Great summer of sport

Audience engagement

The women’s world cup, Wimbledon, the cricket world cup and the netball world cup are just a few of the exciting sporting events happening in 2019. As well making great viewing, they also create a unique opportunity for brands to embed themselves in the audience’s psyche through sponsorship, influencer marketing and celebrity endorsement.

For the Women’s world cup Nike lead the conversation after the success of the US team’s victory. Its last advert shared via twitter celebrating the win has had over 378,000 shares and likes combined from 20.5 million views! The tournament certainly captured the imagination of England supporters – with viewing figures for England’s quarter final a record 7.6million in the UK. Following the success of the tournament, investment into women’s football is at an all-time high and attitudes towards equality are moving in the right direction.

A fashionable take on sport

Wimbledon is as well known for its tennis as it is for its strict ‘all white’ dress code. The dress code limits the amount of colour that can be featured and relates to clothing as well as footwear, hats and sweatbands. Generally, in sport we are used to seeing large logos emblazoned on our sporting stars, whereas when it comes to Wimbledon brands need to find an understated way to feature their branding.

Officials are also bound by a strict dress code, with long-time official supplier Ralph Lauren once again designing this year’s uniform, inspired by the authentic and distinct Wimbledon brand.

It wasn’t just the officials Ralph Lauren designed for, they also created a Wimbledon collection for tennis lovers to purchase and be a part of the championships, even if they weren’t able to attend a match. Other Official Suppliers of Wimbledon include Slazenger, Robinsons, IBM and Lanson – all of whom create unique and specific Wimbledon campaigns and activations to enhance their brand awareness.

No golden ducks here!

It’s widely accepted that the game of cricket originated in the south-east of England and over the years it has grown to become our nation’s second most popular spectator sport. This summer saw England host the Cricket world cup for the first time in 20 years, so excitement levels were high!

Using the opportunity to raise awareness of the sport cricket and encourage children and adults alike to enter the sport, the England and Wales Cricket Board created the ‘Express Yourself’ campaign which puts focus on the players personalities and the excitement of the one-day format, which England are number 1 in the world at.

With a global audience estimated to be over 1.5billion, sponsors have the opportunity to position their brand in homes around the world.

As the Cricket World Cup 2019 Champions, no doubt brands will be queueing up to get involved with the sport, the England team and crucially at gross roots level to build future stars.

Change the Game

BBC sport has included Netball in part of its ‘Change the Game’ campaign which focuses on women’s sport. Their campaign for the Netball world cup focuses on the intensity of the game using the 3 second rule (for those who do not know Netball, you are only allowed to hold the ball for a maximum of 3 seconds, otherwise it gets given to the opposition) to demonstrate this. The campaign features players from the England, Scotland and Northern Ireland teams.

Hosted in the UK for the third time, Liverpool is the home of this year’s tournament where 16 teams from around the world compete for glory. There’s no denying the southern hemisphere dominate the sport, with Australia and New Zealand almost taking turns in lifting the trophy since 1963. During a thrilling and nail biting final, the New Zealand Silver Ferns were victorious once again, beating Australia 52-51.

England’s Roses finished in 3^rd place with a bronze medal, beating South Africa 58-42.