Determinants of audience demand for the televised professional baseball matches in Korea: An analysis of the post-season matches from 2008 to 2016

Abstract

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine factors influencing the audience demand for televised post-season games of the Korean professional baseball league. Design/methodology/approach The data were collected from a total of 129 games - the entire post-season games from 2008 to 2016. Two dependent variables representing audience demand for televised baseball matches, obtained from the third-party television audit company AGB Nielsen, were regressed on a series of match-related and unrelated antecedent factors associated with each match. Pooled OLS regression with wild bootstrap standard errors with 100,000 replications was applied in the analysis. Findings Regarding match-related factors, higher television ratings and the greater numbers of television viewers were associated with matches with greater significance, outcome uncertainty and score sum. In terms of the match-unrelated factors, the broadcast platform appeared to be the most powerful predictor of both television ratings and the numbers of viewers. Other than the broadcast platform, night matches, matches with full stadium occupancy and team values showed positive impacts on both the television ratings and the numbers of viewers. Practical implications The sales of media rights and sponsorships are the major sources of revenues for professional sports leagues, and the size of these two streams of revenues is in proportion to the size of the audience demand for television and other media. This study provides valuable insights to the sports marketers of professional sports clubs and leagues by establishing proper understanding of the determinants of the audience demand for televised sports. Originality/value The characteristics specific to each professional league and country play unique roles in determining the antecedent factors of audience demand for televised sports; this study is one of the few attempts to examine Koran professional baseball league.