Could an esports channel one day rival ESPN?
The esports industry has seen enormous growth over the last few years thanks to games like League of Legends and Dota 2, as well as livestreaming platforms like Twitch.tv. The industry has repeatedly proven to be highly valuable to both developers and advtertisers, and one analyst says all the data is there to support an upcoming explosion in the esports market.
“The media business is about eyeballs, and audiences are turning up in droves for the likes of Defense of the Ancients and League of Legends,” media consultant Prashob Menon wrote in a recent report on the future of esports. “Any media company looking to protect or establish an empire would be foolish to look down on such an opportunity, however arcane.”
Menon compared data from Twitch to other popular sports channels, and he demonstrated that the viewer count and engagement in esports rivals real sports broadcasts. According to Menon, Twitch averaged 600,000 simultaneous viewers for the month of March and reached 51 million people worldwide. “This consumption is so great that Twitch is already larger than 70 percent of American television networks, as well as Amazon’s own OTT video service,” Menon wrote.
He also noted that 70 percent of Twitch’s viewers were under the age of 35, placing them in the magical demographic that advertisers shell out major sums of cash to capture. It is also the same demographic that is becoming progressively harder to reach thanks to its tendency to turn to online entertainment rather than network or cable television.
One of esports’ biggest advantages over traditional sports, says Menon, is the low cost of its content. Services like Twitch pay almost nothing for their content as it is entirely user-generated. Esports are also not limited by location, and both players and fans can enjoy the games from anywhere.
“In many ways, esports have the potential to become the world’s first truly global sport,” Menon wrote. “[Esports] are not just inherently global – they depend on connecting fans and players worldwide.”
He added, “A network that builds the necessary structure, stability, economics and community engagement could find itself with an empire that rivals – or even surpasses – ESPN’s.”
photo credit: IMG_0331 via photopin (license)
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