For those who don't understand why "the bundle" is unraveling, and why OTT and
direct to consumer are options of interest to the content owner. It seems,
maybe even demand for sports content is not quite as inelastic as Disney had
assumed. They figured it out. People would rather bail out than cave in.
(I would not equate streaming with out-of-home viewing, which seems to be
implied in some of the words here.)
Bert
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http://www.multichannel.com/news/audience-measurement/espn-finds-viewership-grows-total-live-audience-metric/416971
ESPN Finds Viewership Grows With Total Live Audience Metric
Streaming millennials, women viewing out-of-home give network a boost
12/07/2017 2:59 PM Eastern
By: Jon Lafayette
ESPN said its move to using Nielsen Total Live Audience Measurement has added a
significant number of streaming and out-of-home viewers to its ratings,
including a good number of millennials.
After seven weeks of employing the new system, ESPN said, its millennial
audience is up 23% in total day and 28% in primetime, compared with traditional
ratings.
Overall, ESPN's viewing is up 4% in total day and 13% in prime time.
The move to total live audience is important to ESPN, which has been losing
traditional pay TV subscribers, resulting in slower revenue growth and hundreds
of layoffs as the network tries to adjust to changing viewer consumption
patterns.
Using the new methodology, millennials account for nearly half of ESPN's
measured streaming audience. Women accounted for about 34% of out-of-home
viewing of ESPN. Viewing among millennial women jumped 12% with the inclusion
of out-of-home measurement, ESPN said.
"These early findings from Nielsen tell us that Total Live Audience is the only
meaningful way to understand sports consumption, including key insights into
our millennial viewers," said Cary Meyers, senior VP of fan and media
intelligence, ESPN. "We will continue to mine this data to not only inform us
on how best to serve fans with our content, but also to guide advertisers on
how best to optimize their brand on our platform with specific audiences."
ESPN said expects its streaming numbers to further increase now that the ESPN
app is supported by Apple TV.
From Sept. 25 through Nov. 12, including streaming and out-of-home viewing
added 14% to ESPN's traditional viewership across both total day and primetime,
the network said.
Among adults 35-54, C3 ratings - the currency used for media buying - was up
18% when streaming and out-of-home were included.
ESPN's college football audience was up 16%. Monday Night Football was up 13%
and NBA games were up 18%. Among millennials, the lifts were greater, with 33%
for college football, 26% for Monday Night Football and 27% for the NBA.
The new ratings system also helped some of ESPN's pre-game and post-game
programming.
College Game Day got a 33% lift, Monday Night Countdown gained 28%, First Take
rose 19%, SportsCenter With Scott Van Pelt was up 14% and Sunday NFL Countdown
increased 16%
ESPN said streaming of ESPN on ABC broadcasts is not included in Nielsen Total
Live Audiences.
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