Alishia Chitolie’s Post

A fascinating report as ever from Tammy Parlour MBE and team. Several bits stand out for me that are important for those of us banging the drum for more investment & exposure for women in sport. 💥 The growth of football, creates an unintentional false narrative here about how well women’s sport overall is doing at attracting investment & visibility. Hear me out. Football is unsurprisingly the dominant sport of interest in the UK and this report shows that. Of all women’s sport, it was the most popular sport for viewers/fans in 2023, bagging 74% of viewing hours.  I have a theory that when people talk here about the growth of women's sport, they are in fact largely talking about football, whose growth is amazing and impressive, but the rest are fishing in a much much smaller pool. In short, getting investment & increasing visibility for women in sport in the UK is incredibly hard, especially if you’re not football. (Football is still great though, and I love it) 💥When fans have a good experience in one women’s sport, it leads to interest in others. 15.6m people who had not watched women’s sport before, watched the Women’s Football World Cup – some 43% of them then went on to watch other women’s sport including cricket and golf.  Good opportunity here for other sports to leverage the popularity of football to their own ends. 💥Free to air television is VITALLY important for women’s sport. BBC and ITV only accounted for 11% of coverage hours - but that equalled 77% of ALL viewing hours for women’s sport in 2023.  Granted getting an FTA deal worth anything is hard (rugby for eg has in the past pretty much had to pay to get their games shown on FTA TV), but the short-term pain of a poorer deal is probably worth it in the long run to grow a league and or a fanbase. Live women’s rugby domestically for eg is entirely currently behind the TNT paywall making it hard for a new league to grow (would love to be wrong about this though!) 💥Fans attending live women’s sporting events tend to be younger, more female and highly digitally engaged compared to broadcast viewers or versus men’s sport.  This is a great opportunity to engage brands/sponsors who want to reach an audience they might not be able to otherwise reach through a deal with a men’s team/league. 

Exciting times for women's sports! 🌟 Here's a snapshot of the remarkable growth in the UK: - Viewership: 46.7 million tuned into women's sports on TV in the last year, a new record! - Viewing Time: Fans watched an average of 10 hours and 17 minutes throughout 2023, up 16% from the previous year. - Football Fever: Dominated 74% of viewing hours, with the Women's World Cup final drawing 12 million viewers. - Live Events: Attendance at women's sports events rose to 2.6 million, up from 2.1 million. - Social Surge: TikTok boosted the Barclays Women’s Super League views by 268% to 150m, and the Women's Six Nations views by 586%. - Against the Trend: These gains contrast with a 5% decline in overall domestic sports TV consumption. Kudos to the athletes, supporters, and all who contribute to elevating the visibility and excitement of women's sports to unprecedented levels! 😊 #womenssports #growth #engagement

Another piece of groundbreaking research from the Women's Sport Trust on fandom, viewing and spectator engagement. A couple of statistics that stood out for me: 1. 2.6 million people attended a women’s sport event in 2023 compared to 2.1 million in 2022. 2. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the TikTok Women’s Six Nations (now Guinness Women’s Six Nations) saw an annual increase in views of 586% on the channel" As we head towards the 2024 Women's 6 Nations, starting in March, it will very interesting to see how these figures rise, because it is very likely they will as sports bodies look to promote, amplify and maximise visibility. https://lnkd.in/eXBBzRet

Having just attended the Women's Sport Trust “2023 – Year in Review” event, I’m with Tammy Parlour MBE on the glass half full approach to 2024. We have so much to celebrate from 2023… ⚽Highest ever broadcast reach (46.7m on linear TV) 🏏Record breaking attendances at live events (2.6m people) 📺Increased engagement (av. viewing times +16% yoy) 📱Global leaders in digital engagement 🏟 Attracting new & distinct audiences But there is still so much more we need to do collectively to improve discoverability of women’s sport. Visibility is key and greater gender parity in coverage is needed across TV hours, news mentions & print which all declined in 2023 2024 presents everyone connected with women’s sport with an opportunity. Football dominates women’s sport consumption (74% of viewing hours) so with 2024 being a non-major tournament year there is space for innovation, unique content creation, ground-breaking brand activations and deeper understanding of women’s sports fans – what connects them to women’s sport, what is their mindset when engaging with women’s sport and what do fans want to experience through women’s sport? Thank you to the Women's Sport Trust and their partners for this much needed data and insight. The full report & event recording can be found here https://lnkd.in/eAaTr5yr

Great to see the momentum behind women's sport continue to grow in the latest Women's Sport Trust report. New, younger and more diverse audiences are still growing which is a great opportunity for brands, but there still remains a big opportunity to convert men's game audience to trial, and convert to being women's sport fans - it's a big audience to go after with targeted strategies that can be overlooked in favour of focusing on the new audiences. Of the 37.8m viewers who watched 3+ mins of women’s sport (all content) in 2023, only 271k did not watch any men’s sport content, and 60% of the Women's World Cup audience, also watched the Men's World Cup ... this is what Orange was thinking of when they did 'that' ad. It's also great to see how sticky the new audiences are, with 43% of new world cup football audiences going on to watch more women's sport. Thank you to Tammy Parlour MBE, Laura Weston, Chris Hurst and the whole team and partners for doing this important work. Follow the link to download and review the full report - brimming with insight! https://lnkd.in/e4nhKXX4

The Rise and Rise of Women´s sports... latest research from Women's Sport Trust https://bit.ly/488KLuN #recruitment #jobs #hiringstaff #executivesearch #sportsmarketing #digital #marketing #PR #corporatecommunications #sponsorship #returners #EDI #socialmobility #underrepresentedtalent #ethnicity

"Sports marketing can be formulaic and highly controlled but women’s sport offers a fresh opportunity where the same constraints don’t exist. Brands need to see this as an opportunity." 📈 People in the UK watched more women’s sport on linear TV in 2023 than ever before - with 46.7 million people tuning in to watch at least a minute 🚀 On TikTok, the Barclays Women’s Super League gained 150 million views – a 268% year-on-year rise 📈 Fans are also showing up in person to watch women’s sport in the UK. Additional data provided by Two Circles reveals that attendances at women’s sports events continue to grow – 2.6 million people attended a women’s sport event in 2023 🚀 Football still dominates the consumption of women’s sport with 74% of viewing hours but other sports such as cricket (15%), rugby union (5%) and golf (3%) also play a part #womenssports #womensfootball #sportsmarketing

The Rise and Rise of Women´s sports... latest research from Women's Sport Trust https://bit.ly/488KLuN #recruitment #jobs #hiringstaff #executivesearch #sportsmarketing #digital #marketing #PR #corporatecommunications #sponsorship #returners #EDI #socialmobility #underrepresentedtalent #ethnicity

Ever wondered what makes a sport popular and which sports will be dominating the scene in 2024? Check out our newest blog post for an in-depth look at the changing factors that affect the sports world.  #sports https://lnkd.in/d4ng-_SU

Advertisers, how are you engaging with the new generation of sports fans? Our President and CRO Jennifer Q. Chen shared with Forbes how the rise of women’s sports has cultivated a lasting generation of young female fans who are transforming the media landscape.🏅📺 Read more below!