WAN-IFRA: What are the last trends of sports news market in Greece?
Stavros DRAKOULARAKOS: The sports vertical could not be immune to trends that concern all thematics of publishing (and, needless to say, not only in Greece), namely the rapidly growing importance of multimedia content and the evolution in content consumption accelerated by social media and smartphones.
Given however the attractiveness of sports video, the fans' desire to access information "right here, right now" and their tendency to share and express their passion, it is more than evident that the transformation of digital sports publishing will be more rapid and more profound.
WAN-IFRA: In Media 24 group, how much importance is attached to sports news and which issues do you face in your efforts to develop your business?
SD: 24 Media is Greece's largest digital publisher so sports is just one of the content areas we have invested - others include general news, technology, entertainment, weather, lifestyle, automotive and so on. Nevertheless, sports remains at the epicentre of our strategic development not only due to record traffic numbers but also because it offers superb context for maximum engagement with users. Still, formidable challenges remain for all sports publishers in all countries, notably the issue of content rights that we expect to remain problematic for the foreseeable future.
WAN-IFRA: 24 Media is very present on mobile, could you explain your strategy (paying or free apps, premium services, etc) and inform us about results you got? For your users, what is your "added value" on this platform?
SD: In a relatively nascent marketplace such as mobile publishing, one would be well advised to test various approaches and learn from experience while it is still early days.
We have tried a combination of policies, ranging from paid apps to free mobile-optimised sites to white label b-to-b sales where we operate as the outsourcee.
Each experiment scores differently in the key parametres of brand engagement, audience building and revenue generation - elements we take into account in our strategic planning for the next two years.
WAN-IFRA: On 4 February next, you'll share your experience with sports dilemmas entitled "Seri by Sport24." But what about others online sport games develop by Media 24? Did you get profitable results (audience, profit, new advertisers, etc)?
SD: We have tried and tested our fair share of games over the years.
Fantasy leagues, office "pools", sports trivia, these were all introduced throughout the past 6 years in our network with remarkable results, bringing in new and engaged visitors, providing advertisers with an additional sales channel (especially in short term events such as the World Cup) while at the same time boosting our traffic.
Seri by Sport24 is all of our "lessons learnt" in one game, it's the next-generation of sports games.
Interview by Sandrine PROTON, Events Manager WAN-IFRA South West Europe.
