Sports all over the world

Last week, I received a report on the important subjects in the world sports community. According to the document, "GlobalWebIndex Insight reports take a deep-dive into the crucial topics of the industry. In this report, we focus on the world of sport throughout Asia Pacific (APAC), Europe, Latin America (LatAm), the Middle East and Africa (MEA), and North America, how the relationship of sport differs by region, and the potential to reach fans through sponsorship." There were a few surprises and a lot of takeaways and learnings after reading the report.

Soccer which is to North Americans as to football is to Latin Americans, Middle Easterners and Europeans is still the numero uno sport in the whole wide world. Basketball is only three percentage points behind in the 16-24 age range but the lead balloons to 28 points if you include the 55-64 age group. Soccer owns four of the five continents on the planet with American Football ruling North America. 

The FIFA World Cup is the most watched sports event in the world in four of the five continents with the Summer Olympics taking the top spot in North America. The FIFA World Cup being the most watched sports event underscores the popularity of the beautiful game. 

In three of the five continents, sports fans prefer taking in their sports through their mobile device. According to the document, "Growing data coverage, quicker download speeds, and improved screen resolution mean mobiles will soon become a very accessible way to watch live sport, along with the in-game coverage and analysis that social media facilitates so well." It is not just all these but in my opinion, all sports content must be mobile device friendly and easy. Sports websites, pages and social media accounts must be easy to navigate which gives sports fans incentive for engagement and it allows our athletes and sports heroes to interact with their fans and supporters.

In sports sponsorship, the report says, "Manchester United is consistently named as the top club in Europe's biggest leagues in terms of sponsorship revenue. United’s shirt sponsor deal with Chevrolet is the car brand’s only soccer deal – where it receives around $65 million a year on top of the $107 million from Adidas. There’s potential, however, for Chevrolet to make more of an impact among Manchester United fans. Among this group, the car brand comes eighth both in terms of current ownership and brand advocacy. Since Manchester United fans are 1.4x more likely than the average internet user to be planning to buy a car in the next 3-6 months, having a better brand-consumer relationship with these fans is paramount for the car brand.

Time may be running out, though, as Manchester United seems to be in the process of looking at a new, big-money shirt sponsorship. Chevrolet’s sponsorship ends in 2021, and it remains to be seen whether this deal will be extended with other leading brands still interested in the brand given it’s just announced record revenues of over $800 million in September.

One brand partnership involving the automotive industry that could prove to be more successful is the one between BMW and Cloud9, perhaps the largest esports organizations in the world. Our data indicates that esports fans are 1.8x more likely than the average internet user to currently own a BMW, and twice  as likely to advocate the BMW brand to others."

“Volleyball is a prominent sporting tradition due to the climatically suitable conditions, especially in Brazil where 46% watch online or broadcast TV, the third highest engagement globally behind Thailand (52%) and the Philippines (46%).” This took me by surprise, volleyball, specifically, I assume, women's volleyball content here in our country is the most watched both online and or broadcast TV. I sense a saturation of basketball online that maybe our sports fans are looking at other sports content. "Basketball fatigue" perhaps?