Premier League (IV): TV broadcasts, media exposure and fandom of the EPL in China

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‍‍What can be learned from the Premier League about local development?

As the first Premier League club to open up a branch in Mainland China, Arsenal has a louder voice than anyone else about China’s market development. Tony Gu, Arsenal Business Director in Asia remarked, “Chinese market still has huge potential. For instance, we estimate that the number of Chinese fans has exceeded 10 million. However, we can only just reach out to 5 million of them on social media which is far less than via offline campaigns. Therefore, we shall try all means to reach out to all of our fans and interact with them directly. Meanwhile, we have to figure out a way of providing services to our partners and potential partners in China. Compared to other football leagues,the Premier League has done a perfect job in commercial development globally, but in China, we still should be humble and offer service to Chinese fans.”

Tony Gu also explained the reason Arsenal put their sales mainly online, and not in shops, “We do not need more shops. People could buy things online by clicking their mouse. We could create an environment for fans and allow them to buy things online. But we still have bricks and mortar experience stores. In China, Arsenal is going to open up some experience retail stores in big cities. ” 

How will the development of Premier League in the Chinese market be visualized? 

‍‍‍‍Li Jiang, the Executive Director of Yutang Sports gave the following speech.  ‍‍

The Premier League’s development needs to be considered from a big environment. Let’s recall what Wang Jianlin,Co-founder and Chairman of the Dalian Wanda Group said about sports. The respected business leader was among many who invested in the sports sector. At the beginning, many people had doubts about his decisions because he offered a price of 10billion RMB to purchase Swiss sports marketing company Infront Sports & Media. He has depicted sports as an important strategy during Wanda Group’s 2015 mid-year meeting. He mentioned that the sports sector in China has continued to grow at a rate of 35% annually for the past six years. This is No. 1 in the world. 

Entertainment provides mental satisfaction, but sports can provide both physical fitness and mental happiness. Sport offers better participation experience which cannot be achieved by entertainment. Currently, the ideas and mindsets of most Chinese entertainment shows are borrowed from abroad, therefore lacking originality. On the contrary, most sports content are original. So the next great era must be sports. 

As to the current stage of development of the Premier League in China, I believe we should mainly consider two aspects. The first one is the league’s media exposure in China. This first aspect is the most crucial element for all sponsors. Except CCTV, Premier League’s games are broadcasted on 20 local stations, including Beijing, Shanghai and Guangdong, the three most important cities. Additionally Jiangsu Province and Shandong Province are also very important. Key cities in these two provinces have given the sports sector a very large role in the growth of their regional GDP. 

In addition to TV exposure, three major websites have also joined the roster –Sina, Tencent, and Letv Sports. Many people have formed a habit of using the Internet to watch games apart from TV. So the addition of online streaming gives sponsors more choices and opportunities to interact with users. 

Premier League’s teams are the most proactive in the Chinese market and have made the biggest effort to build on the opportunities. Even though Arsenal is not one of the top two clubs in the EPL, they have penetrated the most here. Many people come to China to make money, but have lacked the principle foundations. There are many matches in China right now, but the sponsors could be considered very amateurish in their approach to sport. Why? The reason is many people want to earn quick money, which is not correct. 

The last aspect is regarding product types. As for the Premier League, we should consider 3 dimensions: the width, the depth and the length. The width is all about broadcasting platforms. As for the depth we can improve this in three ways. First we should cooperate with all the TV stations, making full use of all the resources. Secondly we should integrate internet resources, mainly those of the 3 websites, Tencent, Sina and Letv. I believe that currently there is no truly super giant among them when it comes to the number of service users and clients. Thirdly, since all the fans follow players, I suggest clubs cooperate with players on a deeper level to keep the fans. The last dimension is the length. After cooperation with EPL, we can take fans to the UEFA Champions League and the World Cup. After all, each season has its duration. It is thrilling seeing the two moves of Super Sports: the Carnival and the Chinese Campus Tour.

To cater to users and clients, products have to be designed according to different seasons. We should have partners at different levels, home and abroad since many clubs don’t have partners in China. And also we should embrace creativity. There are many forms of marketing other than virtual adverts.

‍‍(From left to right: Zhang Shanshan, Searching Product Marketing Director of Sogou, Zhao Jun, VP of Super Sports, Li Jiang, Executive Director of Yutang Sports, Dr Allen Tsaur, Senior VP& General Manager of Asia Operations,Cooper Tire, Gu Tong,Business Director of Arsenal Football Club Asia, Wei Jianglei, Senior VP & General Manager of Sports Business, Sina, Xiong Bingjie, host from Super Sports and Han Mu, founder of Lanxiong)

‍‍Broadcast rights of EPL continue to reach new highs. For us who are part of EPL’s broadcasting chain, the main issue of next season is how to play to our advantages and make use of league resources to unlock the true values of the EPL. ‍‍

Proofread by Raymond Fitzpatrick.