How AT&T turned college football commercial into NIL opportunity
Tune into a college football game over the next year season, odds are the AT&T commercial has popped on.
A woman is sitting in the audience cheering on her college football team amidst a wedding. The wedding comes to a stop as she exclaims, “He’s so clearly short.”
From there, an AT&T representative adds, “It’s college football with AT&T 5G.”
But what the commercial does not show is the role NIL played in the ad. Thanks to the new era of college athletics, student-athletes are monetizing their publicity rights. AT&T deliberately shows an athlete in its commercial. Those athletes have earned compensation for their work in the advertisement.
While AT&T has a handful of USC players it has used in the spot, it has also worked with Florida A&M players Jeremiah Pruitte, Aric Hrone and Devin Smith. Those trio of players are represented by A&P Agency, which facilitated the deal.
For years, commercials have been extremely valuable to major brands during sporting events. It’s a way to promote and possibly gain new customers. And now athletes can be used, while receiving compensation for their NIL.
AT&T produced four commercials in total, which have been spaced out. The ads are set to run through December 2023. The commercial is expected to play during Monday night’s national championship game, too.
AT&T creating unique NIL opportunities
On top of the NIL earnings, though, for an athlete to be able to say they participated in a national TV commercial is not an every day occurrence. Before the NIL Era, athletes never would have been able to access the platform AT&T provies.
Now they can. It creates a springboard for another NIL deal and it only strengthens their brand.
“A lot of people have seen it, all my family. It’s pretty exciting,” Pruitte told On3 in a phone interview. A lot of my teammates, they were really excited. But they couldn’t really believe it at first, especially since it was AT&T and so big.
“A lot of people have seen it. And a lot of people understand it is only up from here.”
A Colorado State transfer, Pruitte finished the season with 12 catches for 103 yards and three touchdowns. At one point this season before a game, the commercial popped up on a TV screen in the locker room.
Pruitte recalls the ad being replayed multiple times.
“Actually came on one of the gamedays,” he said. “Everybody was able to see it. My coaches know about it, they seemed pretty excited. They kind of knew back when I got invited to the NIL Summit I might have opportunities like this.”
Just off of the commercial alone, Pruitte is confident that he has added at least 1,500 Instagram followers through story mentions and being tagged in numerous posts.
AT&T continues to build NIL roster
The telecommunications company based in Dallas has gone all in on college football. It is one of the top sponsors of the College Football Playoff. And it’s started to ramp up its work in the NIL space.
Past the commercial, Caleb Williams has signed with the brand. The USC quarterback spent part of his weekend at College Football Playoff fan central as part of a partnership with AT&T. Set up at the brand’s “Fan Bowl,” Williams signed autographs and took pictures with fans.
“Had a great time at the AT&T fan zone at the College Football Playoff fan central,” he wrote in an Instagram story, tagging himself as an AT&T Athlete.
And while he won’t be playing in Monday night’s national title game, the Heisman Trophy winner appeared at AT&T’s 5G Radio Show at the Allstate Championship Tailgate at SoFi Stadium.