Weekly Newsletter 6/29
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INNOVATION IN ACTION
NON-ENDEMIC SPONSORS CREATING NEW REVENUE STREAMS
Last week Major League Baseball announced an unprecedented partnership with the cryptocurrency exchange brand, FTX. The five-year partnership establishes FTX as the official cryptocurrency exchange of the league. The deal means that FTX's logo will appear on umpire uniforms during all games, gives the company worldwide marketing rights associated with MLB marks, logos and special events, and secures their rights to use highlights of players in content creation through an agreement with MLB Players Inc. Non-endemic sponsors are continuing to enter the sports space as a way for both the companies and the leagues to drive new revenue by expanding their potential fan bases. We’ve seen cryptocurrency make its way into baseball with the Oakland Athletics accepting crypto as payment for suites, but this partnership will put the rapidly growing technology on the screens of casual, die-hard, and Fluid Fans alike.
Sports Innovation Lab Events
CATCH UP ON LAST WEEK'S DOUBLE DOSE OF
THE FLUID FAN PODCAST
Last week we featured two new episodes of the Fluid Fan Podcast! Our special episode featured our own VP of Data and Insights Caiti Donovan to talk about The Fan Project Report. Our second episode of the week featured Keia Clarke, CEO of the New York Liberty, to chat about all things women’s sports, marketing and the growth of the WNBA. Catch up on both shows before our next episode is released next week! You can listen to the full episodes on iTunes and Spotify.
The Fan Project Spotlight
FANS OF WOMEN'S SPORTS ARE DIGITAL NATIVES
The digitally native Fluid Fan is the path to growth for the entire sports industry, and Fans of Women’s Sports are some the most Fluid Fans of all, representing the future fan and a bullseye for revenue growth. Our data showed Fans of Women’s Sports were forced to become digital natives before general sport fans, so they have exemplified technological and societally-influenced behaviors, which we call Fluid Fandom, almost 5 years earlier than we expected.
Because of this behavior, we can see that Fans of Women’s Sports are Early Adopters of a new model for how sports are consumed: The Community-Based Monetization Model. In other industries, these Early Adopters are sometimes called Trend Setters or Hyper Users. Typically they make up less than 10% of the total fanbase but drive 50-80% of revenue. Download the report to learn more.