Categories: OLD Media Moves

How Yahoo Finance livestreamed the Berkshire annual meeting

Adweek magazine examined how Yahoo Finance able to livestream the Berkshire Hathaway annual meeting from Omaha, Nebraska last year.

Adweek writes, “It all started with an email from Berkshire Hathaway CEO Warren Buffett. ‘It said, ‘Call me,'” recalled Yahoo Finance editor Andy Serwer. ‘So, I called him up. And he said ‘I’ve got this idea. What do you think about livestreaming my annual meeting?’ And I said ‘yes’ as quickly as I could!’

Challenge
“Upwards of 40,000 people travel to Omaha, Neb., for the annual meeting, but a continuous global livestream would bring the daylong event to the world. ‘Five-hundred thousand people in China watched it live. And that was with a 12-hour time difference,’ said Serwer.

Goal
“Yahoo needed to find sponsors to help defray the costs. TD Ameritrade and Scottrade signed on as pre-show and halftime report sponsors. ‘They were thrilled with the fact that it was a global stream and that close to 40 percent of the streams actually happened overseas,’ noted Yahoo global revenue chief Lisa Utzschneider.

Execution
“The first-of-its-kind meeting was Buffett’s idea. ‘I asked him later why he came to us,’ said Serwer. ‘He said there were several reasons: you successfully executed an NFL game. (The Buffalo Bills-Jacksonville Jaguars matchup in October 2015 netted 15.2 million viewers.) You have the technology to do it. You have the global platform. And, then he also said, ‘I have this relationship with you and I know that I can just call you up anytime and get through to you.””

Read more here.

Chris Roush

Chris Roush was the dean of the School of Communications at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut. He was previously Walter E. Hussman Sr. Distinguished Professor in business journalism at UNC-Chapel Hill. He is a former business journalist for Bloomberg News, Businessweek, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Tampa Tribune and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. He is the author of the leading business reporting textbook "Show me the Money: Writing Business and Economics Stories for Mass Communication" and "Thinking Things Over," a biography of former Wall Street Journal editor Vermont Royster.

Recent Posts

Yahoo Finance seeks a senior editor

Yahoo Finance is the world’s #1 finance destination, empowering investors with news, information, and tools…

8 hours ago

Axios hires Wang as media editor

Christine Wang has been hired by Axios to be its media editor. She previously spent more…

10 hours ago

Dow Jones CEO Latour talks WSJ’s tech news cuts

The Verge CEO Nilay Patel interviewed Dow Jones & Co. CEO Almar Latour about various topics on his podcast,…

10 hours ago

Reuters Breakingviews hires Gandel as Wall Street columnist

Reuters Breakingviews has hired Stephen Gandel as its Wall Street columnist. Gandel has been the U.S. banking…

10 hours ago

Washington Post combining biz, tech, climate, health and science teams

The Washington Post is combining its business, technology, health, science and climate teams, reports Sara Fischer of…

10 hours ago

Bangor Daily News seeks housing and real estate reporter

The Bangor Daily News is seeking a smart, hard-charging reporter to cover statewide housing and…

11 hours ago