The 2008 Olympics ended Sunday, and NBC reportedly has streamed 72 million videos through Saturday, according to an eMarketer report released today. But despite the heavy traffic, the report estimated that NBC earned a mere $5.75 million in video advertising for all its efforts. That's just 7.3 cents per stream, hardly gangbusters monetization.

The large audience and tiny video ad revenue highlight a trend disclosed by another eMarketer report released last week that adjusted predicted online video ad spends for 2008 to $585 million, down from its original, $1 billion-plus forecast.

How do you effectively market online video ads to advertisers wary of the format? The Olympics and this past March Madness video coverage show that high-profile sporting events can draw huge crowds, so why aren't content deliverers making more money off of the audiences they attract?

Internet audiences are fickle, first of all. Despite having exclusive rights to online video and the Olympic logo for the duration of the Games, NBC finished second to Yahoo! Olympics in overall web traffic to Olympic sites over the past two weeks.

Ashkan Karbasfrooshan of seekingalpha.com suggests [1] that NBC could have sold licenses to its exclusive content to turn a larger profit on their online investment. The proliferation of pirated content, such as all of the "unsanctioned" videos online of Usain Bolt's incredible 100m final, dilutes the value of ads placed over supposedly "exclusive content."

One thing is for sure, in 2010 and especially 2012, there will be a fierce struggle for the online rights to those Olympics, and a significant amount likely will be spent on online video advertising. 

For more:
- Ashkan's insightful comments on alternative strategies for the next Olympic online host [2]

Related Articles:
Olympic Moments [3]
US Interest in Mobile Olympic Coverage High [4]
Olympics online videos ratings surge [5]