Rogers Communications is launching “Sportsnews,” a 24-hour promotional or “barker” channel where Rogers’ subscribers can learn about its sports programming and news.
“We have pretty passionate sports fans as customers of Rogers cable,” said Anthony Antonelli, senior director, sports and on demand services for Rogers Communications.
“With the explosion of the internet and mobile viewing, we’ve done things like put the Blue Jays games on mobile and broadband, and Maple Leafs games for the season on broadband. So this is an extension of that.”
Rogers hopes to make some major noise with the new barker channel. It’s available to roughly 1.8 million of 2.3 million Rogers digital cable customers in Ontario and Atlantic Canada, on channel 999, in both SD and HD, at no extra cost.
“The new cable service will inform sports fans about everything that’s available on Rogers cable,” said Antonelli. “Our goals are to drive penetration of premium sports packages and to get people to tune in to sports services like Sportsnet – and maybe even buy pay per view events.”
In a statement, Antonelli stated, “Whether you’re at a sports bar with friends, the gym, or at home in front of your big screen TV, Sportsnews will keep you up-to-date with the day’s key match-ups, headlines, scores, stats, and breaking news through a real-time Twitter feed.”
Sportsnews uses regionally localized direct response advertising.
