New England Sports Network launches streaming platform (Score 49)

New England Sports Network (NESN) launched the first-ever regional sports network digital subscription service. The platform, which is called NESN 360, will allow users to stream live programming and on-demand shows. This includes live Red Sox & Bruins games, highlights and original shows. NESN 360 is compatible with iOS, Android, Apple TV and Roku. In other news, NESN hired Ahmed Darwish as its CMO earlier this year. Darwish joined the network from Starz, where he served as the product and marketing VP. 

According to Pathmatics, NESN earned 831.1k impressions YTD through desktop display ads (98%) and mobile display ads (2%). It placed 100% of these ads directly onto bostonglobe.com and bloguin.com. It spent about $10k on digital display ads YTD, a significant increase from $2.4k spent in this channel during the same time period of 2021. Full-year spend jumped from $2.1k in 2020 to $54.1k in 2021. 

Sellers-- NESN primarily targets male Gen-Z and millennial sports fans in the New England area. It has been ramping digital spend up since the beginning of 2021, and I see no signs of it slowing down any time soon. It also invests in OOH, print and local broadcast TV ads, per Kantar. I predict the new CMO will continue increasing spend to promote NESN 360. Those of you that can offer ad space in New England should get in touch with the network's DMs. 

Agency & martech readers-- To the best of my knowledge, NESN is not currently working with any agency partners. Reach out to Darwish to see if he needs any assistance promoting the new streaming service.