Comcast’s NBCUniversal is beefing up the executive team for streaming service Peacock, poaching leadership talent from rival streaming giants Netflix and Hulu to head up marketing and programming efforts in two newly established roles.
NBCUniversal named Shannon Willett as Peacock’s chief marketing officer and Brian Henderson as EVP of programming. Willett is coming from Netflix where she held the role of VP of Global Marketing Strategy and Operations. She was at Netflix for nearly seven years, focused on creative marketing campaigns with global reach, leading a team of 250 people globally, and in various marketing positions of increasing responsibility. As CMO at Peacock, Willett will be in charge of Peacock’s global marketing efforts as she takes the lead across brand management, creative, media planning, marketing operations, social content marketing, subscriber growth and customer care.
Henderson is joining Peacock from Hulu, where he served as SVP of SVOD content, programming and partnerships. At Hulu Henderson was responsible for content acquisition and scheduling in partnership with different content engines, spending over six years at the streaming giant. As EVP he’s charged with leading Peacock’s global content strategy. He’ll be working to curate Peacock’s content offering, using data and insights to drive customer growth, usage, retention and overall business. He’ll also partner with content leaders in the NBCU world, including the NBCU TV & Streaming acquisition team, to steward the platform’s programming strategy for licensed, original, international and emerging content.
Both Willett and Henderson will report to Peacock President Kelly Campbell and be based in Los Angeles. Campbell herself is Hulu alum where she served as president before joining Peacock last October.
“We are thrilled to welcome Shannon and Brian, two exceptional leaders that will play vital roles in making Peacock a must-have streaming service and round out our executive leadership team,“ said Campbell in a statement. “Shannon is a fantastic strategic marketer with an incredible portfolio of brand-defining, best-in-class global campaigns, and her expertise will be critical to Peacock’s next phase of growth. And as a pioneer in the evolution of streaming content, Brian will be invaluable as we continue to expand our content offering and establish Peacock as the top general entertainment streaming service in the market.”
Peacock parent Comcast still has an interest in Hulu, holding a 33% stake, though Disney is the majority owner and has operational control over the streamer. In 2024 Comcast could require Disney buy its holdings in Hulu.
The push for more focused attention on content and programming comes as Comcast pledged this year to double the content budget for Peacock in 2022 to $3 billion, with expectations to rise to $5 billion annually over the next few years. The streaming service, which has free, ad-supported and premium tiers, is also bringing on Willett’s marketing chops as it accelerates an international expansion, expected to bring more users to the platform.
In January, Comcast spoke about the streaming service during fourth quarter earnings, counting 24.5 million monthly active accounts in the U.S. at that time. Peacock launched over a year ago, and metrics include more than 9 million paid subscribers, primarily on the $5 per month ad-supported tier. Around 7 million Peacock Premium subscribers get the service for free through Comcast and other distributors, according to Comcast CEO Brian Roberts on the earnings call, who said he expected many to convert to paying customers eventually.
And while it’s bolstering the content budget this year, NBCUniversal CEO Jeff Shell earlier this year indicated that Peacock will hit peak investment in 2023, and then start to see profits as revenue begins to outpace costs.
When it comes to content, one recent move was pulling back current NBC titles that used to go to Hulu the day after airing and making them exclusive to Peacock as it tries to attract more subscribers. NBCUniversal in March ended its next-day content-sharing deal with Hulu for new episodes starting in the fall 2022 season for shows like Saturday Night Live, The Voice and American Auto, sending them to Peacock instead. According to Variety, Hulu still has rights to other NBCU shows like Law and Order: SVU, This is Us, 30 Rock, and others for a few more years.