Over the Air Sports is Back!!
Hey!
A few links with what is going on and why it is happening for you.
Do me a favor and share the 3 biggest issues you are facing heading into 2024 so I can get you answers.
To the Tickets!
Can you do me a favor, share this newsletter with one friend or colleague.
Over the air sports makes a comeback:
What will the business model of sports business look like without the huge cable rights’ deals supporting it?
That’s the question at the heart of the continued disruptions like:
Decline of cable TV subscribers and Pay-TV viewership: 29.6% of TV viewing was paid in July, the lowest number ever.
Lowest World Series ratings in history well below 10M viewers per game.
I like this post about the context around the NBA’s ratings over the last 20 years.
A few things I think about when I think through this question:
You want to have mental and physical availability for your product.
Putting your games on over the air networks is one way to ensure that when people think about your games, they can actually watch you in action.
This helps sell tickets, increase brand equity, and, hopefully, create more fans.
There is very little data to suggest that streaming services will spend the same sort of money as cable or broadcast TV executives have to obtain rights to sports broadcasts.
We have limited data now with the YouTube TV deal for the NFL network, Amazon’s deal for a Thursday Night NFL game, and Apple’s deal with MLS being the best places to look as starting points.
In truth, weren’t the Hollywood strikes really about fighting back to regain some control because the streaming services were brutal partners once they lacked competition?
How do you grow an audience now?
It takes a new playbook (pun intended).
Focus on the top of the funnel with overall market awareness.
S/T/P and strategy.
I know my thinking is that:
D2C services are tough businesses and we don’t really have much data to tell us that fans are willing to spend $20+ for standalone apps to watch their favorite teams games live.
In truth, we’ve seen the ability of people to find pirated screens increase.
The decline of the season ticket is as much about costs, attention, and the state of the economy as anything else.
Will the secondary market and “fan resellers” be willing and able to support a business model that will likely need even higher revenue to sustain itself?
Consumer debt and delinquencies are rising. Debt is up about 14% in the last year, the biggest jump since this number started being tracked in 1999.
This is matched by reports that more affluent customers are putting money into savings due to the higher saving rates.
UFC and Bud Light partner up, the goal is global reach:
Know this about any partnership:
You bring your good stuff to the relationship. I bring my good stuff to the relationship. The bad stuff stays behind.
The Budweiser and Bud Light brands still carry a lot of name recognition.
For Bud Light, if managed well, this can act as a tool to update the brand.
For UFC, this is a chance to reach a global audience and reach into different parts of certain markets.
I’ll see you at Sparks in NYC on Thursday?
I’m in NYC to see the LCD Soundsystem show at Brooklyn Steel and I’ll be stopping by Sparks for the Coalition for Ticket Fairness event on Thursday before the show.
Let me know if you are going to be heading to the event.
Maybe I’ll try and catch ‘Spamalot’ while I’m in town!
Strategy is at the core of my virtual workshop in December.