Home Team Sports has always been a hidden gem for Fox Sports, pulling in easy revenue and significant profits by selling national advertising for regional sports networks.
Now that Fox has sold HTS to Playfly Sports -- a move my friend Michael Smith first reported nearly three weeks ago-- expect to see slight tweaks in the way it conducts its business. Craig Sloan will take over as HTS president, with Kyle Sherman transitioning into an advisory role.
One of Sloan’s first orders of business: put more emphasis in the way HTS studies fan behavior. One of the selling points HTS uses while selling against national outlets is that RSN viewers typically are much more emotionally connected to their teams than viewers on national outlets.
“Our main premise is to putt brands in front of fans,” Sloan told me. “There are a lot of benefits that go along with those kind of emotional connections, from understanding fan interest and behaviors as well as figuring out ways for brands to make a connection there.”
