalom athlete Joe Clarke show us interactions between the British and Spanish teams at the Opening Ceremony, Australian water polo player Tilly Kearns filming what teams get up to during weather breaks in training, while Norwegian swimmer Henrik Christiansen has created a series of TikTok videos solely about the chocolate muffins in the Olympic village.
Australian goalkeeper Mackenzie Arnold racked up over 42m views on a single video of her and teammate Alanna Kennedy showing their Opening Ceremony outfits.
Allowing athletes to create and share their own behind-the-scenes content helps to make them more relatable to their audiences, who won’t necessarily be completely clued up on who they are and what sport they compete in.
Take Team USA’s Ilona Maher as a prime example. With nearly four million followers across her Instagram and TikTok alone, the rugby sevens player is now the most-followed rugby player in the world — male or female — on social media.
Since Tokyo 2020, she’s been sharing a mixture of funny behind-the-scenes videos with empowering body image messages, helping her to find an audience way beyond her sport.
The results? More than doubling her Instagram following in the space of a week.
FOLLOWER GROWTH: 24/07/24 - 31/07/24
FOLLOWERS: 2.04M
GROWTH: +1.19M
% GROWTH: +141.27
Crowdtangle, 2024
Given we saw Simone Biles and Suni Lee joking about planning their TikTok on camera straight after winning Olympic Gold in gymnastics, one thing is definitely clear:
Give athletes the freedom to create content, and they’re far more likely to embrace it, meaning the Games win even more.
More organisations embracing creator culture
Nowadays, everyone with a mobile phone has the potential to be a creator.
So why not embrace this too?
Across sport, we’re seeing more and more organisations embracing creator culture. Creators in their very nature are more personable and relatable than the organisation’s voice, allowing for a more authentic connection with audiences.
Ahead of this summer’s Games, the IOC announced that Paris 2024 would feature the first-ever Olympic Creator Programme — in collaboration with Instagram, YouTube and TikTok — inviting content collaborators from outside the world of sport to cover the magic of the Olympic Games.
We’ve seen other organisations follow suit, with Warner Brothers signing a new content partnership with Youtube, NBC launching their own creator collective as well as Team USA announcing their first partnerships with athletes and creators, who are taking their followers behind the scenes in Paris.
While we all like to hear that our nation has won a medal, organisations are now aware that they have to adapt their content to the ‘casual’ fan — the one who has just as much, if not more, interest in what goes on around the events than the actual competitions themselves.
The remainder of the Games and into Los Angeles 2028
If one thing is clear, it’s that personality-led content is winning in 2024.
Social media — and the IOC’s willingness to adapt to channels and trends — has provided the opportunity for Olympic athletes, who only get such a platform every four years, to elevate their profiles and their sport further.
Whether it’s an athlete taking fans behind the scenes at the Opening Ceremony, a team elevating their output with reactive, mobile-shot content or an organisation putting creators at the forefront — fans want to see people, and the stories that go beyond the Games.
It will be fascinating to see how this momentum carries over into the Paralympic Games, and then once again in 2028 when the Olympics is held in Los Angeles.
It’s difficult to predict exactly how the social media landscape will look in four years' time, but the 2028 Olympics could very well be a showcase of how technology can further enhance the athletic experience — both for participants, teams and spectators alike.