Cricket Gateway Awarded Best Digital Channel 2019

LAHORE: Cricket Gateway’s Youtube Channel was recognized as the Best Digital Channel 2019 at the Pakistan Digi Awards 2019. With almost 900,000 subscribers in less than 40 days, this channel brought the PSL season 4 live to over 9 million viewers in 1080p nationwide.

The Award was received by Bilal Chughtai, Head of Media and Mehvish Mumtaz, Group Account Manager - Blitz Advertising Private Limited, in a ceremony recently held in Karachi.

Ecstatic at the win, members of team Blitz exclaimed:

“This is one for the books, we never imagined that this channel partnership would reach these heights only in the first year. We would like to thank all our team members, Our JV partners, Team Youtube and our advertisers, esp. Jazz and ABL for their continued support”.

After 2 seasons and a combined viewership of over 50 million views on their website, Cricket Gateway Pakistan launched its Youtube Channel with PSL Season 4, introduced by the Blitz Group as a joint venture with Trans Media, ITW and Techfront.

During this year’s PSL Season 4, Cricket Gateway garnered an overwhelming response from the audience with over 72.4 million views and a combined unique reach of over 9 million users, making it an ideal platform for brands to advertise.

To further facilitate advertisers, Cricket Gateway partnered with YouTube to become the first ever Pakistani YouTube Channel to offer customized in-stream insertions and real time DRM (digital rights management, with over 13500 pirate beams blocked in real time). For these reasons alone 20 of the top brands in Pakistan used it this year to promote their brand message. These included giants such as ABL, Jazz, Telenor, P&G and the DWP Group.

In addition to partnering with YouTube, Cricket Gateway also shared unified ad-inserted beam with other platforms, namely Jazz, Goonj TV, Geo.tv and many others.

While speaking on the success of Cricket Gateway, Mr. Ahsen Idris - CEO Blitz Advertising shared, “It’s an honor for me, my team and the Blitz Group at large, for being recognized as Pakistan’s Best Digital Channel 2018-19. When we started out Cricket Gateway, we had big ambitions for the platform, and it is heartening to see that our aim and vision is now coming to fruition. Insha Allah, we are aiming for more than 100 million views within the next season. I would also like to thank our joint venture partners ITW and the Transmedia group, YouTube, the team at Blitz and most importantly the viewers and the brands that have over the course of last 4 years have made PSL a national –and international, success story.”

About Digi Awards

Pakistan Digi Awards is the biggest digital event hosted by six strategic sponsors and media partners namely EFU Life, Monthly Brands magazine, Jubilee Life Insurance, FHM Pakistan, Tech Pakistan, and by a panel of seven expert judges to acknowledge the people and teams demonstrating the best innovative and creative use of digital technologies.