Sky Sports subscribers

[LeoJC]

How many Scottish Sky Sports subscribers are there?

[Daniel0210]

@LeoJC 
You aren’t addressing Sky Customer Services here. This is primarily a customer helps customer forum so we aren't going to know the answer to that. As you mentioned 'Scottish Sky Sports subscribers' and not 'Sky Sports subscribers in Scotland' Sky won't know either. 

[d2h]

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@LeoJC wrote:

How many Scottish Sky Sports subscribers are there?

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Sky don't break down subscription numbers anymore and report on the entire Europe-wide operation. Pre-Comcast, they did used to report UK numbers in isolation but even then, it was never broken down into home nations.

Sky will of course have the data but as it's considered commercially sensitive, it will not be released in the public domain. 

[oj01]

I don't recall Sky asking if I was English or Scottish when I joined. 

[LeoJC]

I wonder why it would be considered "commercially sensitive"…

[LeoJC]

Can a Sky employee please provide the information I am requesting, please?

How many Sky Sports subscribers are subscribed from Scotland?

Thank you.

[caesarome · Accepted solution]

Nobody will post that information for the reasons already stated and in any case the large majority of people posting on here are customers and not Sky employees.

[nolte]

@LeoJC why do you need to know?

[LeoJC]

@caesarome 

I'm seeking this information for a thesis I am working on in relation to Telecommunications and its relationship with Football. To suggest it would be considered "commercially sensitive" gives the impression it insinuates concealing information for deceptive purposes. It is an unacceptable position if this turns out to be the case.

[Daniel0210]

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@LeoJC wrote:

@caesarome 

It is an unacceptable position if this turns out to be the case.

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@LeoJC 

Sky might say it's not acceptable to divulge such information on a public forum. 

[Doc5907]

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@LeoJC wrote:

@caesarome 

I'm seeking this information for a thesis I am working on in relation to Telecommunications and its relationship with Football. To suggest it would be considered "commercially sensitive" gives the impression it insinuates concealing information for deceptive purposes. It is an unacceptable position if this turns out to be the case.

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@LeoJC Sky simply won't provide this information to you for your thesis.

Its not deception or concealment, they just don't provide that type of information....to anyone.

[nolte]

One of the reasons it may be commercially sensitive is when it comes to bidding for sports rights.  So if bt sports know sky sports have 500,000 subscribers in Scotland, this affects how much sky are willing to pay for Scottish football.

One avenue you might look at is Sky Media as this is designed for selling to advertiser. I don't think they will give any information but the site could be useful for you.

Good luck on your thesis

[japitts]

Most companies will consider subscriber & customer data as commercially sensitive to varying degrees.

[d2h]

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@LeoJC wrote:

@caesarome 

I'm seeking this information for a thesis I am working on in relation to Telecommunications and its relationship with Football. To suggest it would be considered "commercially sensitive" gives the impression it insinuates concealing information for deceptive purposes. It is an unacceptable position if this turns out to be the case.

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@LeoJC 

I would hope that somebody writing a thesis is able to understand the fundamentals of what commercially sensitive data and information is. To suggest it insinuates information is not disclosed for deceptive purposes is not the case. 

All companies regard certain data as being commercially sensitive and a much better way to understand it is to think of said data as being so informative that it would affect the ability of the business to work competitively. 

Be it subscriber numbers, procurement costs, sales figures, development plans - that's all commercially sensitive.

As somebody quite rightly notes, any competitor can gauge Sky's cost ceiling for bidding at auctions for live rights (as just one example). If they have x000 subscribers to a particular suite of channels in Scotland, rivals can use the reserve price + incumbent price paid last time, estimate their ceiling based on paying customers, and place a conservative 5-10% increase on their own bid in order to try to win the rights. Being armed with subscriber data before the auction would put y company at an advantage over x company. 

Would it be as big an issue if y was smaller than x? Probably not. But when x is the market leader, y already knows they must be competitive - subscriber numbers to such a detailed degree would make their competitiveness much stronger but it would also disappoint the selling party. Such data could make a product seem much less valuable if only x000 are subscribed to see it in a particular town/city/county/home nation. Such an outcome could see rivals not submit a bid or, as is more likely, submit a much lower offer. This scenario would virtually guarantee that x walks away with the rights again for little to no increase on the previous deal. 

[rscott]

Sky only publish total customer numbers for Europe - they don't even break it down by country, let alone into TV and broadband, so are highly unlikely to disclose the information you request.