WARC’s Global Media Trends report is estimating brand spend in sport to top $60.9 billion globally. With social media taking center stage -- and with the “Summer of Sport” kicking off major events like the FIFA World Cup in the US, Canada, and Mexico in two years -- there’s a lot for brands and their sporting alignments to play with when it comes to this cultural shift.
Sporting Stans
In the past, only athletes with an otherworldly game were crowned with superfan status -- superstars like Jordan, Kobe, Brady, Messi, and Ronaldo. While the idolization of GOATs will always exist beyond team fandom, athletes no longer need to be the best in the game to have mass appeal as an individual star.
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Fandoms are now growing around athletes who use their social posts to express their interests off the field, such as avid gamers Alphonso Davies, Lando Norris, and Josh Hart. Fans are also following those who use their platforms to drive social change, such as Marcus Rashford, Simone Biles and Naomi Osaka. It’s a far cry from team-controlled media appearances and post-game interviews, where athletes have historically toed the party line and become personality vacuums.
Thanks to social media, fans can form emotional connections with the athletes they love that go beyond their performances on the pitch, field, or court. Today, the opportunity to see an unfiltered look into athletes’ personal lives—what impacts their performance, their relationships with their teammates, their connection to what’s happening in culture, and even their moral and political beliefs—is making them more accessible -- and more real. More like us.
This insight has precipitated different behaviors from fans. Just like pop culture stans, online fans are publishers and pundits in their own right, creating fan accounts, custom art, edits and supercuts of their favorite athletes. They rally behind their guys, actively engaging in the comments section, even sending verbal shots at rivals in defense of their heroes.
Check out the comment section of any Instagram post about Messi. You won’t find a single Messi hype post without the comments section taken over by Ronaldo “fanboys.”
Beyond Performance
Brands looking to break through the ever-crowded space of sports marketing can take creative inspiration from creator fans, as well as the content athletes put out themselves. Tapping into the multitudes of athlete talent to find untold stories or points of relatability are how brands can create greater impact with their audiences.
Partnering with athletes whose personality and values align with the brand and their target audience, and then leaning into that personality to capitalize on fan engagement, is the cheat code for winning with today's passionate fandoms. Consumers want to see brands tap into the niche interests, personal struggles and triumphs that make them feel connected to these athletes on a deeper level.
For these new social-savvy fandoms, it’s not only about performance and winning (although that’s always a factor). Engagement is built on creating conversation around and interaction with the athlete.
It’s through this shifting cultural lens that new metrics are evolving around brand and sports collaborations, and how brands tell their stories.
This post was previously published in an earlier edition of Marketing Insider.