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June 8, 2023

Hang Media Out to Serve Communal, Participatory Viewing Trends

Hang Media has raised ~$5 million between its seed and ongoing Series A round to build out a platform that hosts athlete-led video watch parties during sporting events (think: ManningCast). Former Madison Square Garden Company CEO Hank Ratner, Chicago Bulls center Andre Drummond and NFL Hall of Famer Andre Reed are among company’s investors. 

But the 18-month-old startup is not looking to serve as the home of alt-broadcasts. It sees ‘the game’ as a reason to gather and entertain, not as the entertainment, which aligns with how Gen-Z thinks about and consumes sport.

“Gen-Zs don’t want to sit at attention and be broadcast to,” Jon Klein (co-founder and CEO, Hang Media) said. For them, the game is “the opportunity to get [online] and track their bets or their fantasy [lineups], to watch highlights or engage with friends. [The demo] expects their media to be participatory and communal.” 

Hang is working to deliver memorable second screen viewing experiences, by creating opportunities for fans to connect and interact with one another and their favorite players, that sit alongside the traditional three-hour game broadcast. The early returns suggest the startup has tapped into a fundamental behavioral trend.

“The [audience] numbers and duration [spent viewing] are staggering,” Ratner said.

The average Hang stream draws 800,000 spectators for 80 minutes. 40% of those viewers are between 18 and 34 years of age.

Fans are interacting on second screens when watching live sporting events. So, it’s no surprise there are startups trying to capitalize on the complimentary viewing opportunity. 

However, few, if any, have found the success Hang has to date in terms of attracting users and sponsors. 

Klein, who previously served as the president of CNN U.S., believes that is because of how the company presents its watch parties.

“Younger users are bombarded with sensation constantly,” he said. Other platforms “load [the screen] up with a lot of gizmos. They think [the experience] has to be noisy. We think it has to be real.”

At its core, Hang is trying to facilitate authentic human connections and deliver unfiltered storytelling.

Its platform gives fans the chance to feel as if they are “in the same room with people they never in a million years thought they would have been face-to-face with,” Klein said. The athletes will often refence their names. “And because of the length of a game, [any façade that may exist] melts away. Nobody can perform for that long.”

That leads to thoughtful and engaging conversation fans will often struggle to pull away from.

That dynamic is not unlike the popular athlete-led watch parties that exist on cable. The difference is the bulk of those programs are limited by the linear television format.

“And that’s not where Gen-Z’s head is at,” Klein said. “They put a game on and then they’re gone [doing other things].”

Of course, that is not unique to sports. The demo consumes all its entertainment in that fashion. 

The sooner rights owners/holders embrace the idea, the better off they’ll be. Some still see second screen and alt broadcasts as cannibalistic to the main feed.

Hang has proven that is not the case and that communal viewing experiences can keep fans tuned into the game broadcast longer. 

“[Many] live sporting events aren’t able to keep people for an hour and a half,” Ratner said. 

Hang's high engagement levels help to explain why marquee brands like Coke, Wells Fargo, Academy Sports & Outdoors, and Dave & Busters have all signed on as sponsors. The company's partners also enjoy the platform’s reach and the digital advantages it can offer, like information sharing and product integration, as well as the brand association they get with the athletes who participate.

Hang has shown capable of delivering targeted audiences too. It put on an interactive watch party for Miller Lite around Super Bowl LVII that drew one million viewers from the Midwest. Sammy Watkins and collective of other former Chiefs hosted the event.

“The players were drinking Miller Lite and fans could buy it on screen,” Klein said. “We [ended up driving] 1,000 deliveries over the course of the game.”

Hang tries to use current athletes for its watch parties where possible as they resonate best with Gen-Zs. They’re also more likely to have a younger, digital-first audience that would be inclined to tune in.

Sponsors underwrite Hang events, so there is no cost for fans to participate.

The platform limits the number of fans on-screen to 40 per quarter (they want everyone to get the chance to talk). But there is no cap on the number of participants in the accompanying text-chat stream. A typical live Hang will draw 10,000-20,000 fans to the platform. 

The remainder of the ~800,000 users who tune will do so on-demand in the week following the event. Hang distributes its content across Twitch, YouTube and Facebook.

“It shows you people’s thirst to listen to athletes and influencers talk about relevant things [openly],” Ratner said. 

Every hang is profitable on the basis of sponsor revenue in versus athlete expenses and marketing costs out. 

Klein said there are plans to add ticketing functionality and “a self-serve version of [the platform], where athletes can just publish links to a Hang at their convenience and invite their friends in.” 

Athletes would then be able to charge fans to join those private video chats. Drummond has started to test the offering.

Hang also has plans to unfurl a B2B strategy. It envisions businesses rewarding valuable clients or top earners with a unique interpersonal athlete experience.

Klein believes it all adds up to a massive business. 

“The horizon is limitless because [watch along streaming] is going to become fundamental to the viewing experience,” Klein said. “You won’t be able to be in the media business without having a communal and participatory strategy.”

That’s not just in sports, but across the entertainment landscape. 

Twitch already serves the function within esports. So, it’s fair to wonder why the platform cannot do the same for stick and ball sports.

Klein explained that the Amazon subsidiary, which was built for gamers, operates too fast. 

“We’re also face first in our thinking and orientation,” he said. “They’re mostly text chat.”

That’s not by accident. 

Klein learned from former CBS media executive Don Hewitt that “television is not a visual medium. It’s a medium for connecting people.”

Building an independent media brand is a heavy lift. We use this space to shine a spotlight on some of our favorite sports, media and finance content creators. We hope you will check them out. 

The Sunday Column by Roger Mitchell

Roger Mitchell's Sunday Column and his podcast Are You Not Entertained (AYNE) explore the uncertain waters of sport and finance to try and better understand the risks facing the sports business. Recent Story: Explaining open sports leagues to Logan Roy

Excerpt: Open leagues in Europe are beautiful, and utterly our DNA, but they are destroying us. The status quo hasn’t been working for a while, causing so many instabilities in the whole system. Rugby, the same.All of this has been the basis of my own thesis of inevitability in the direction of travel.  Many think you can find a balance in European football. Keep open leagues, and all the tradition, but yet still control the market forces.

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