“I come from an age when an ‘app’ was an appetizer,” says Al Roker. “Not something you downloaded on your phone.” He’s quickly learning to change with the times.
Roker will play a significant role in a new app from “Today” that helps users with tips about wellness — including exercise, diet and more. A “Start Today” app soft-launched last year, with some fans able to beta-test it. Now NBC will put a more overt promotional push behind it, part of a bid to make “Today,” so closely identified with the mornings for seven decades, something that has stronger ties with a broader part of daily life.
The venture will take “Today” out of its usual competitive set — it battles every day for viewers with ABC’s “Good Morning America” and “CBS Mornings,” among other A.M. TV properties — and set it against dozens of digital outlets that deal with wellness. “We are making a bet that we can look at it holistically and say, ‘If you want fitness, nutrition, inspiration, we have it in one place — and trusted experts who are bringing it to you,” says Libby Leist, the NBC News executive vice president who oversees “Today.”
The app will require a monthly or annual subscription, says Leist, and there will be a discounted offer for the next several days.
“Today” appears to be going to a place many news rivals hope to visit — and soon. Warner Bros. Discovery’s CNN has, under current CEO Mark Thompson, vowed to build a new digital operation that plays to interests including wellness, and is expected to unveil new details in 2025.
Big TV audiences are “great, but the durability of any good brand these days and in the future is going to be in how well you engage your loyalists,” says Chris Berend, chief digital officer of NBCUniversal News Group.
The NBCU unit has moved full-bore into digital over the last few years. It operates NBC News Now, a live-streaming outlet with separate programming from its cable and broadcast counterparts. CNBC recently unveiled a stand-alone streaming app that will let subscribers see all its programming, even shows meant for audiences in Europe and Asia. And “Today” already has a “Today All Day” broadband outlet that offers clips from the show.
“Today” can move into a longer daily cycle, says Berend. “We have clear authority and trust,” he says. “I think that’s hard to replicate, and both our audiences and our competitors are realizing that.”
Executives believe “Today” has permission to expand further into fitness, food and staying healthy. After all, many of the segments on the original broadcast show are tied to just those topics. The genesis of “Start Today” comes from an 800,000-member Facebook group of the program’s viewers, who are already discussing how to live in healthier fashion.
Roker, who will serve as a sort of chief motivational officer on the app, also comes to the subject organically. “Today” viewers have followed his efforts to walk five miles a day on the advice of his doctor. “I started posting about it,” he says, “and it just grew.”
He thinks “Today” appeals to a broad swath of potential audience. “I look at it almost like Vince Vaughan in ‘Dodgeball,’ he says, nodding to the 2004 comedy about a bunch of “Average Joes” who defeat a better trained team in competition. “On a lot of these apps, the people are chiseled, extremely good looking, like they don’t have to deal with weight issues or food or life,” he says. “I think ours is for ‘normal’ people. There’s no shame, no judgment. We can just be part of the solution.”
Even so, by plunging more readily into digital media, “Today” is probably in for a workout.
