THE 14TH ANNUAL SHORTY AWARDS

The Shorty Awards honor the best of social media and digital. View this season's finalists!

Special Project

Special Project
From the 12th Annual Shorty Awards

B/R App: Making It Easy to Be a Sports Fan

Winner in Sports & Fitness

Audience Honor in Sports & Fitness

Objectives

The main goal for Bleacher Report is to make it as easy as possible to be a sports fan. 2019 marked a watershed year in making this even more a reality. It marked a period of rapid growth for the B/R app with the introduction of new functionality making it an all-in-one sports platform offering the fastest alerts in the industry, premium content distribution, and groundbreaking social features.

As the most engaged sports app in the world, the B/R App delivers by telling the news first, executing first-in-class packaging and curation, immersing fans in their favorite pastimes with a sense of community -- making it a one-stop destination for sports fandom.

Strategy and Execution

When it comes to strategy, the B/R App places one thing in mind above all else: make it easy to engage with your favorite sports. 

We’ve created a completely personalized user experience allowing users free reign over what they want to see, when they want to see it, and if they’re alerted about it or not. Users choose which sports, teams, and even players they follow to receive content tailored to their interests. What’s seen in-app is carefully programmed and curated by sports enthusiasts for sports enthusiasts to ensure a valuable experience for sports fans. 

The Bleacher Report app is also the first sports app of its kind with seamless social functionality - which builds community and engagement. We debuted “fires,” which are our version of likes, direct messaging, group messaging, AMAs (Ask-Me-Anythings), and content sharing within the app. These features exist in tandem with comments, replies, and expanded profile customization. Every social feature we build is designed to develop a community of sports lovers who want to find their fan counterparts and engage with their favorite sports. 

When users open the app, they’re immersed in their favorite sports and put in contact with fellow fans. Images are tight and bright. Text is conversational and light. Videos stream as you scroll through threads. Alerts yell the news first, and often do so with HD video or rich media that add to the story. 

No other sports app on the planet takes as much attention to detail, builds meaningful community, or tells the news faster than the B/R App. 

Results

With more than 1 billion engagements in 2019, the B/R App was earned the mindshare of millions of users along with the most valuable real estate in the world - the phone inside their pocket. When it comes to the all-important ‘stickiness’, the App is opened 4x per day on average - making it the most popular sports app in the U.S. Over the past year, the B/R App saw a 145% increase in engagements.

These platform-like numbers are a direct result product of the new functionality and features introduced to the app. 

With the fastest alerts in the sports app industry, real access to big-name athletes like Russell Wilson, Julian Edelman, and Metta World Peace via B/R App AMAs (Ask-Me-Anythings), community threads that garner constructive conversation, and a seamless user experience for highlights, news, and lifestyle content; the numbers prove that the B/R App makes it as easy as possible to be a sports fan.

Media

Video for B/R App: Making It Easy to Be a Sports Fan

Entrant Company / Organization Name

Bleacher Report

Link