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2020 was a year of change for most businesses in the World. Many businesses went down the drain while many tried to survive via acclimatization. The normal protocol was disrupted, and new norms were set for almost all sectors.
This doesn’t exclude the sports industry as there were disruptions in normal daily activities. Teams and events tried all they could to meet up with a standard yet preventing the spread of the deadly COVID-19.
Like many other sectors, the sporting industry experiences digital transformation to provide excellent services for its customers. This, therefore, causes an open loop for various forms of innovations in 2020.
However, due to how the sectors were digitally transformed, there are predictions regarding sports marketing trends to look out for in 2021 in the nearest future.
Sports Marketing Trends In 2021
Over the Top Contents
OTP contents are contents (including video, audio, and other forms of media content) delivered over the internet without the involvement of a multiple-system operator in the content’s distribution.
Some of the classic examples of OTT contents are those that Netflix, Amazon Prime, and Facebook offer. Most of them now give room for streaming possibilities, thereby allowing users to access soccer irrespective of where they are using any device.
Neil Horowitz, who is Greenfly’s Product Marketing Director stated that more football teams will get the services of creators who are creating content that have to do with the team, or are fans of the team.
Also, most of these platforms have ample information about their users and thus, can engage in a targeted advertisement. All these will enhance sports marketing, and that’s where the industry is already heading to.
Artificial Intelligence (AI)
The usefulness of artificial intelligence is already seen in many other sectors. However, its usefulness is just surfacing in the sporting industry. For example, the legendary club Arsenal has already created a chatbot named Robert Pires.
The bot communicates with fans and provides them with results, statistics, news in humorous and simple language. This
Some of the advantages of chatbot in sports marketing include
- It can give room for the team to build more fan loyalty and reach out to new different groups of people.
- It will also help in strengthening the brands of sports marketers in the business-to-business segment.
- It can also help in collecting data of fans for proper marketing
Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality, And Mixed Reality
Before now, virtually all online shops struggle with the very high customer acquisition cost due to the free delivery options that most of them offer. For example, a customer can place an order for different sizes of a product to test which one fits them perfectly, after which the rest are returned.
However, with the advent of VR, AR, and MR, the cost of acquisition has greatly reduced as most products can now be tested virtually.
But how does this affect sports marketing? Most sport shoes can now be tested virtually even before the order is placed. With this, the customer can easily see what they are ordering and thus make the best decision.
According to Kyle Waller, Digital Executive at the Premier League, it won’t take too long before tickets are being marketing via virtual reality lenses.
Wearable
One of the major markets expected to experience a superb change is the sports industry’s wearable market. In fact, according to a study, the global sales of wearables are expected to be close to 100 Billion US dollars in 2021.
With the current situation, things are already moving in this direction as Nike, a leading company in wears production, created an amazing product – shoes- that are perceived as one from the future. Another great invention is that from Digitsole, which was presented in Munich 2019.
According to Adam White, Office Sport’s CEO states that 2021 will see the consolidation and verticalization and of sports properties across the World. And this is exactly what is happening already.
Women in Sports
Before now, the dominant sex in the sports industry is the male gender. However, with the current situation, the industry is now gender-mixed. This has been associated with the rising number of women as a strong group of buyers.
This was recognized as an opportunity by ISPO, which is why they created the Connecting Women program. The program is designed for committed women. Also, other companies causing a stir up in the industry is North Face. The company launched her campaign titled “She Moves Mountain.” This campaign is specifically for women in sport. The Government of England is also one of those strongly addressing the female population.
Jon Scammell, Chelsea’s International Market Lead stated that they will observe more revenue of women’s sports, sponsorship revenues, record audiences, and TV right deals.
Seniors in Sport
Most of the pictures used in sports advertisements are extremely that of sporty and active people who are full of life. However, more seniors ‘older people,” are coming into the market. The reason for this is two-sided. One side is the fact that the target group of senior citizens is already growing very fast.
On the other side, the group is an extremely financial string and is becoming much more demanding. One of the most successful and active campaigns designed for seniors is that from Canada titled “Make Health Last.” The motto of the campaign was “what will your last ten years look like?”
To be successful in sports marketing, it is important to know what is most likely to happen in the nearest future. However, it is not certain that all the trends will surely come to pass. But they all have a higher chance of becoming a reality. Some of them are already a reality. As a sports marketer, you should keep your eyes open and always follow the trends.
Wrap Up
There are many more sports marketing trends popping up every day, and it cab be hard to keep up with them if your business revolves around this. However, you can get the help of a reputable sports marketing agency to get the stress off you.The above are only a few, but the future seems promising with many more options. The great part about these trends is the job opportunities that come with them, which is something every marketer should watch out for.
