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Case Study: Shaping a New Era in Sports Media Coverage

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The sports media landscape has long grappled with gender imbalance in coverage, limiting the representation of women’s achievements and stories. A reference group put together by Sport New Zealand, including sports leaders and academics, concluded that the largest driver of visibility for sport is media coverage. Sport New Zealand recognised the need for a transformative change and commissioned Isentia’s Insights team to produce an ongoing annual report delving into these critical issues.  The challenge was to uncover actionable insights that could reshape the narrative around women in sports.

Sports media and gender

Solution:

Leveraging its extensive media monitoring and analytics expertise, Isentia’s Insights team worked closely with Sport New Zealand to conduct a comprehensive study. The aim was to understand the current state of gender representation in sports media, analysing 100 media items per day from 1 January – 31 December 2022 and identify areas of improvement. By analysing a vast array of media data, the Insights team pinpointed trends, disparities, and potential strategies for change.

Implementation:

One of the largest of its type, this study analysed over 42,000 media items in its first year, using human-driven media analysis to examine how athletes, sports leaders, and teams are portrayed in news media. The research resulted in a meticulously detailed report, dissecting media coverage of women in sports. Isentia’s Insights team examined coverage nuances to highlight key findings like the surge in women’s sports coverage due to New Zealand hosting events, and the evolution of focus areas between male and female athletes. The report serves as a powerful resource for understanding media dynamics and the impact of sporting events on gender balance.

Results:

Compelling insights that have ignited a paradigm shift in the sports media landscape. The report underscored the remarkable 28% surge in women’s sports coverage and its correlation with hosting events in New Zealand. This data-driven approach can empower stakeholders, brands, and media networks to make informed decisions. The insights are a catalyst for fostering inclusivity, driving gender equality, and refining communication strategies within the industry.

Sports New Zealand case study mockup

This commissioned work between Isentia’s Insights team and Sport New Zealand serves as a testament to the power of data-driven research in fostering change. By shedding light on gender disparities in sports media, the case study exemplifies how media monitoring and analytics can lead to meaningful transformation, shaping a new era of balanced and inclusive sports coverage.

Key findings sport new zealand

Curious about the transformative power of insights and research for your organisation? Let’s chat! Reach out to explore how data-driven strategies, like those that elevated Sport New Zealand’s impact, can reshape your success story. Connect with us today!

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Australia has been a hot destination in higher education for international students, but with recent policy changes and growing anxiety around housing, the student journey has seen a shift, impacting intake into the top Australian universities and making the process a bit unpredictable.

In our analysis we also zoom into the Southeast Asian region, where we uncover what priorities drive students from this region to apply at Australian universities, how housing plays a role and what kind of career outcomes they would expect post-study.

In this report we analyse over 3k posts across social and online media to unpack:

  • How Australian universities are navigating a "crisis of governance" and public trust, with intense media scrutiny on budget deficits, leadership accountability, and long-term financial sustainability.
  • How the rapid integration of AI is seen as both a transformative academic toolkit and an existential threat, forcing institutions to prioritise AI literacy and redesign assessments to combat risks like deep fakes and academic misconduct.
  • How shifting Australian migration policies have made policy safety the primary concern for Southeast Asian students, influencing how they weigh university reputation against visa hurdles and long-term career ambitions.

Reflecting on the media reporting from 2025 provides institutions with the tools to craft communication strategies that address both the domestic demand for accountability and the international student's need for security and value.

Please fill in the forms below and access our reports to get a deeper insight on audience sentiment and behaviour when deciding an education and career in Australia.

Access the SEA insights report here

Access the ANZ insights report here

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Analysing Australia’s higher education landscape in 2025

A deep dive into how global audiences perceive Australian higher education and the university sector with a spotlight on the SEA region.

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The media landscape is accelerating. In an era where influence is ephemeral and every angle demands instant comprehension, PR and communications professionals require more than generic technology—they need intelligence engineered for their specific challenges.

Isentia is proud to introduce Lumina, a groundbreaking suite of intelligent AI tools. Lumina has been trained from the ground up on the complex workflows and realities of modern communications and public affairs. It is explicitly designed to shift professionals from passive media monitoring back into the role of strategic leaders and pacesetters. 

“The PR, Comms and Public Affairs sectors have been experimenting with AI, but most tools have not been built with their real challenges in mind.” said Joanna Arnold, CEO of Pulsar Group. 

“Lumina is different; it is the first intelligence suite designed around how narratives actually form today, combining human credibility signals with machine-level analysis. It helps teams understand how stories evolve, filter out noise and respond with context and confidence to crises and opportunities.”

Setting a new standard for PR intelligence

Lumina is centered on empowering, not replacing, the human element of communications strategy. This suite is purpose-built to help PR, Comms, and Public Affairs professionals significantly improve productivity, enhance message clarity, and facilitate early risk detection.

Lumina enables communicators to:

  • Understand & Interpret: Move beyond basic alerts to strategically map the trajectory and spread of narrative evolution.
  • Focus & Personalise: Achieve the clarity necessary to execute strategic action before critical moments pass.
  • Execute & Monitor: Rapidly deploy strategy firmly rooted in real-time, actionable insight.

Get a demo today: Stories & Perspectives module

We are launching the Lumina suite by making our first module immediately available: Stories & Perspectives.

In the current fragmented, multi-channel media environment, communications professionals need to be able to instantly perceive not just how a story is growing, but also how it is being perceived across different stakeholder groups.

Stories & Perspectives organizes raw media mentions into clustered, cohesive Stories, and the Perspectives that exist within each, reflecting distinct media, audience, and public affairs angles. This unique functionality allows users to:

  • Rise above the noise: Instantly identify which high-level topics are gaining momentum or fading from attention.
  • Get to the detail, fast: Uncover the influential voices, niche communities, and specific channels actively shaping the narrative.
  • Catch the pivot point: Precisely identify the moment a story shifts—from a strategic opportunity to a reputation risk—or when a new key opinion former begins guiding the conversation.

"Media isn’t a stream of mentions," said Kyle Lindsay, Head of Product at Pulsar Group. "But rather a living system of stories shaped by competing perspectives. When you can see those structures clearly, you gain the ability to understand issues as they form, anticipate how they’ll evolve, and act with precision. That’s what we mean when we talk about AI built for communicators, and that's what an off-the-shelf LLM can't give you."

The Lumina Roadmap: AI tools for the future of comms

The launch of Stories & Perspectives is the first release of many. Over the upcoming months, we will systematically roll out the full Lumina roadmap, introducing a comprehensive set of AI tools engineered to handle every phase of the communications lifecycle.

The full Lumina suite will soon incorporate:

  • Curated media summaries: AI-driven daily summaries customized specifically to the priorities of senior leadership, highlighting only the most relevant stories.
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Want to harness the power of Lumina AI for your PR, Comms, or Public Affairs team? .

Complete the form below to register your interest.

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Announcing Lumina: The purpose-built AI suite for PR, Comms, and Public Affairs

An intelligent suite of AI tools trained on the language, workflows, and realities of modern public relations and communications.

Ready to get started?

Get in touch or request a demo.

Contact us Request a demo