Sports Media Report
Minute Media, parent company of 90min, today announced the launch of 12UP, a new sports media platform focused on U.S. sports, featuring authentic and social-first content created by everyday sports fans. Building off the success of 90min, the world’s fastest growing football media platform, now with 47 million unique visitors, 12UP will cover both on and off-the-field stories by tapping into the passionate and authentic voice of citizen journalists.
“With 12UP, we’ve found a new, differentiated lifestyle voice in sports,” said Rich Routman, President of Minute Media. “We believe 12UP fills a void in the sports media landscape for fans and brands, especially given the scarcity of sports media brands that can deliver the millennial audience at scale.”
Powered by Hydra, Minute Media’s proprietary content management and publishing engine, 12UP features short form, rich media content that starts with social and brings users into a mobile-first experience.
“We are excited to expand the Minute Media platform to 12UP and the U.S. audience,” said Asaf Peled, Founder and CEO of Minute Media. “We have built our business by turning the typical publishing business model and experience on its head. Enabling fans to drive the conversation, through our content curation engine, has built scalable editorial volume that is unmatched in our industry.”
12UP gives fan contributors, brand advertisers and publishing partners the opportunity to connect with sports fans in a unique and differentiated way throughout the entire ecosystem.
· For Contributors: Sports fans can create, publish, and distribute their own content, sharing their passion for the game with millions of users. Powered by Hydra, citizen journalists, many of which are social influencers, can create articles, quizzes, slideshows, videos, listicles, and endless other multimedia content to tell the stories behind the game, integrating sports into pop culture.
· For Brand Advertisers: 12UP is the only sports property that earns brand advertising dollars through authentic storytelling, employing a cost per engagement model for the first time in sports. 12UP’s editorial team creates and curates stories that weave brands into sports organically, giving advertisers complete ownership of the brand experience and content offering. 12UP also features best in class programmatic technology for targeted media trading, automating the sales process beyond the core social-first content creation platform.
· Publishing Partners: Hydra’s powerful content management system can easily distribute 12UP content, whether at scale or via customized content, broken down by demographic, language or sports/team, to fit our publishing partners’ needs.
“While digital sports experiences, advertising technology and editorial approaches have dramatically changed over the last decade, most of the advertising opportunities are a direct copy and paste from previous years,” added Routman. “We believe now is the right time to pivot the commercial model and get back to earning brand advertising dollars through engaging social-first storytelling.”
12UP has been in private beta over the last two months, quietly building up to reach more than 4 million unique users, 85 percent of which have come through mobile, with 70 percent of that audience being 18-24 years of age. There are currently more than 100 new pieces of content being developed by citizen journalists and 12UP’s editorial staff on a daily basis.
The launch of 12UP comes during a time of continued growth for Minute Media. Last October, the company closed a $15 million round of funding, bringing its total funding to $45 million, led by leading venture capital firms Battery Ventures, Dawn Capital, Gemini Ventures, North Base Media and ProSieben. Across Minute Media properties, audience growth has climbed from 7.5 million unique visitors up to 47 million global unique visitors in the past 18 months, with more than 110 million monthly users engaging with Minute Media content through social platforms. Minute Media has offices in London, Tel Aviv, Singapore, and now New York and Miami.
