 regionalize and monetize their fast-growing global streaming radio footprint with custom SaaS-based solutions.){kind=link}
Live and on-demand streaming services provider StreamGuys has announced that Australia’s Sports Entertainment Network (SEN) is regionalising and monetising its rapidly growing global streaming radio footprint with the help of its streaming and podcast solutions. StreamGuys’ SGcontrol solution, part of a custom SaaS-based package, aids content regionalisation within Australia and facilitates access to premium content worldwide through SGcontrol’s tokenisation feature. To monetise live streams through pre-rolls and mid-rolls, StreamGuys is also providing server-side dynamic ad insertions, bolstered by StreamGuys’ programmatic ad marketplace service for filling out-of-region ad inventory.
SEN, a multi-platform content and entertainment group, operates a radio broadcast network with 70 stations in Australia and New Zealand, along with several TV programmes and a publishing business. Accessible globally via the SEN App and the company’s official website, SEN’s digital platforms have experienced substantial growth in recent years, reporting 2.1 million monthly audio streams and 5.2 million monthly podcast listens in 2022.
Simon Chapman, SEN’s Digital Director, aimed to find a new partner to help SEN commercialise their live streaming platforms better, which required a more effective geographical structure for content delivery and consumer access. StreamGuys’ in-country partner, Agile Broadcast, connected the two companies to assist the SEN team with their vision.
“Localised sport is very important for the communities of the different cities and states we serve,” said Chapman. “As a rights holder to the AFL (Australian Football League), NRL (National Rugby League) and other professional sports leagues, we target specific matches to the appropriate communities. In addition, Australia has seven states, each of which has different regional wagering laws which makes geographical targeting a legal requirement. We are also careful about what we provide globally both in terms of content and advertising structures since audiences outside Australia can’t act on these wagerers.”
A regional point of presence was also important to Chapman for stream reliability and redundancy, which StreamGuys provides to the ANZ region through their Oceania data centers. StreamGuys’ local CDN presence also provided a seamless and accelerated on-ramp for SEN, which were up and running with SGcontrol’s geo-targeting and geo-location services /throughout ANZ within weeks. StreamGuys later turned on SGcontrol’s tokenisation feature for subscription-based access outside the ANZ region, and is now up and running with server-side dynamic ad insertions for all live streams.
“We hadn’t gone down the dynamic ad insertion path before StreamGuys,” said Chapman. “We have a very large global audience of Australians that live in Hong Kong, North America, the UAE and the UK. While they want access to the games that are meaningful to their home communities, it doesn’t make sense to serve them ads for local Australian businesses. StreamGuys allows us to tap into their programmatic inventories so that we can fill slots with ads that are meaningful to where listeners live today. That goes hand in hand with how we personalize content for each individual that subscribes using the tokenization feature. We can create a set of preferences for each listener and provide a true market-facing commercial offering based on demographic, location and more.”
SEN is now evaluating the same services for its audio podcasts.
“StreamGuys has delivered as advertised on their live stream services, but what impresses us most is how fast they onboarded us along with the level of technical support they bring to our localised live streams,” said Chapman. “They put localised servers in their data centers as we requested, which improved stream redundancies and reduced our operational costs. They have gone above and beyond that from a customer service level, and we are anticipate doing more with them in the near future.”
Visit www.streamguys.com