If you feel like you’ve been seeing “The Tonight Show” all over your TikTok and Instagram Reels lately, that’s not a coincidence. That’s partially the work of a team led by Nick Dyer, the show’s head of digital and supervising producer. This year “The Tonight Show” saw 9.2 billion views across social media from June 1, 2024 to May 30, 2025, marking a 55% rise compared to the same time period last year, TheWrap has exclusively learned.
“What we’ve seen with some of our biggest guests who do show content and digital content is that it’s a rising-tides-lifts-all-boats mentality,” Dyer told TheWrap. “Wherever people are watching Jimmy [Fallon] and the show is a win in our books because it just means they’re more likely to consume us, no matter what screen they’re on.”
“The Tonight Show” is the No. 1 late night show when it comes to social followers and engagement. The show currently has 100 million followers across social media, more than any of its competitors. That digital dominance wasn’t an overnight sensation but a “slow build,” according to Dyer.
A former senior producer for “The Daily Show,” Dyer moved to NBC in 2021 in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic. When he started Fallon’s guests were still all virtual, which meant that the show could post clips of the episode but that its digital channels had limited opportunities for exclusive content. It wasn’t until the show resumed taping in-studio that its digital strategy evolved. Now nearly every guest has their own tailor-made bit that lives exclusively on social media. This year alone, digital originals accounted for nearly 2 billion views.
“Brick-by-brick, we’ve built more of a presence and more of trust,” Dyer explained, noting that every department is on board with the show’s digital exclusives. “Our talent team books these amazing guests for projects that are absolutely massive, and when they come on the show, they get to do something fun. It’s not always just an interview. It’s a sketch, it’s a game, and the content with Jimmy and the guests inherently goes viral.”
A big reason for the engagement the show has seen comes down to research and creativity. Dyer knows that there’s an endless amount of competition when you’re posting to social media. Instead of falling into the trap of chasing the latest trend, Dyer’s team extensively researches both relevant social trends and the work of the show’s upcoming guests. The goal is to create a moment that could only come from “The Tonight Show.”
“It has to feel like it’s something that makes sense for Jimmy and the guest, and it has to be something that is taking it one step further or playing off of something else that elevates the content itself,” Dyer said.
A great example of this happened during Ariana Grande’s November 2024 appearance. For “The Tonight Show” digital channels, the “Wicked” star and Fallon recreated the viral video of a man shouting at his friends about the Wicked Witch of the East (bro). Grande and Fallon’s recreation of the beloved meme secured 23.5 million views and 3.2 million likes on TikTok alone. The video was so well received that the NBC show even released a side-by-side comparison of the two videos.
@fallontonight @arianagrande’s sister is a witch ♡ #FallonTonight #TonightShow #ArianaGrande #Glinda #Elphaba #Wicked #ArianaOnFallon #JimmyFallon ♬ original sound – The Nostalgia Library
“She knew the facial expressions, the movements — everything,” Dyer said. “It was one of our biggest digital originals that we’ve done over the year.”
Another time-intensive example involved “Squid Game” star Lee Byung-hun. That digital exclusive involved Lee as the Front Man overlooking figurines of Fallon and The Roots. From the Front Man’s beloved whiskey to the use of “Fly Me to the Moon,” the skit is packed with references to the beloved Netflix original.
“We plan weeks in advance for this stuff,” Dyer explained. “We also only have a very short window to shoot with guests. They get here, they’ve got to get prepped for the interview. They have to get hair and makeup, they have to get camera ready, they have to get miked, and before you know it, the show’s about to start. We take time to prep for everything beforehand so when we have that five minute window to shoot with Jimmy and the talent, we’re ready to go.”
As with every part of a late night show, creating this digital content is a never-ending time crunch. As soon as one video is done, the team is prepping for the next guest’s exclusive. But Dyer credits this intense cycle as one of the reasons why the series’ content has performed so well.
“We’re really good at constantly tweaking and refining our process to maximize our exposure, our views, our engagements, and ideally turn turn people that aren’t fans into fans and turn fans into super fans,” Dyer said. “It’s been really fun to do. It is daunting because there is just so much content, sometimes three guests a night. But the upside of it is that we just have so much data and so many opportunities to constantly get better.”
