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Basketball fans score with new apps from Sporting News

Continuing its dedication to cross-platform publishing, Sporting News released two new apps devised to help quench its readers? desire for the latest on-the-go sports news and stats. 

In September, the company released an ad-supported iPad app through which readers could subscribe to the magazine, as well as watch videos and take advantage of an interactive scoreboard. For Sporting News, the new NCAA Basketball and Pro Basketball apps are the next steps in the strategy of expanding its digital reach.

?Sporting News is committed to fueling informed sports conversations via content, video, photos and social interactions between fans on any platform or device they choose,? said Jeff Price, president/CEO and publisher of Sporting News, New York.

Sporting News is a multi-media company best known for its biweekly magazine, which first gained notoriety for the publication?s extensive baseball coverage. The company now also covers basketball, hockey, football and NASCAR.

Sporting News enlisted Zumobi, a mobile app network, to publish the apps.

Connecting with on-the-go sports fans
To publicize the apps? launch, Sporting News is promoting through multiple platforms, including their Web site, daily digital magazine and print magazine.

The apps cater to fans of both college basketball audience and the pros?one covers NCAA hoops and the other the National Basketball Association and WNBA.

Both include features that link users to news, scores, videos standings and stats, as well as push notifications for the up-to-the-minute news.

Users can customize the app to stay updated on their
favorite team's scores and stats.

?Users can customize the apps for at-a-glance information about the games they can?t miss and receive updates on their favorite conferences and teams,? Mr. Price said.

Facebook and Twitter are integrated so that users can also share the apps? graphs and stats with their friends via social networks. 

The Sporting News NCAA Basketball app is available on Apple?s iOS and Google?s Android platforms, while the Sporting News Pro Basketball app is currently only available through the Android platform, but it is coming to iOS soon.

The company?s other apps include Sporting News Pro Baseball, Sporting News Pro Football, Sporting News NCAA Football and Sporting News NASCAR.

Monetization via in-app ads
The apps are available to users as free downloads, and ad-supported through Zumobi, which uses a rich media advertising platform called BrandBlast and publishes the apps directly.

Mr. Price said part of the reason Sporting News chose to partner with Zumobi was the company?s successful revenue-sharing model and its advertising team.

Future apps will follow the same ad-supported system.

?The partnership will eventually cover all of the major U.S. professional and college sports on multiple platforms,? Mr. Price said.