Women’s sports & Sponsorship

According to YouGov research, the current sports sponsorship business is worth $52 billion and is expected to expand to $90 billion by 2030. Women’s sports sponsorship accounts for only 7% of total sponsorship. Even if the proportion of women competing in leagues has increased, the quantity of sponsorship money committed to women’s sports remains low. There are multiple factors that have led to this trend in sponsorships.

According to another study, female athletes receive just 4% of worldwide media attention, making it difficult to increase viewership or popularity. As a result, it is difficult for investors and brands to recognize the prospective market as a risk to invest in. Women’s sports have been stuck in this cycle for decades. There are no huge companies to sponsor, thus there is little confidence in taking the risk to fund women’s sports. The low number of viewers is due to the lack of media coverage provided to women’s sports. This is the loop in which women’s sports has always remained.

Women’s sports, particularly women’s football, gained traction during the 2019 FIFA Women’s World Cup, when the crowd chanted “equal pay” after the US won the tournament. Since then, there has been a considerable increase in the popularity of women’s football. Fast forward to 2022, and there has been a significant shift in the paradigm. WEuros 2022 was a no-brainer. It was the most ever watched women’s sport in the world. It smashed all previous records for the most tickets sold in any prior European event. Media coverage was massive during the Euros.

There have been significant changes in the sector of media houses dedicated to women’s sports since 2020. Several social media pages, websites, and a new business focusing on women’s sports have been established. Just women’s sports and Togethxr, for example. JWS and Togethxr have a business model that is distinct from that of traditional media businesses. Sports, leisure, and culture are at the heart of these two businesses, both of these are community-driven. Billie Jean King Ventures, backed by the Dodgers, recently announced a fundraising round for nine trailblazing female-owned businesses. Togethxr is one of the start-ups chosen from more than 100 applications. With the availability of information related to women’s sports, the number of fans and the number of viewers has also increased.

Back to the initial point, sponsorship money in women’s sports is still lower. I believe this is because businesses are still underestimating the untapped potential of women’s sports. Deeper exploration reveals a significant gap in the research on women’s sports fans and what they want.  This might have been the result of a lack of data on women’s sports fans. As a result, calculating the real value becomes complicated.

The following article will go over the significance of data in sponsorship decisions and how it may affect women’s sports sponsorship globally.