Key Takeaways
-Beyond retail Black Friday is becoming a key sports moment, with streamers like Amazon proving that live games can anchor a full day of fan engagement, commerce, and cross-platform storytelling.
-Shopping and sports consumption are converging, as interactive ads and QR-enabled offers turn engaged viewers into ready buyers, especially on a day built around deals.
-Short-form content is the next major unlock, giving rights holders a way to extend Black Friday engagement by pushing platform-specific clips that guide fans toward timely promotions.
It seems only natural that the first NFL event to be broadcast globally on Prime Video would be the third annual Black Friday game. After all, the term Black Friday has become, as the New York Times once put it, “a conceptual synonym for the idea of ‘sale,’” and nothing embodies the idea of sale more than Amazon.
And so, the game between the Philadelphia Eagles and Chicago Bears on Nov. 28 will be available for streaming in over 240 countries and territories worldwide, with no subscription or Prime membership required. It won't be the only sporting event on the docket. In addition to the Eagles-Bears game, Prime Video will air the return of “The Skins Game,” featuring the top six golfers in the world, and an NBA doubleheader.
All in all, Prime Video will air more than 12 hours of live sports on Black Friday to fans around the world. “Black Friday is becoming one of the best sports holidays of the year,” said Jay Marine, Head of Global Sports at Prime Video US. “We cannot wait to provide fans with best-in-class coverage and a full day of action, holiday deals, and surprises.”
Merging Commerce With Fan Engagement
Marketing Black Friday as a sports holiday is a relatively new concept. While the day after Thanksgiving has long offered fans a busy schedule – with college football, high school football, and college basketball games – it was never intertwined with pro sports, like Thanksgiving Day and the NFL or Christmas Day and the NBA. All that changed in 2023, when Amazon came up with the idea of airing an NFL game on the biggest shopping day of the year.
For Amazon, this made sense on multiple levels. For one, broadcasting an NFL game on Black Friday is a way to drive shoppers away from brick-and-mortar retailers and towards Amazon. In addition, viewers can take advantage of special sales promotions during the game via interactive ads and QR codes that link to some of Amazon’s best Black Friday deals.
“Amazon is making a smart move by merging commerce with its NFL viewing experience,” said Randy Bapst, CEO of AiBUY, which develops in-content shopping solutions. “Sports fans are very engaged viewers, so they’re the optimal target for this type of interactivity – and from our research, they’re a demographic that’s open to live shopping.”
The Return of Shoppable Television
Live shopping is an e-commerce format in which viewers can watch someone present products and purchase them in real time. In TV terms, the experience is called “shoppable television.” Considered the holy grail of advertisers since the 1990s, the idea of shoppable television – best expressed by the slogan “selling Jennifer Aniston’s sweater” to viewers watching Friends – has endured decades of disappointment. And then came the first Black Friday game.
According to television data firm EDO, consumers who saw a retail ad during the 2023 Black Friday game were 127% more likely to engage with the brand than the retail primetime average. And the 2024 game performed even better:
– Black Friday viewers were 51% more likely to search for brands or products advertised during the game than during other NFL Thanksgiving games.
– Engagement with interactive ads increased 10% from 2023, according to Amazon’s click/scan rates.
– Interactive ads were 11 times more effective in driving engagement than QR codes during the Black Friday game.
“Completing your holiday shopping while enjoying your favorite sports and indulging in Thanksgiving leftovers is as brilliant as it gets,” said Jim Williams, the CEO and founder of LJC, a media consulting firm. “It’s a sponsor’s dream to reach fans with enticing deals they can purchase directly from their phones while watching an NFL or NBA game.”
Tech That Turns Sports Moments Into Sales
For rights holders, the lesson from Amazon’s Black Friday playbook runs deeper than just airing games on the day. The real opportunity lies in turning every type of content – whether it's a full match, highlights, or behind-the-scenes moments – into gateways that connect fandom with shopping in real time.
AI-powered content solutions make this possible at scale. By automatically creating and distributing personalized, multi-format assets across every fan touchpoint, rights holders can transform excitement around live moments into shoppable experiences – on Black Friday or any other day of the year. Because when fandom meets frictionless commerce, every highlight becomes a conversion opportunity.
Actionable Insights
– Use big shopping moments as content triggers by creating short-form clips tied to key plays, player storylines, or holiday themes that can be paired with targeted offers across your owned channels.
– Build “shoppable moments” into your content workflows, embedding clear paths to purchase inside highlight reels or social assets, whether via interactive ads, QR links, or platform-native commerce tools.
– Prepare multi-format content bundles in advance so you can quickly surface personalized clips around live events and deploy them during peak engagement windows, boosting fan attention and conversion.
