In The live streaming of the season four of IPL by Times Internet Limited (TIL), the official digital partner of IPL, in association with Google, has witnessed a 31% jump in online viewership. In the last years tournament there had been 55 million page views globally, whereas in the season four there is 72 million page views globally. This is an indicator of the fact that now there is an acceptance of online streaming for live sporting events in India against established mediums like television.
The page views solely from India went up 79% over last season at 43 million, up from the previous year number of 24 million. There were five million page views for the final match of the tournament alone this represent the highest single-day online viewership for the tournament. Naturally the advertisers who invested in the online arena are a happy lot. They have got enough bang for their buck.
Last year BCCI had scrapped the earlier deal with World Sports Group over allegation of improper payment of facilitation fee. World Sports Group had in turn transferred the rights to Elephant Capital-backed Global Cricket Ventures. After the Times consortium won the global tender for media rights for a period of four years starting from 2011, Times Internet entered into a partnership with Google in April this year to broadcast 74 live IPL matches on YouTube.
Times Internet incorporated the live streaming and match highlights with all kinds of ad formats such as clickable video ads, dynamic banners, flash innovations and page skinning. Many of the hits came from smartphones and other handheld devices, which are mostly preferred by the younger generation. Now Times Internet has entered into a digital partnership with the National Basketball Association (NBA) of the USA to launch a section exclusively for NBA on the Times of India website.
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