With major events such as the FIFA Women’s World Cup and the US Open, 2019 has proven to be a monumental year for sports, with millions streaming content across their phones, desktops and connected devices. 10 years ago, streaming live sports when and where you want would have sounded like a myth.
Pioneers like fuboTV have paved the way when it comes to live sports, giving viewers the opportunity to watch sports whenever and wherever they’d like. In 2015, fuboTV was started as a live TV streaming service for soccer. Since then, the company has shifted from carrying some of the biggest names in sports such as NFL, MLB, NBA, MLS and international soccer, to also offering some of the most popular shows, movies and news.
With extensive experience in OTT ad sales, Chris Flatley, VP of ad sales at fuboTV, sat down with SpotX to discuss the convergence from linear to digital, and what’s on the horizon for fuboTV.
SpotX: We know that streaming sports is really the bread and butter for fuboTV, but what has the evolution been like for fuboTV now that the offering extends to movies, shows, etc?
Chris Flatley: When fuboTV started out, we were focused solely on sports, specifically soccer. As our audience grew, we noticed a demand for more content, which led to increasing the sports content available. Today, we offer a variety of content for all viewers, not just for sports fans.
SpotX: What do the average viewers of fuboTV look like, and how are viewers consuming content?
Chris: The viewers typically skew towards young families, early tech adopters, who are seeking a replacement for traditional cable and satellite. As a subscription based product, our entry package starts out with a certain number of channels and genres, and the user can build off of that with the different types of content we have available.
The interesting thing we’ve found about how users are consuming content is that 90% of our audience is being reached across connected TV. While they have access to other means of consumption for the content, it’s primarily on the big screen in the living room.
SpotX: What are some of the short term goals you have on the horizon for fuboTV?
Chris: From an ads perspective, the goal is to continue scaling our business. Offering advertisers what they are demanding today in OTT; whether that’s addressable, data, or attribution to help close the loop on a buy. We’re looking to continuing to push the envelope and innovating within those spaces.
SpotX: What are you excited about for the future of fuboTV beyond 2019?
Chris: Well, we’re really excited about the launch of fubo Sports Network, which is our first entry into programming original content, curated and produced by fuboTV, with our valued consumers in mind. The model around that is it will live as its own free channel across the leading OTT platforms. We’re rolling it out first on XUMO and smart TV platforms like Samsung TV Plus and LG Channels powered by XUMO with plans to follow on more major OTT platforms in the weeks after.
Learn more about the fuboTV and SpotX partnership in the full interview with Chris Flatley below:
fuboTV | SpotX from SpotX on Vimeo.