How Can Streaming Services Improve Super Bowl Experience in the Future? Utilize the Second Screen

NFL fans across the United States are now planning out their methods for staying sane in the next few months. Super Bowl LVII is over, and now the long, dark wait until September begins.

But the data regarding this year’s Big Game is still coming out. Super Bowl LVII saw an average of 113 million viewers according to Nielsen, including 7 million who watched via streaming. The latter figure represents a record for Super Bowl broadcasts on streaming services.

A new report from the mobile marketing analytics platform Adjust showed that, in addition to watching the game and chowing down on tasty snacks, Americans were using their phones quite often on Super Bowl Sunday. The data offers some interesting insights for just how streaming platforms can improve the Super Bowl experience in the future.

Simply having the Super Bowl available to stream in the first place is a good start. FOX made this year’s big game available to stream for free via the FOX Sports app, and future Super Bowls will be available to stream on Peacock or Paramount+, depending on which network holds the broadcast rights in a given year.

So what can these services do to stand out on Super Bowl Sunday? One way to improve the user experience would be to offer an in-app option for food delivery. Food delivery app installs were up 18% year-over-year on Super Bowl Sunday this year. If Peacock or Paramount+ partnered with Grub Hub or Door Dash to offer a special in-app discount for Super Bowl snacks, as well as a way to make orders without leaving the action on the field, it could provide all companies involved a big boost on future game days.

In the days leading up to the Super Bowl, streaming giant Roku announced a partnership with Door Dash that very well might have come in handy to many football watchers over the weekend.

Access to more relevant sports news and sports betting platforms would also help enhance the streaming app user experience in future Super Bowls. Adjust’s numbers show that in the U.S., installs of sports news apps increased by 19% YoY on Sunday, and American users spent an average of 29.48 minutes on sports betting apps.

It would be fairly simple for the broadcast networks to add links to relevant articles about the teams playing, or up-to-the-minute odds for specific wagers on a content tile next to the video stream. Doing so would help round out the user experience more fully, although streamers would have to tailor wagering content to the specific states where sports betting is legal.

Thanks to highly lucrative broadcast rights deals between the NFL and its network partners, the Super Bowl won’t become a streaming-exclusive any time soon. But users are streaming the game at a higher rate than ever, and the major broadcast networks can leverage Adjust’s data into a better, more interactive experience that helps draw more customers to their streaming services.