ESPN digs in its past in order to highlight its future.
The sports giant supported by Disney, from Thursday evening, during the broadcast by ABC of the first match in the NBA final, gives fans a taste of his first days as well as a suspicion of what will happen. An ESPN promo will include images of some of the first minutes indicated on the wired network when it made its debut in 1979. At the end of the sticker, however, ESPN will highlight its ability to interact with sports fans via mobile devices, and it will praise its ubiquity with the game game using a new slogan: “Sports forever”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=75due__2ylu
All this occurs while ESPN is preparing to kick off a new streaming service of $ 29.99 per month which aims to give subscribers access to everything it offers on a single platform. The new service – simply nicknamed ESPN, like its flagship linear network – will compete before the next NFL game cycle, and Disney aims to convince customers to bring it together with other wide -band offers such as Disney + and Hulu.
In the months preceding the launch, the company “wanted to make sure that ESPN was above the mind”, explains Jo Fox, vice-president of sports marketing outlet, during an interview. “We show the passion that fans for life, but also how ESPN played a role in connecting fans thanks to technology.
The new service is considered essential to the fortune of ESPN and its Disney and Hearst owners, who are struggling with an exodus of subscribers, from traditional cable to demand for demand. ESPN and ESPN2, which should each have 61.4 million subscribers at the end of 2025, will probably see these figures go to 57.9 million and 57.8 million respectively by the end of 2026, according to Kagan data, a Global Market Intelligence research unit.
Nostalgia may seem a strange way to invoke the future, but ESPN leaders believe that the long history of the network gives it the credibility that others are lacking. “When you say,” sport forever “, words are words, right? Said Sinan Dagli, executive director of BSSP, the agency that helped ESPN create the promotion. “We have evidence.”
Some Disney rivals are also focusing on streaming sports fans this fall. Fox Corp. Aims to launch a new autonomous streamer, Fox One, which will make content from its linear portfolio available to consumers who do not subscribe to a cable or satellite service. The offer will include the Fox Sports NFL and MLB games.
ESPN aims beyond its immediate fans base, explains Fox. The objective is to obtain a large group of some 60 million consumers who do not subscribe to traditional television plans to consider the new ESPN streaming place, she says.
The spot presents original images of the “Sportscenter” anchor Lee Leonard opening the first program of this longtime program. “If you are a fan … What you will see in the coming minutes, the hours and days to follow can convince you that you have gone to sports paradise,” he said. Viewers are quickly shown from the protruding facts of the ESPN over the decades, ranging from classic moments to Stuart Stuart Stuart Scott by pronouncing the slogan “Booyah!” to the advertiser Mike Breen shouting “Bang!” ESPN personalities, notably Adam Schefter, Pat McAfee, Malika Andrews and Dick Vitale, make cameos.
At the end of the place, viewers see a fan obtained an alert from the ESPN mobile application-and it looks like the famous audio “DA-DA-DA. DA-DA-DA “which is so part of” SPORTSCENTER “.
ESPN plans to manage the sticker in many Disney media, emphasizing digital places as well as on open -air places.
“Sports Forever” may not last so long – who can say? – But there is certainly a desire to keep it in use. “We do not see it as a kind of sort of place,” explains Fox. “We love it because it is fun, but it is obviously extremely relatable. It also has a lot of different ways to activate it. So we certainly think of the way we do this, continuing.”
