Global Sports Sponsorship Spend To Reach $65 Billion In 2019

A report from sports data agency, Two Circles, claims global brand spend on sports sponsorships will grow to $65 billion in 2019.

Despite this, the report also claims sports rights-holders will miss out on $26 billion in unrealised revenue throughout the year due to unsold inventory, unreported engagement and outdated asset-packaging.

Two Circles CEO, Gareth Balch, said, despite sports sponsorship spend growing by 4% on average since 2014, rights-holders have under-exploited their sponsorship businesses by about $22 billion a year on average during this time.

“Most rights-holders continue to package and sell sponsorship just as they did 20 years ago, offering brand exposure through linear broadcast coverage as the main benefit for brands.

“Globally, we’re spending more time-consuming entertainment on digital platforms; we consistently see a disparity between what brands need to reach an audience effectively and quantifiably, and what digital assets rights-holder are able to offer in their sponsorship packages,” he said.

Two Circles claim more rights-holders are starting to package digital assets into sponsorship propositions however, and they predict spend on sponsorship will increase by 6% on average per year between 2020 and 2024.

They anticipate global spend on sports sponsorships will reach over $89 billion by the end of 2024.

“Rights-holders are adapting to this new world and we predict a sports sponsorship correction, by embracing the power of data and digital to create sponsorship assets that better satisfy the objectives of brands, rights-holders will realise the true value of their sponsorship businesses.

“This will drive greater spend from brands in all sectors, not just the ‘traditional’ sectors for sport such as financial services, automotive, airlines and gambling,” Mr Balch said.

The traditional sectors Balch mentioned reportedly make up 58 per cent of all UK sports sponsorships, according to the Two Circles report.