Singapore
Asia's no. 1 sports broadcaster ESPN STAR Sports has launched the sharp new version of its popular website www.espnstar.com today, offering sports fans a total sports content experience with the real time, comprehensive, authoritative and innovative content and at the same time offering advertisers a expansive range of customized and creative advertising opportunities.
With a comprehensive range of sports content across an unparalleled breadth of sports, www.espnstar.com brings together expert and credible insights and analysis from ESPN STAR Sports' stable of pundits and Asia's most knowledgeable and popular sports presenters in the form of editorial columns, blogs and podcasts. In addition, sports fans can get real time updates on the latest sports news, results, statistics, player and team updates and live scores of key sports from across the globe. Another highlight is the new, embedded video player which delivers news & updates along with programme highlights from ESPN STAR Sports' original productions, which makes for a richer user experience.
The website has been developed based on the findings from a comprehensive online media consumption research conducted across Asia. Over 70 contacts points, in the form of interviews, focus groups and online discussions, were carried out to better understand the habits, preferences and requirements of different sports fans across the region. The website also underwent rigorous consumer testing at various stages of development to gain a better understanding of actual consumer behaviour for online offerings.
Said Manu Sawhney, Managing Director, ESPN STAR Sports, "As Asia's leading sports broadcaster, we are committed to serving our fans by providing them with the most comprehensive and entertaining sports content across multiple platforms and the new espnstar.com complements our broadcast and mobile offerings. It is an important initiative for us at it helps us in engaging our viewers beyond our broadcast channels and at the same time creating more business opportunities for our partners in terms of increased flexibility in effectively targeting and communicating with the audiences across markets and better meeting the brand communication objectives".
The new www.espnstar.com dramatically enhances the experience of web visitors with a fresh and user-friendly layout, with web pages categorized by sport and an intuitive application that serves different geographic requirements in a customized manner to target specific audiences. Content will be tailored according to regional sports preferences, such that visitors from South East Asia will see more football content and visitors from India will see more cricket-related content.
Advertisers will have many reasons to smile as the new website offers more creative opportunities in form of customized and well-targeted campaigns, new and innovative branding options and the means to track feedback and monitor results in real time.
Sporting a new logo to signify the equity and appeal of ESPN and STAR, the website kicks off with comprehensive and dedicated coverage of the upcoming Euro 2008, with an extensive line-up of features including LIVE score updates, daily updates on teams and players, expert match predictions, match previews and analysis, post-match podcasts by ESPN's resident football pundit Steve McMahon, former Liverpool midfielder and England International and exclusive video clips of special programmes and updates for Euro 2008.
The website continues its extensive coverage of the upcoming Wimbledon Championships and Asia Cup cricket tournament in July in similar fashion, with live score updates, in-depth analysis by our presenters and expert analysts, and exclusive features and interviews on our video player.
About ESPN STAR Sports
ESPN STAR Sports is a 50:50 joint venture between two of the world's leading cable and satellite broadcasters. As Asia's definitive and complete sports broadcaster and content provider, ESPN STAR Sports combines the strengths and resources of its ultimate parent companies - Walt Disney (ESPN, Inc.) and News Corporation Limited (STAR) - to deliver a diverse array of international and regional sports to viewers via its encrypted pay and free-to-air services.
ESPN STAR Sports showcases an unparalleled variety of premier live sports from around the globe 24 hours a day to a cumulative reach of more than 310 million viewers in Asia. ESPN STAR Sports has 17 networks covering 24 countries, each localised to deliver differentiated world-class premier sports programming to Asian viewers. This includes ESPN Asia, ESPN China, ESPN Hong Kong, ESPN India, ESPN Malaysia, ESPN Philippines, ESPN Singapore, ESPN Taiwan, MBC-ESPN (Korea), STAR Sports Asia, STAR Sports Hong Kong, STAR Sports India, STAR Sports Malaysia, STAR Sports Singapore, STAR Sports Southeast Asia, STAR Sports Taiwan, and STAR Cricket.
On the ground, the ESPN STAR Sports Event Management Group manages and promotes premier sporting events around Asia. ESPN STAR Sports aims to reach consumers at any time, any place and through all new media platforms, both internet and mobile. The multi-lingual, online platforms, espnstar.com, espnstar.com.cn and espnstar.com.tw and footballcrazy.tv interact with millions of users providing them with in-depth sports news, results and competitions. Developed for the sports fan that is constantly on the move, mobileESPN and STAR Sports Mobile delivers differentiated mobile content targeted at its various audiences. mobileESPN enables the serious sports fan to follow their favourite sports more closely than ever before with a combination of specially produced video news clips, in-depth news coverage and analysis. STAR Sports Mobile aims to provide interactive and entertaining opportunities to engage with sports, delivering exclusive video excerpts from leading football clubs Arsenal and Liverpool as well as highlights from STAR Sports original programmes covering opinions, instructional tips and the latest online game reviews.
Source: ESPN STAR Sports (Business Wire India)