Premier League should embrace streaming, not shut it down

Last week, the moderators of the extremely popular subreddit, r/soccerstreams, announced they would cease all user and subscriber activity involving streams of live soccer games including those from the Premier League, Champions League, and many more.

This happened because the admins of Reddit threatened to ban the subreddit (a threat which actually came from the Premier League itself).

If you aren’t familiar with Reddit, soccer streams, or how it all works, don't worry. More on that later. But first, this is an absolutely idiotic, shortsighted move coming from the Premier League as it doesn’t benefit any parties involved - the league, the fans, the broadcasters, or any other stakeholders.

Moreover, this move shows the Premier League higher-ups do not understand the market, their audience, nor the future of broadcasting live sports.

The Premier should never have made this move to shut down Reddit streams and instead should embrace streaming as it is already the market’s choice for all entertainment except live sports.

Streaming is here to stay and will be the future of live sports. The sooner the Premier League embraces streaming, the sooner they will expand their reach, bring in more revenue, and please the fans.

Reddit is a user-generated news site to put it simply. Users can post links, photos, blogs, or anything else they want, usually categorized by subject called a “subreddit”, i.e. a subreddit for soccer streams, one for French food, one for new movies reviews, one for travel advice, etc.

Other users can see each and every post and either upvote it or down vote it pushing the post higher and lower in the rankings with the most popular ones eventually reaching the front page.

One thing to keep in mind, Reddit is a huge site. Currently (Jan 26th, 2019), it ranks as the 6th most visited site in the US and 17th in the world, with 53% of the traffic coming from the US and 8% of visitors from the UK in a distant second place. So, Reddit is a big deal.

And over the past few years, a subreddit called r/soccerstreams has featured streams of virtually every live soccer game, which is not hyperbole. At the time the subreddit shut down, it had roughly 425,000 subscribers according to the Independent.

To put that in perspective, the Premier League averaged only slightly more viewers in the US during the first two weeks of 2019 with 495,000+ per game, according to World Soccer Talk.

Granted, not every subscriber of r/soccerstreams exclusively watched the top flight in England, but it’s safe to say a lot did as it’s the most popular league in the world and the most popular league in the US, where a majority of Reddit users are from.

And it’s called soccer streams for crying out loud. Only the US and Canada call it soccer.

In the past few years, Reddit became the go-to site for soccer fans in the US to watch their favourite teams week in week out whether it was the league, domestic cups, or Champions League, as well as international games including the World Cup, qualifiers, and more.

So, if a huge number of fans, particularly in the US, consumed the Premier League and soccer in general through Reddit, why would the EPL want to shut down a major way that fans use to connect with the league and their favourite teams?

Those watching games on Reddit are watching for free essentially because they don’t have a TV subscription. This is the main reason the Premier League went after them.

But imagine if they did pay? The Premier League could increase their recorded viewership by 50%, 70%, or even 100% possibly as well as their revenue. More on this later. And on a side note, other streaming subreddits are already up and running so fans haven't missed out.

Technically though, these streams are illegal. Companies like NBC in the US, Sky Sports and BT in the UK, and others in their respective regions purchased the rights to broadcast the Premier League and they paid a pretty penny, to the tune of billions of dollars. Regardless of the money paid, they hold the rights to broadcast the games so no other company or individual can show the game on TV or online.

So, contractually and legally, it's easy to understand why the league pushed to shut down the streams. If a company paid me billions for this article and everything I wrote, I too would try to shut down anyone reproducing my content without having paid for it and gotten my consent. Again, it's clear why the Premier League took this action.

However, thinking practically, it was a stupid move that benefits absolutely no one.

The big question and effort put forth by the Premier League shouldn’t be ‘how do we stop these streams?’. They instead should ask ‘why do so many fans stream?’ and ‘how can we reach these fans and turn them into paying customers?’

Live sports are behind the times as every other form of entertainment has moved to streaming online. Movies and TV? Netflix and Hulu. Stand up comedy? Youtube and Netflix. Music? Youtube and Spotify. Books? Kindle. The only form of entertainment that hasn’t moved to on-demand streaming over the internet is live sports continues to use an antiquated and outdated form of broadcasting to their audience.

Sports leagues partnered with radio companies first and then TV companies in the 20th century for distribution. Without radio and TV, the only other way to watch your favourite team until the beginning of the 21st century was in the stadium. TV and radio were the distribution to reach as many fans as possible.

And did that stop fans from going to the games? No. Premier League stadiums filled up then and continue to sell out now. Look at the league now as the lucrative TV deals turned the league into the global behemoth it is. Reaching fans through radio and TV benefitted the fans and the league and streaming will do the same, especially for the younger soccer fan and international fans.

Right now, the Premier League has two distinct audiences to cater to but only recognizes one, the middle aged, 35+ crowd who pay for cable. They completely ignore the younger, 18-35 group that should be their bread and butter as the league could have these customers 30-50 years if they can hook them now.

Short term, stick with the 35+ crowd as they have the money right now. People in their 20s don't have squat. But long term, the younger generation is the golden ticket. And young people simply just don’t pay for cable.

In 2017, the Pew Research Center published a study where 61% of adults between 18 and 29 said the primary way they watch TV is streaming while only 31% say they mainly use cable or a satellite subscription. And a big reason they stated was not seeing enough value in paying for cable. In 2017, the average cable bill in the US was $100 a month. In 2018, cable bills averaged $107.

Why pay over $100 a month for channels you don’t watch with shows you don’t like and programming that just doesn’t interest you? Furthermore, you have to watch what’s on TV at a specific time.

Compare that to Netflix, Spotify, and Youtube for $10 or $15 a month or free. And you can watch anything at anytime. There is no comparison. And because of this, nearly 25 million people cut the cord (ended their cable or satellite subscription service) in 2017 and another 33 million in 2018 did the same.

TV is dying, only on life support thanks to live sports.

But why should it matter to the Premier League that so many young Americans don’t pay for cable? It matters because the majority of soccer fans in America, the EPL's most sought after market, are young people. In a Gallup Poll from January 2018, 11% of US adults 18-34 said their favourite sport was soccer, tying basketball for 2nd place behind american football.

What’s the biggest demographic of soccer fans in America? Young adults. Which demographic doesn’t pay for cable and streams everything? Young adults.

Where is soccer not the most popular sport in the world and has massive potential for growth? America. What countries do Premier League clubs target aggressively to grow their brand? America.

When the Premier League moved to shut down the reddit soccer streams, they inadvertently disconnected their biggest international audience from their product.

So what should the Premier League do? Let sites illegally show their games and lose out on a ton of revenue? No. But that doesn’t mean they stick to their same model either.

With two separate audiences, the Premier League can easily reach both. For those who still have cable, show the games on TV like they do now. No need to change. They're grandfathered in and not changing so keep it that way.

For the younger audience, the league has to stream because the younger fans won't pay for cable just to watch soccer as the evidence from the past few years shows. Netflix has nearly 150 million subscribers worldwide and more than 60 million in the US so clearly these people know how to set up an account and stream. No problems in signing up fans to stream soccer.

When it comes to streaming, the league has two options. Either they can continue to outsource the broadcasting rights like they do now to NBC, Sky, or whoever to stream online. Or the league can do it themselves.

The most likely outcome would be outsourcing the streaming to media companies. Leave the distribution to distribution experts while the league focuses on creating the best product possible on the field.

And with that, the most important factor to consider for the Premier League to convert young fans who are used to streaming for free into paying customers is two fold.

First, they have to get the pricing right. Young people don’t pay $100 a month for cable and won’t for live sports streaming either. But what do they pay monthly for? Netflix. And what does Netflix charge? $9, $13, or $16 a month depending on the plan. The Premier League’s competition for young fans isn’t the cable companies; it’s the other streaming entertainment providers.

Imagine you’re opening a supermarket in a town that already has two other supermarkets. Old Man River’s Supermarket costs customers $100 on average a month with vegetables, fruits, meats, and then a ton of other stuff most customers don’t buy very often like motor oil, fertilizer, and children’s bikes.

The other supermarket, Millennial’s, has fruit, vegetables, meats, and everything else customers need without all the extra fluff. And it comes out to only $10 or $15 a month on average for customers.

At Old Man River’s, customers have to buy a two year subscription and they’ve been losing 10-20% of their customers each of the past few years where at Millennial’s, customers can come and go as they please and the supermarket has grown year over year.

Who are you competing with? Obviously the second one, 'Millennial's'.

If the Premier League wants young fans to pay for their service, they need to get the pricing similar to Netflix, Hulu, and other online streaming providers.

Second, they should not have geographic restrictions. Right now, NBC holds the rights to show the Premier League in the US both on TV and digitally with highlights. So, an American living abroad where English isn’t the first language can't watch English language soccer coverage on TV.

Even if he did live outside the US in an English speaking country, maybe he'd rather watch NBC because he enjoys the coverage more or he wants to feel more at home with American accents.

Now in fairness, what percentage of American Premier League fans live abroad in a non-english speaking country? Probably not a lot. But just as Netflix provides programming in several other languages, the Premier League could do it too.

Sell rights to one, two, three, or more English language broadcasters and let them compete for eyeballs. If they want to have all British commentators and target the UK audience, let them. And if they want to use a mix of American and British commentators and target all English speaking countries, let them.

And the same for other languages. Sell rights to one, two, three, or more Spanish language broadcasters and have them fight for customers. Restricting coverage based on region doesn’t fit in today’s market.

Fans want to watch the Premier League and limiting broadcasts to TV cuts out the millions of young people who don’t have and don’t want cable. They’ve shown they’re willing to pay for quality content on Netflix and without a shadow of a doubt would do the same when it comes to live sports. The Premier League just have to give it to them.

Remember that NBC averaged 495,000 viewers for Premier League games in the beginning of this year. Could the Premier League sign up 100,000 people to a streaming service at $100 a year in the US alone? Easily. 200,000? Probably. 500,000? That’s where it probably starts to get iffy on sign ups because people still pay for other services like Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime, etc.

Where streaming actually supersedes TV is when it comes to advertising. The Premier League won't earn the billions in subscription fees like they get in revenue from the TV deal, but advertising can make up a lot of the difference.

With personalized accounts, the broadcasters whether that be the Premier League itself or NBC for example, can sell highly targeted advertisements and probably charge more than they do now. No more all encompassing McDonald’s commercials because the ads aren’t just trying to reach anyone and everyone, but a specific target customer. Just like Facebook sells aggregated customer info to advertisers, the Premier League broadcaster can do the same.

Regardless of if you like Facebook or other companies selling your information to advertisers, it's better to see ads for products you're interested in than nonsense that's you'd never consider.

During the World Cup, Fox showed the same damn Landon Donovan and Marco Fabian commercial at least 5 times a day in the US. But how many customers switched over to the banking giant? They spent a lot of money on showing ads to customers that will never spend a dime on their services.

Or you know what? Don't worry about targeting ads and just simulcast the TV feed and online stream. Kill two birds with one stone and please every fan who wants to watch the games.

And why not do this….provide games on an individual basis. Bundesliga fans may not watch the Prem regularly but they tune in for Man City/Liverpool or Man United/Man City. How about charging $2 or $3 to watch that single game?

This season, TNT started showing the Champions League on TV in the US and also had every match live on their partner’s streaming service, B/R Live. They offer packages for the year, a month, and individual games.

ESPN+ offers Serie A, the FA Cup, and more for only $5 a month. Facebook streamed Champions League games before in the US and now has them in South America.

The new rights cycle starts next year for the Premier League and Amazon Prime will show two full match days domestically in the UK.

It may not have taken off yet, but streaming is the way of the future when it comes to live sports.

If the Premier League started streaming games right now, how much could they make? $100 million is probably a safe estimate from both subscribers and advertisements in the US. Now, that pails in comparison to the billions NBC paid so that’s the reason they haven’t done this yet. But they'll need to.

Just like embracing any new technology, first movers have their positives and negatives. Will the Premier League not make as much money in the beginning? Sure. Will they make more in the long run? Guaranteed.

The upcoming rights cycle sold for less than the previous one and while one data point doesn’t indicate a trend, the overall picture does. From cord cutting to the rise of streaming in general, the future of live sports is online. That's where the audience is and that's where the broadcasts will have to go.

The Premier League recently pushed to shut down the popular subreddit, r/soccerstreams, and it showed just how out of touch the executives are with the market and their audience. Fans won’t go without as new subreddits with streams already popped up to show games.

So the Premier League can either fight its audience and restrict games to TV in an antiquated model or catch up with the times and start streaming.

Many fans want to give the Premier League and/or NBC money to watch games but they’re too stubborn to do so and in the process ignoring and pissing off millions of fans. They are letting fans and revenue slip through their fingertips.

At some point, they’ll have to change their ways. Hopefully sooner rather than later.