Sports marketing can be defined as a marketing strategy that aims to promote sports events, teams, or products and services using an athlete or team.
Sports marketing encompasses both the promotion of sports brands (such as leagues, sponsors such as Betway events and teams) and other commercial products and services through the lens of sports.
From television and radio commercials to email marketing and a strong brand presence, chances are you’ll come across some form of sports marketing on a daily basis from any social media or network.
Using an athlete or team to promote a brand is the trend and has a clear reason. An athlete or team acts as influencers to have a direct impact on the audience.
For example, the image of famous brands such as the isotonic drink Gateorade, Adidas, Audemars Piguet watches, EA Sports, Gilleltte, among several others.
Other prominent athletes such as basketball player Michael Jordan have lent their name to prestigious brands such as Nike, a brand that designed the Air Jordan sneakers, sneakers that gave rise to a new line called Sneaker Heads, thus opening a new market for sports shoes associated with great athletes.
Where can we appreciate sports marketing?
Events such as the FIFA World Cup, the Olympics, the Davis Cup, and the European football leagues are events that, because they have huge audiences around the world, have sponsors such as Nike, Adidas, Puma, McDonald’s, among other brands. prestigious.
SuperBowl part-time shows generally feature big celebrities performing and there is a prime time for commercials to play, which is why companies spend so much money to promote their product during that time, as millions of people from all over The world sees the SuperBowl, which is just one of the many events you can bet on online using Betway sports betting .
Even during the low season, companies like Coca-Cola associate their advertising with prominent athletes to promote their products.
It should be noted that non-sports celebrities also promote sports brands. An example of this is Kylie Jenner who has been the image of Puma and Adidas, Rihana, who designed her sports line Fenty by Puma and Kanye West, who partnered with Adidas to produce their Yeezy collection.
All of these celebrities often promote their brands through all sorts of social media, and the reach and success of sports marketing simply becomes a global phenomenon.
What are the various sports marketing strategies?
Consumer choices are influenced when there are promotional activities by influencers and experts.
Celebrities generally have a large number of followers on social media and therefore act as the perfect choice for companies to use in their advertising to increase the reach of their product through their followers.
Companies also prefer to use world-renowned athletes in a particular sport for promotional purposes. Expert promotion turns out to be more genuine than that of random celebrities. For example, Nike has employed Usain Bolt to promote its line of clothing and shoes specially designed for track sports.
Innovative marketing strategies through the use of a certain event in sports history are also becoming the norm in sports marketing. For example, after Colin Kaepernick’s famous kneeling during the national anthem, Nike launched the campaign for its 30th anniversary with Colin leading the commercials.
Thanks to these types of strategies based on prestigious athletes, Nike reached a record high in earnings in September 2018.
Social media has changed the way of traditional marketing. They have opened up a new horizon for businesses and individuals to participate, and due to the growing popularity of smartphones, companies are employing strategies to promote their products and make them viral.
Future of sports marketing
Access to various streaming services has enabled live sports events to be witnessed and this prevailing trend will continue over time. Therefore, it is the perfect time for companies and brands to take advantage of this trend and reap the great benefits that sports marketing can generate, especially from new technologies such as virtual reality and augmented reality. These technologies will help sports brands find new ways to interact with their audience. They will bring a new level of interaction with fans as they, sitting at home, using virtual reality, will be able to fully immerse themselves in the games as if they were in the stadium.
Smart stadiums will also be essential for a new type of sports marketing to emerge in the stadium itself, where the experience will be multi-sensory and more individualized.
