Business insights

Connected through interactivity

Connected through interactivity

New revenue and engagement opportunities for sports content owners & distributors.

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The need to digitalise entertainment is strongly taking center stage in sports. The social distancing measures required to fight Covid-19 are increasing  demand for digital interactions across all industries.

The need to digitalise entertainment is strongly taking center stage in sports. The social distancing measures required to fight Covid-19 are increasing  demand for digital interactions across all industries: this August, for example, musician the The Weekend streamed the first interactive virtual concert in history drawing 2 million total unique viewers. The need to digitalise entertainment is strongly taking center stage in sports. The sports entertainment industry needs to deal with the reality of live sport events taking place in an empty stadium by reinventing the user experience of one of the most consolidated and valuable forms of TV content, introducing a new virtual social dimension.

Connected through interactivity

As attested by the huge (and to a degree unexpected) success of sport documentaries such as “The Last Dance” and “The Test”, the appetite for sports content has certainly not waned during the lockdown months and ESPN recently revealed that 64% of sports fans in the US say the prolonged suspension of live sports has driven greater appreciation. 59% also specifically reported that they plan to watch sport on TV as much as they can , indicating that this is still the key channel for fans to get their sports kicks.

While the sports entertainment ecosystem has always been ahead of the game when it comes to exploring secondary avenues for revenue and engaging with fans, Covid-19 has imposed sudden and immediate changes. Fortunately, now is also the time that new technologies such as Machine Learning and AI, in combination with Interactive TV standards (HbbTV in Europe, ATSC3 in the US) are ready to be leveraged by savvy businesses offering new fan engagement and enhanced revenue potential for broadcasters and sports content owners and distributors. It is natural therefore that we are seeing an acceleration in take up of these technologies both from the sports content owner & distributor and from the fan side. 

Fans, for example, have taken up more gaming and Nintendo reports so that digital games sales more than tripled, with 56% of sales via download in the first quarter compared to 38% a year earlier, helping them reach new users and increase profits . At the same time social media usage has increased – up 40% in the UK for example - driving content owners to start using gamificaction more creatively: think of the Premier League’s “Guess the Missing Player” for instance.

It is also becoming evident that new sports entertainment experiences are here to stay as they not only offer near-real-time data analysis and prediction capabilities on sporting action,- just think of how AWS has analysed Formula 1 data to identify the fastest driver - but also yield an unprecedented understanding of fan behaviour and preferences. In fact, the opportunities for targeted, even personalised, data-driven advertising and monetization now within reach are going to prove game changing for live sports, creating new revenue generating streams.

AI powered data analysis drawing on IoT can in fact help broaden the gaming audience across a range of devices and platforms that match user preference and engage fans, offering advertisers and third party partners a more accurate understanding of their audience. The opportunity for real-time interaction with fans is also now within reach for many sports content providers and we will soon be able to leverage analytics for third party merchandising opportunities through more accurate statistics.

Are AI, VR/AR and IoT technologies with interactive TV standards beginning to yield results?

Another important element in the race to make sports even more omnichannel and connected is the use of AR/VR. In fact, reports suggest that traditional, physical sports venues will also be expanding their engagement techniques to other platforms and will be equipping themselves for eSport and virtual reality experiences.

Sports content streaming is already very multifaceted, but it is also about to get even more diverse with content owners investing in developing their own OTT streaming services. Designed to give loyal sports fans extra insight and to keep them updated with the latest news, loyalist apps have evolved to provide a range of other services and many are branching out to deliver OTT streaming. They also provide a key opportunity for AI and Machine learning technologies to build a more in-depth understanding of the fan through the employment of pre-game wagers and trivia quizzes which contribute to reveal their viewing habits, devices used, second screen usage, content preferences, demographics and in-app purchasing habits.  

Data and statistics relating to real and fantasy sports can fuel increased engagement in the games, encouraging fans to place wagers and pit themselves against other fans in their predictions. Contests and leader boards, for example, can create highly engaging and sticky experiences making a strong game within the game,  keeping interest active and introducing a new (virtual) social dimension within sport events fruition. To do this, they rely on interactivity and on information being delivered in real-time and accurately. The image below, derived from an application and back-end systemdeveloped by Fincons Group, illustrates this interactivity:

Machine Learning is also enabling a better understanding of fans enabling viewers to  select specific action to replay, extract personalised highlights and provide direct navigation to preferred content through a smart player with key events within the video. The ability to, for example, select the camera from which to view a specific action or the Formula 1 driver to focus on with these tools, enhances both live and VOD experience and makes a more efficient use of content, as illustrated in the screenshot below:

In addition to user-engagement content, the opportunity provided by Next Gen TV for tailored, even personalised advertising is huge. Greater targeting, based on geography, demographics and actual viewer preferences provides an efficient opportunity for third parties wanting to target viewers with merchandise or products commonly associated with the specific sports experience, such as energy drinks and coffee for eSport gamers. Introducing Click & Buy into the mix can help drive the impulse purchase of third party products without the viewer ever having to exit the viewing experience or switch device.

Finally, it is clear that the potential about to be unleashed by combining AI, VR/AR and IoT technologies with interactive TV standards is beginning to yield the first exciting results. Content owners and distrbutors that want to stay ahead of the game should start trialling new engagement forms based on interactivity and technology to keep up with fierce competition. The imperative is “Be the first!”.

Alberto Niero - Fincons Group Alberto Niero

Fincons Group

General Manager Global BU Media

https://www.linkedin.com/in/albertoniero/