Advertising on Las Vegas Sphere—how brands are using the giant digital billboard

A mysterious spherical structure had been under construction behind the Las Vegas Strip since 2019, but it was only when the towering globe was first illuminated on the Fourth of July—and then officially opened to the public in September—that its capabilities were truly understood. Known simply as Sphere, the one-of-a-kind arena has captivated Sin City and social media since its completion earlier this year, thanks in large part to its dynamic shell that doubles as a 366-foot-high, 516-foot-wide digital surface for brands that are seeking an unparalleled out-of-home display. Related: Heineken advertises on Sphere for Formula 1 race “With the launch of the Sphere, it’s the biggest screen on the planet, it’s the highest resolution screen on the planet. There’s a lot of ‘world’s firsts’ there,” said Davide Bianca, chief creative officer at BCN Visuals, a production firm specializing in 3D anamorphic billboards, which recently worked with Microsoft and San Francisco-based agency 215 McCann to handle an Xbox campaign on Sphere. Dealing with the enormous, non-traditional canvas that is Sphere’s exterior poses any number of technical challenges for advertisers, but particularly so for Xbox’s “Power Your Dreams” takeover that debuted on Oct. 19. Bianca noted it was “intended to create an optical illusion” and “very technically challenging” to develop. Also read: YouTube NFL Sunday Ticket buys ad on Las Vegas Sphere Among the obstacles: how can a surface with no corners be efficiently seen by onlookers on the ground, hotel guests in the towers that flank the venue, and drivers passing by on Sands Avenue all at once? (The answer: having the spherical Xbox logo rotate on the building’s “North Pole” axis, while mirroring other elements so they can be at least partially seen regardless of angle.) “There was a lot of strategic planning that went into how the content needed to be designed,” Bianca said. “Even rendering [the graphics] in the cloud for the final master was insane for this.” What is the Las Vegas Sphere? Officially a multipurpose venue, Sphere currently hosts just two attractions: Irish rock band U2’s 36-gig residency there styled as “U2:UV Achtung Baby Live at Sphere” and “Postcards from Earth,” a film by Darren Aronofsky purpose-made for its 16K resolution wraparound screen. While both acts make use of Sphere’s immersive interior technology, it is arguably the building’s outer display made up of 1.2 million fully programmable, hockey puck-sized LEDs—known as Exosphere—that has intrigued the public and piqued the interest of advertisers from PlayStation to Autodesk even more. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Dara Treseder (@daratreseder) What brands are advertising on the Las Vegas Sphere? Since Sept. 1, when YouTube became the first advertiser to utilize Exosphere, in support of its NFL Sunday Ticket subscription, the 580,000-square-foot skeleton has come to life numerous times at brands’ behest. It has been transformed into, among other things, a bunch of ice blocks for Heineken Silver; a tennis ball ahead of the US Open Finals; a concert stage to promote DreamWorks’ upcoming movie “Trolls Band Together”; and a basketball in service of the NBA’s Summer League, which was undertaken as a creative project rather than a marketing gambit, David Hopkinson, Sphere’s president and chief operations officer, told the Las Vegas Review-Journal in July. “Our ambition for Sphere is art as well as commerce. Half of the operational time of Sphere will be art, and we’re looking forward to being part of that community,” Hopkinson told the newspaper. “The other half of the time we expect will be commercial and brands and advertisers, many of whom are household names or aspiring to be household names, will be interested in showcasing their brands and products on Sphere.” How much does it cost to advertise on the Sphere? A digital out-of-home display of this caliber doesn’t come cheap. Last month, X (formerly Twitter) user PitchDeckGuy posted a presentation showing that a four-hour, 50% share-of-voice buy on Sphere may cost advertisers as much as $450,000, while a “one week flight,” which reportedly gets brands at least 414 minutes of time on screen, clocks in at $650,000. Those numbers—which are apparently inclusive of a 90-second creative spot developed by the venue’s in-house team—were directly provided by Sphere representatives to the marketing agency whose deck was posted on social media, Las Vegas NBC affiliate KSNV reported. pic.twitter.com/8JDb139km3— PitchDeckGuy (@BetterPitchGuy) October 2, 2023 How much did it cost to build the Sphere? The Sphere also didn’t come cheap for its owner, Sphere Entertainment Co., which was spun off from Madison Square Garden Entertainment earlier this year. Due to both technological challenges and pandemic-related construction delays, Sphere’s final building costs tallied $2.3 billion. Just last week, the venue revealed a nearly $100 million operating loss for the fiscal quarter ended Sept. 30. How many daily ad impressions does the Sphere generate? “This buzzworthy, larger-than-life display is really what kind of excited our team and the Bosch team,” said Megan Storm, head of media at Omaha, Nebraska-based agency Bailey Lauerman, which worked with wiper blade company Bosch to extend its “Night Vision has Evolved” campaign to turn Sphere into a giant eyeball during the recent AAPEX and SEMA automotive trade shows in Las Vegas. Developing work to display on Sphere is “a bit unlike selling an advertising campaign, and more like working with a media owner working on original branded content in a way,” added Greg Andersen, Bailey Lauerman’s CEO and head of strategy, who said that successful activations must “really flex the muscle of the technology behind that medium.” While social impressions for the agency’s recent Bosch extension, which ran from Oct. 30 to Nov. 5, are still under review, there is little doubt that an Exosphere media buy is a magnet for online conversation. Sphere estimates that an ad on its exterior display will generate 4.7 million daily impressions, 4.4 million of which come from social media platforms, reports suggest. Meanwhile, videos with the hashtag “#spherelasvegas” already have nearly 300 million views on TikTok alone. More social media and marketing news “Brands that choose to advertise here will not just buy ad space; they will buy into a unique, immersive experience that guarantees attention,” the industry trade group DPAA wrote in a blog post ahead of Sphere’s grand opening; and marketers’ desire for that sort of exposure has yet to let up. This week, Formula 1 will begin a multi-day Exosphere takeover connected to the inaugural Las Vegas Grand Prix. Interest in advertising on the unique OOH display is likely to only continue ramping up into early 2024 as Las Vegas prepares to host its first-ever Super Bowl, which will take place Feb. 11 at Allegiant Stadium, just a 15-minute drive from Sphere. 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Advertising on Las Vegas Sphere—how brands are using the giant digital billboard

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