Sport Industry Socials Officially Launches
Last night (7th July) saw the first Sport Industry Socials event of the year, Finding A Fanbase, take place at the HKX Building in Pancras Square.
In packed room full of industry professionals from all levels of their respective organisations, leading figures representing sports on different stages of their journeys discuss the challenges of finding and retaining fans in a crowded marketplace.
Hosted by Emma Lax, Head of Strategy at Cake, the panel consisted of representatives from some of the world’s most exciting and forward-thinking sports.
Hrag Sarkissian, Founder and CEO at eSkootr, Willie Cruickshank, Race Director at World Air Race, Dave Souza, Communications Director at ESL, and Jen Vile, Marketing Director at the Hundred, all sat down to explore the obstacles and opportunities of earning eyeballs in a digital age.
“We are building a whole new category of sports and we were focused on seeing this whole micromobolity sector grow,” said Sarkissian, speaking about the origins of the eSkootr Championship (eSC), a brand-new electric scooter racing series which debuted in London this year. “This is a sector that has been growing very quickly. You look at cities like Paris, Berlin, even London, it is obviously the solution to decongesting cities, but it is very relevant to a large demographic. This is where eSc saw an amazing opportunity.”
As the head of another sport hoping to establish itself on the international stage, Cruickshank explained how an engaging and entertaining format is key to attract new fans. “One of the important lessons to learn is – keep it simple. It is very easy to get sucked into making formats so complicated. Our format before with Red Bull was a head-to-head format and we have changed that slightly. We were being driven predominantly by our TV production partners around how we could make it more exciting, bringing in elements from other motorsports. We sat down and said that this will take a lot of time to explain to somebody. Let’s just make this simple – the fastest one wins! Sometimes the simple solution is the best way.”
As well as simplifying the format, Vile described how new-look cricket tournament The Hundred has introduced entertainment outside of the just the sport itself. “The way that we thought about music is two-fold,” said Vile. “Entertainment, that is appropriate for our audience, and that supports the brand positioning of the Hundred. The cricket is the showpiece, and everything we have built around it is to enhance the overall experience. Nothing should take away from that being the hero and the players being the stars.
“We are trying to engage younger audiences. Cricket was increasingly predominantly white, male, over-55. We needed to diversify. Music is a great way to get another form of representation into The Hundred. We obviously have a gender balance proposition with men’s and women’s teams and we have lots of international stars which helps with representation on the pitch. This is another way to drive representation through different artists, different genres, different cultures. And it helps with communicating the youthfulness and freshness of The Hundred brand.”
Souza also agreed about the importance of increasing diversity with the ESL ecosystem. “There is an overall goal to increase the mix of genders that we do get to see in mainstream esports,” Souza explained.
With regards to gaming as means of attracting new audiences, Cruickshank explained how “the gaming market was worth about £178bn, next year it is expected to be at £380bn” and, as a result, “no sport can afford not to be looking at how it can engage with that market.”
“We are incorporating a lot of VR, AR into what we are doing,” Cruickshank added. “This means we will be able to have people at home competing on exactly the same racetrack at home, as we are flying on location. They could be on the same racetrack at the same time.
The future of our sport is not just a traditional spectator, you need that level of interaction and integration. When speaking with partners, it is that possibility of gamification that lights up their eyes,” Cruickshank said.
Sticking on the theme of gaming, when asked about broadcasters entering the esports space, David questioned the appetite from fans within the esports community “Esports community has always had free content. The majority esports content is on Twitch or YouTube. The idea of moving away from free-content to a network or pay-wall is really jarring against the esports community because they have never known anything different. I’m sure it will happen in the long-term in some varying degree, but I think for the community there will always be free platforms.”
An evening of entertaining and informative discussion highlighted the ongoing challenges around finding a fanbase. A clear theme ran through the evening around changing perceptions of the different sports. From the World Air Race trying to simplify and re-position itself away from the Red Bull brand, to the Hundred attempting to turn an exclusive and inaccessible sport into something for all, the parallels between sports that have been around for two years, or two hundred years, were obvious.
The next Sport Industry Socials event takes place on Thursday 8th September and will be entitled ‘The Legacy of Award-Winning Campaigns’. Receive two tickets to each of the 2022 Sport Industry Social events by purchasing a Sport Industry Membership.
