Streaming

[Shockster]

It's up to the individual to decide if they think it's value or not.  My point was that if you don't have a license, then using a VPN makes you invisible and as such can't be detected. 

[IainB]

6 hours ago, mikebv said:

I have read comments around how cheap it is at £10 compared to going as eg "all the family can watch" with the suggestion that if you paid to watch it live the cost of two admissions at adult level and two at kids level, with food, drink etc would be around £50 to £60..

I think that misses the point..

The stream needs to be aimed at those who dont attend Speedway regularly but know it exists and maybe used to follow it, and also the many thousands of fans around the country who have no affinity to either side on show.

And the amount of 'families' who go is minimal when up against those who attend alone I would say..

If I wont pay £18 to watch it live now, then I probably wont pay £10 to watch it on TV..

Especially given you can watch so much Speedway on BT, Eurosport and Premier from the comfort of your armchair, (which you have already shelled out a good few quid a month for)..

I would imagine given the pandemic the streams will be a perfect time for a 'toe in the water' to see how it goes, and I hope it goes well..

But going forwards when up against the Satellite broadcasters who can provide around 15 to 20 meetings a month for circa £60, then I would think the £5 per meeting price point will be nearer the mark than a £10 one to get fans to purchase the meetings 'regularly'..

Maybe with the technology of today, the stream could be blocked locally around the home teams area to encourage fans to attend, but to be honest I would think that the vast majority of regulars who still go now would go anyway, so it's not really them you will appeal to via a stream. Unless its maybe 50/50 if a meeting will go ahead due to poor weather, but even then you will still be getting some revenue in rather than zero if they stay away as many do at present when it looks like a meeting could be called off..

The target audience for any stream has to be the utopian "everyone who follows the sport in the country that wont be there in person", which is a massive market even for Speedway..

On a 'normal' week, if every track had a meeting I would suggest 20,000 to 25,000 or so will attend, many of whom will watch 'any speedway' on TV...

I would also suggest at least that many again (and probably many more) still follow the sport but hardly attend (if at all). These people currently pay no money directly into the sports coffers yet many will have used to put "plenty" in until they finally 'gave up' with UK Speedway. Yet still watch as much of the sport as they can via TV. 

You only have to look at the high 5, and sometimes over 6 figure viewing figures for Sky and BT over the past ten years, to see that the interest is still very much out there in the UK to watch domestic Speedway..

Get the pricing right and it could be a real winner for the sport as a collective, however, I do think that working as a collective is the key..

If clubs do it as individuals, and stand alone, then I dont think it would be anywhere near as successful as all working together to share costs and share profits, maybe with exclusivity deals to broadcasters to maximise that potential and deliver a consistent quality of stream.. 

Speedway has more % 'neutral' fans than a great many other team sports, fans who just love watching the racing, so streaming could be a great way to harness that and make some real money for the sport as a whole..

Streaming really could be a game changer for clubs and the sport in the UK, with, as just one example, more revenue coming in from local businesses who can build their brand awareness by advertising during the stream to the locality that they serve. Speedway has so many natural breaks it would be perfect to use some of the time as advertising slots..

But again, it will only ultimately work if that price point is right and you get enough people to sign up to it regularly..

One wonders if British Speedway actually knows who their demographic is, I know it likes to think of itself as a "family sport" but from what I see on the terraces it seems to be an old persons sport even though the competitors probably see it as an extreme sport, so who do you aim your stream and pricing at? I don't agree that "the stream needs to be aimed at those who dont attend Speedway regularly but know it exists and maybe used to follow it" or the neutral... I consider myself a fan of F1 but have never been to a race, having said that I do subscribe to the F1 channel, I also quite like to watch the odd Football match but would never pay to attend one or watch one on PPV TV... it's really quite complex when you start to think about it.

Maybe they could/should be looking to team up with their "broadcast partner" to see how this can be made financially viable, maybe using the Eurosport Player

[IainB]

22 minutes ago, Booey boy said:

I could not find it online.Also the product they put out has got to be worth paying for look at the so called Bfitish final very poor line up not worth paying to watch

I think the "Bfitish final" is hopefully a one off in these current circumstances, I think the wider topic under normal circumstances is an interesting one

[George Dodds]

13 hours ago, MattK said:

Let's say £5k for arguments sake.

Do you think it would be easier to persuade 500 people to pay £10 each to stream the meeting or 1,250 at £4 to stream the meeting? I'd say 1,250 at £4 is a far easier sell than 500 @ £10.

but 500 people at £10 is not £5000. Immediately remove the cost of collecting the fees, let's say they use ~Paypal and it's 50p per transaction, then immediately you've lost £250. Many other costs will increase through volume - admittedly some may decrease - but simple maths doesn't do it. Twice as many watching at half the price will almost certainly not generate the same income.  

[hammer1969]

27 minutes ago, Booey boy said:

I could not find it online.Also the product they put out has got to be worth paying for look at the so called Bfitish final very poor line up not worth paying to watch

People have to buy a TV licence and lots of stuff the BBC put out doesn't interest everyone at least paying to watch a live stream you can choose if you want.  I'll be watching on Saturday regardless of line up, one a race starts anything can happen at least you get a result unlike a football match where you watch for 90 minutes and it's still 0 - 0 when it finishes.

[Booey boy]

13 minutes ago, hammer1969 said:

People have to buy a TV licence and lots of stuff the BBC put out doesn't interest everyone at least paying to watch a live stream you can choose if you want.  I'll be watching on Saturday regardless of line up, one a race starts anything can happen at least you get a result unlike a football match where you watch for 90 minutes and it's still 0 - 0 when it finishes.

I've been watching all the polish and Swedish speedway 

[Booey boy]

41 minutes ago, Shockster said:

It's up to the individual to decide if they think it's value or not.  My point was that if you don't have a license, then using a VPN makes you invisible and as such can't be detected. 

I have a vpn checkedmost of the sports steaming sites but ould not find it

[Shockster]

8 minutes ago, Booey boy said:

I have a vpn checkedmost of the sports steaming sites but ould not find it

That's because it was Pay per view.

[Booey boy]

50 minutes ago, Shockster said:

That's because it was Pay per view.

I can get other pay per view steams ?

[Shockster]

This was not on TV though.

[Najjer]

On 9/25/2020 at 9:54 AM, iainb said:

One wonders if British Speedway actually knows who their demographic is, I know it likes to think of itself as a "family sport" but from what I see on the terraces it seems to be an old persons sport even though the competitors probably see it as an extreme sport, so who do you aim your stream and pricing at? I don't agree that "the stream needs to be aimed at those who dont attend Speedway regularly but know it exists and maybe used to follow it" or the neutral... I consider myself a fan of F1 but have never been to a race, having said that I do subscribe to the F1 channel, I also quite like to watch the odd Football match but would never pay to attend one or watch one on PPV TV... it's really quite complex when you start to think about it.

Maybe they could/should be looking to team up with their "broadcast partner" to see how this can be made financially viable, maybe using the Eurosport Player

I think you've summed this up pretty well actually.

I've said for a long time British Speedway is marketed poorly and has for a long time used the 'family sport' banner, which I think is completely wrong. Speedway is just about the most extreme sport you can get, no brakes, 70mph and flat out on a dirt track with 4 riders spraying dirt everywhere. None of this nice family night out. As an extreme sport, Speedway could sell with the correct marketing drive behind it.

[arnieg]

Last night seemed to be a success. The obvious questions now are:

How many people subscribed? and

Where do we go from here?

[IainB]

17 minutes ago, arnieg said:

Last night seemed to be a success. The obvious questions now are:

How many people subscribed? and

Where do we go from here?

When I tuned in and saw the rain I thought here we go, we're in for a night of high farce and what is the stream rain off policy? In the end it turned out to be quite an entertaining meeting.

I do hope the price point for the behind closed doors meetings is not going to reflect the pricing policy for when crowds are eventually allowed back. And you have to wonder why they've gone down the SportCentralTV route when their "broadcast partner" already have a streaming setup available on the market. Maybe it's because the Eurosport deal has been put on hold, I'm not sure as this seems to be a bit of a grey area. But Chris Louis did mention last night that Eurosport have many ideas for British Speedway, we'll see in the fullness of time no doubt. Eurosport charge around £5 a month for Eurosport player... which I'd happily pay to watch some British Speedway, in fact I'd happily pay £5 a week

Edited September 29, 2020 by iainb

[OveFundinFan]

I hope not too many subscribed for last night. £12.95 is too much, if a lot subscribed then £12.95 could be a norm. I would go fo £7-£8 for top league racing

[mikebv]

My local football team (Stockport County), are charging £7.50 per game and free to season tickets purchasers..

I wouldn't think that £7.50 is too far away from what Speedway clubs could charge I would think given County are fifth tier, non league..

It's a one camera operation with the usual local radio commentary..

[Ben91]

I watched last night and the quality of the stream was generally not bad. My only grip is that it was hard to make out some of the commentary over the sound of the bikes at times. 
 

I watched last night but I wouldn’t make a regular habit of paying almost £13 to stream a meeting. When the viewership figures come in I hope the fact that it was the British final and the fact that we’re in unprecedented times come into play. I certainly wouldn’t have paid £12.50 to watch the challenge meeting from Belle Vue last week, perhaps a fiver would have piqued much interest. 

[SteveLyric2]

1 hour ago, iainb said:

When I tuned in and saw the rain I thought here we go, we're in for a night of high farce and what is the stream rain off policy? In the end it turned out to be quite an entertaining meeting.

I do hope the price point for the behind closed doors meetings is not going to reflect the pricing policy for when crowds are eventually allowed back. And you have to wonder why they've gone down the SportCentralTV route when their "broadcast partner" already have a streaming setup available on the market. Maybe it's because the Eurosport deal has been put on hold, I'm not sure as this seems to be a bit of a grey area. But Chris Louis did mention last night that Eurosport have many ideas for British Speedway, we'll see in the fullness of time no doubt. Eurosport charge around £5 a month for Eurosport player... which I'd happily pay to watch some British Speedway, in fact I'd happily pay £5 a week

I'm sure I've read somewhere (Speedway Star?) that the 5-year Eurosport deal has been deferred to start in 2021, with the full agreement and support of the Eurosport Management.

[AFCB Wildcat]

The British Final was my first experience of streaming and I was impressed with the professionalism of the whole production.

Unfortunately I couldn't watch it live but did it on catch up first thing this morning after work. I used my basic smart phone & Chromecast to my TV and all was good except the occasional pixelation on some shots but fortunately not during the racing. The only thing I struggled with to start with was not being able to accurately move it on to the start of the racing i.e. skip the build up accurately from the window on the sport central site but I later found I could do this better from the Google home app.

Personally I have no issue with the price. I've paid more for 2 pints of beer in London! I hope it was a success for the production company and if that's the price it takes to make it happen I'll happily pay it for future events. 

If it wasn't for the Covid restrictions I'd be paying around £30 admission for football plus another £40 or so in the pub before & after plus travel costs to away games. I rarely get to see live speedway since Weymouth's demise because I work nights Monday to Thursday and can only do weekend tracks so to stream speedway and Football for a little over £20 isn't breaking the bank for me but I understand everyone's circumstances are different so I'm not criticising anyone. 

 

[Daniel Smith]

Think we need some perspective here. Some are saying £12 is to much for streaming, even if it's a Premiership meeting. 

The thing is, clubs would still have to cover the same costs. With standard entrance at £18 how many would actually stay away from stadiums to save £6?? I'd say A LOT. Once you factor in fuel, programme & food, the opportunity to watch your team on the sofa, £12 is cheap.

Meetings online when the fans are allowed to return will not be financially viable unless the cost of a stream matches the admission costs imo. 

[mikebv]

42 minutes ago, Daniel Smith said:

Think we need some perspective here. Some are saying £12 is to much for streaming, even if it's a Premiership meeting. 

The thing is, clubs would still have to cover the same costs. With standard entrance at £18 how many would actually stay away from stadiums to save £6?? I'd say A LOT. Once you factor in fuel, programme & food, the opportunity to watch your team on the sofa, £12 is cheap.

Meetings online when the fans are allowed to return will not be financially viable unless the cost of a stream matches the admission costs imo. 

Not sure..

I would be nterested in the 'odd' streamed meeting at £7/£8 but probably wouldnt attend any matches 'live' all season as not really interested in following the sport under it's current operational model of "not being a proper team sport"..

So I would watch it like I currently watch Sweden and Poland, ie "just watch the racing" for what it is..

And that could be any teams not just Premiership teams

In fact, charge me £20 a month for a full streamed season ticket's racing, and the sport could get circa £120 or so out of me that they currently wouldn't get one penny of..

I would suggest there are many, many more thousands who still follow the sport actively via satellite broadcasts, on here, and via Speedway Star, than actually attend domestic Speedway regularly, with many from defunct tracks and many who basically "gave up" on British Speedway.

Ardent followers of the sport but who basically dont put anything at all into the coffers of the sport over here..

So a potential huge market for a streaming service to aim for I would think.. 

And who knows, maybe it could rekindle interest enough to persuade some to go back and visit the stadiums again?

Edited September 29, 2020 by mikebv