News Plus 29 Jul 2021 - 3 min read
Share  

'Not vapourware': TEG bids to rule sports and entertainment with 16m-strong universal ID, claims attribution cracked

By Brendan Coyne - Editor
TEG's plan: Understand the fan, change sports sponsorship dynamics.
  Share
Tags: first party data Universal ID TEG Andrew Reid Sports marketing

TEG, the business built on Kerry Packer's original Ticketek unit and now owned by private equity firm Silver Lake, is bidding for first party ID supremacy within sports and entertainment – and claims it can crack attribution in the real world while changing the dynamics of sports sponsorships for codes, venues, advertisers and publishers.

What you need to know:

  • TEG has combined its analytics, digital and insights businesses to create a universal ID for sport and entertainment.
  • It uses Ticketek data, a million-strong panel and other datasets to cover 16m people in ANZ.
  • GM Andrew Reid claims it can deliver real world attribution and alter the dynamics of sports rights sponsorship.

We know who goes to a cricket game and using Flybuys data, we can see that person went to a Coles store and purchased a product promoted at the game. This is something [industry] has always tried to do in a digital sense. Now we can do that with a live event. It's not vapourware – it's in operation as we speak.

— Andrew Reid, GM, Ovation

As Australia’s publishers and adtech firms battle to build out post-cookie identifiers and vie for supremacy by signing-up as many partners as possible, TEG aims to own live sports and entertainment, with one ID to rule the category.

Merging its analytics, digital and insights units under one roof, it has created a universal ID that runs across 16 million people in Australia and New Zealand, and wraps in a million-strong panel.

General Manager Andrew Reid said the combined platform – dubbed Ovation – creates “a single view of a household and all of their entertainment preferences, not just one sport or one event, but across a full calendar year.”

Attribution: “not vapourware”

The aim is to “understand the fan, and what ultimately motivates that fan to participate in a certain sport – and then tie that back to transaction data,” added Reid, claiming TEG’s partnerships with the likes of MasterCard and Flybuys closes the loop on real world physical attribution.

“We've got to a point now where we know who goes to a cricket game and using Flybuys data, we can see that person actually went to a Coles store and purchased a product that was promoted at the game. This is something [industry] has always tried to do in a digital sense. Now we can do that with a live event,” said Reid.

“So we are joining the datasets together to say ‘actually, that sponsorship did have an impact’ – and that’s not vapourware, it’s in operation as we speak.”

Sponsor beyond season

Quantifying sales as a direct result of sponsorships creates a new dynamic in negotiations between brands, sports rights holders, events companies and publishers, said Reid. “But you can also amplify the value,” he added, by using the datasets and ID to go beyond a single event – or even a single sporting season.

“You may have a deal with a sport that runs over the summer. Okay, it’s high profile, but why should the sponsorship stop at the end of the summer? With this universal ID, there's no barrier to building up that relationship with those same fans for the next nine months.

“That's exactly what we're getting to now. So there is huge upside with regards to amplification both in season and out of season,” added Reid, “and it hasn’t even been touched yet.”

Tilting media negotiations

Reid thinks quantifying the value of fans creates a clearer picture of the media value of sports for buyers, sellers and advertisers.

“If sports and events are going to start really driving media value, then a better understanding of the fan and what they're worth is going to be a critical component that feeds into media negotiations,” said Reid, with TEG currently working with the likes of the NBL and Cricket Australia.

“So we want to play a bigger role in demonstrating that a fan is actually worth considerably more to a broadcaster than they have [been valued] in the past, because we simply know a lot more about them.”

Alt-ID battle

TEG’s move comes as publishers grapple with which ID providers to partner alongside their own IDs, with the likes of LiveRamp and Unified ID 2.0 making the early running in Australia, but everything still to play for.

Reid said TEG’s ID will “handshake” with those kind of solutions, “if they become the currency” across publishers or networks. “So we're not going to be that totally universal ID. We'll lead in sports and entertainment, but still be able to work with someone else's category via aggregators at some point in the future.”

However the ID landscape shapes up – and however many partners publishers end up with – Reid thinks insight will be the critical factor, especially if everyone ultimately uses many of the same providers.

“There are two differentiators. Firstly scale and quality, secondly the ability to play a more constructive role around modelling, insights and propensity – predicting how an audience will react to a certain offer or opportunity,” said Reid.

“That is how a publisher will get to differentiate themselves with the advertiser or the agency – the ability to predict audiences more accurately [than a rival],” said Reid. “That will become critical in determining those data partnerships.”

What do you think?

Close
Support Mi3 Subscribe / Join
Search Mi3 Articles