Sporting Nation in the Making

SportzPower-GroupM ESP India Sports Sponsorship Report 2014
Sporting
Nation
in the
Making
Growth & Potential of
Sports in India
Sporting Nation in the Making
Growth & Potential of
Sports in India
SportzPower-GroupM ESP India Sports Sponsorship Report 2014
©Sportz Network Private Limited and GroupM Media India Private Limited
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FOREWORD
THE TRIGGERS ARE ALL THERE
T
his decade promises to be a
transformational one for Sports in India.
The triggers are all there. A hungry
spectator base of over a billion people, a dozen
sports television channels beaming sporting
content round the clock, a rapidly growing list of
keen corporates and brands waiting to invest in
emerging cricketing and non-cricketing platforms.
For brands, sports present a highly
impactful and passionate platform, to connect and
engage with trade and consumers. However, there
is very little information and data beyond TV
viewership ratings for brands to evaluate and
leverage the various opportunities available in
sports, which will help them develop brand
marketing strategies and programs.
To increase its utility to Rights Owners,
Advertisers and Agencies, we have divided this
report into four segments – On Ground
Sponsorship, Team Sponsorship, Athlete
Management and On Air.
In recognition of its rising importance as
potentially the biggest sport in India after Cricket,
Football has a dedicated section. With the Under17 FIFA World Cup, and the Reliance-Star-IMG
property, the Indian Super League (ISL), in the
pipeline, we believe that the future of Football in
India is very bright.
We gratefully acknowledge the valuable
inputs provided by rights owners, agencies and
industry participants who have graciously offered
information and support in preparation of this
report.
We hope that you will find this report
useful and informative. Any feedback or
suggestions to enhance future editions of this
report are most welcome.
SportzPower, India's leading provider of
sports business news and knowledge, and GroupM
ESP, the Sports & Entertainment arm of GroupM
Media, have collaborated on an initiative which
seeks to capture and present the trends and
developments in the Indian Sports Industry from
2008 to 2013.
The Report, the first of its kind in India,
documents important events during these eventful
years, including the emergence of league-format
sports in India like the Indian Premier League
(IPL), Hockey India League (HIL), and Indian
Badminton League (IBL).
Thomas Abraham
Co-Founder, SportzPower
thomas@sportzpower.com
Vinit Karnik
Business Head – GroupM ESP
vinit.karnik@groupmesp.com
4696
4109
3924
3753
SPORTS BUSINESS SIZE
(in INR crores)
2442
2139
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
CONTENTS
The Big Picture
. . . . . . . . . 06
View From The Ground
. . . . . . . . . 08
‘Cricket And Football Will Both Co-exist In Our Marketing Calendar’
. . . . . . . . . 10
Football – A Microcosm Of The Short Non-cricket Tail
. . . . . . . . . 12
‘A Time Of Unrivalled Opportunity For Indian Sports Federations’
. . . . . . . . . 14
‘The Game Changer’
. . . . . . . . . 15
‘Football Is Going To Be Big In India’
. . . . . . . . . 16
Buck Stops At TV
. . . . . . . . . 18
‘Enabling A Paradigm Shift’
. . . . . . . . . 22
Team Sponsorship – All About The Boys In Blue
. . . . . . . . . 24
When It Comes To Talent, Money Chasing Dhoni & Co
. . . . . . . . . 26
‘Other Sports Are Steadily Carving A Niche’
. . . . . . . . . 28
‘Shorter And Newer Formats Key Drivers For Growth’
. . . . . . . . . 30
‘We Are A National Brand And Address Consumers Across Geographies’
. . . . . . . . . 31
Digital Media – Score Big With Early Adoption
. . . . . . . . . 32
On The Front Foot
. . . . . . . . . 34
06
THE BIG PICTURE
I
f the India growth story, into a country worth
being placed on the world business map, began
with liberalization of the economy in 1991, the
growth of the sports business in this one-sport
country is directly linked to the launch of the
successful Indian Premier League in 2008.
Year 2008 and the IPL, despite all its warts,
hence gains immense significance for providing the
impetus to monetizing cricket, and initiating a
process which gave hope and a template for other
sports. Hence, when India's growth as a sporting
nation in all aspects, especially the money part, is
documented, 2008 will be recorded as the start line
from where the country's nascent sports business
took off.
It is apt therefore that the inaugural
SportzPower-GroupM ESP India Sports
Sponsorship Report sets 2008 as the base line of its
analysis that covers a six-year period till 2013.
In a market that is starved of authenticated and
reliable data, the insights the study provides serve
as an ideal ready reckoner on where the sports
industry is positioned in India today, as well as a
guide that offers pointers to the triggers that are
shifting the ground in India's slow, stop-start shift to
a multi-sport country.
The Report, which examined advertising
investments in Indian Sport from four angles – On
Ground, Team Sponsorship, Athlete Management,
and Media – offers a comprehensive overview of
where the money is flowing in Sport.
The key takeaway the Study offers is that when
it comes to monies spent on Sport in India, the
reality is that it is MOSTLY about Cricket, but
certainly NOT all about the gentleman's game.
That Cricket in general and within it the Indian
Premier League in particular, dominates the
conversation around Sport in this country is a no-
Ÿ The number 2, 3, 4, 5... Sports; the real
opportunity lies in these under-leveraged and
under-monetized areas which otherwise have a
sizeable target audience juicy enough for brands to
associate with and influence
Ÿ Play for Football, Basketball, Distance Running
3500
3000
3000
2500
On Ground
2250
2000
2000
2250
Team
Sponsorship
Athlete
1500
Media Spends
1450
1150
1043
1000
705 724
500
426 437
126
420 445
756
712 669
456
254
267
293
2010
2011
2012
721
382
127
0
2008
2009
2013
Source - GroupM ESP
Figures mentioned are in Crores (1 Crore = 10 million)
brainer. But the point advertisers, marketers, and
the news media need to take into consideration is
that this dominance is NOT quite as allencompassing as is being presumed.
Embedded within this Report is a validation of the
following posits:
Ÿ India is at the cusp of a revolution in the growth
of the sports industry. In the next few years the
market is going to grow exponentially, with other
sports complementing the cricket story
Spends in Indian Sports (2008 – 2013)
Ÿ Increase in On Ground sports sponsorships in
2010 because of Commonwealth Games in New Delhi
Ÿ Increase in Team Sponsorship in 2011 because of
addition of 2 new franchises in IPL
Ÿ Increase in Media Spends in 2011 because of ICC
ODI World Cup in India
Ÿ Increase in Endorsement values in 2013 because
of new cricketers and Olympic performance
Ÿ Decrease in media spends in 2012 due to weak IPL
on Air
07
Ÿ Close on their heels are Golf, Motorsports,
Tennis, Hockey, Badminton, Contact Sports
It should serve as a wake-up call for all
stakeholders in the Sports sector that in the six-year
time frame that the Study covers, the highest share
of On Ground revenue Cricket has commanded in
percentage terms was in 2009 – all of 79%. And the
lowest? It was just 52% in 2010, which was also the
year when New Delhi hosted the Commonwealth
Games.
On Ground sponsorship has a direct linkage to
stadium attendance. And therefore reflects active
fan engagement. What this shows is that in the IPL
era, it takes an event the size of the Commonwealth
Games to significantly shift the needle.
sport just does not matter that much.
But that is not to say that the ground is not
shifting as far as other sports are concerned. In
2012, the share of non-cricket On Ground
sponsorship stood at 34.5%, dipping to 32.8% in
2013, ironically a year that saw the launch of two
new IPL-style tournaments – the Hockey India
League as well as the Indian Badminton League.
But it is also true that between 2008, when IPL
first burst onto India's consciousness and shook
everything up, and 2013, advertising investments in
Indian Sport – On Ground, Team Sponsorship,
Athlete Management, and Media – rose roughly twofold.
It is true that Sport still has a long and winding
road to traverse from being a peripheral element of
mass consciousness and entertainment to being a
big part of it in the manner that, say, movies are. It
certainly was, and to a significant extent still is, also
true that with the honorable exception of cricket,
Ÿ Total spend rose 92 per cent to Rs 41.1 billion in
2013 from Rs 21.39 billion in 2008
Ÿ Media spends touched a high of Rs 30 billion in
2011, the year when India hosted (and won) ICC's
ODI World Cup
08
VIEW FROM
THE GROUND
I
n terms of fan engagement, 2012 was the defining year
as far as the IPL was concerned. Why? Because it was
the first year that revenues from match gate receipts
became intrinsic to the IPL story. Translated, that reads as
IPL made the critical transition of garnering fan loyalties
into the equation of what remains a predominantly madefor-television proposition.
Football remains the problem child of Indian sport.
There is a huge underlying potential here that is yet to
translate into deliveries. What is clear though is that if and
when Football makes that big leap forward, its rise will be
phenomenal.
Proof positive of that is provided by the impact
delivered by one-off events like the Argentina vs Venezuela
friendly in 2011, which saw the world's best player Lionel
Messi strutting his stuff at the hallowed Salt Lake Stadium
in Kolkata before an adoring and star-struck audience.
Another being the Audi Football Summit played in January
2012 at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium in New Delhi
between the Indian national team and German giants FC
Bayern Munich.
It is also a telling indictment of the people who
administer the world's most popular game that a niche
sport like Golf and a mass participation one like the
Marathon, both of which are presumed to be TV unfriendly,
garner far higher numbers than Football!
Between 2008 and 2013, while On Ground
sponsorship in football went up from Rs 85 million to Rs
142 million, in Marathons it rose from Rs 285 million to Rs
09
600
522
508
500
489
Cricket
466
444
Football
400
Marathons
300
Golf
299
293
Others
200
164
153
137
100
68.9
62.8
8.5
28.5 32.7
29.3
13.9
9.1
11.7
36.5
29.1
14.9
37
27.1
39 37.5
16.4
42
14.2
28
0
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
Source - GroupM ESP
Figures mentioned are in Crores (1 Crore = 10 Million)
420 million. Football clearly has a way to go before it
can deliver numbers anywhere close to Distance
Running in India, let alone Cricket. But at least it can
lay claim to a steady, though extremely poor,
increase year-on-year in the period under review.
2013 to $3.5 million in 2014 – in its prize money.
Money flows into On Ground Sponsorship decoded
There are serious issues that professional golf is
Ÿ Cricket is the key driver. Increase in 2010 due to
facing going forward, though a larger number of Airtel deal & more number of Home Series. Increase in
people are adopting the sport.
2013 numbers due to revision in IPL Central
Sponsorship deals
So too Motorsport. Even bigger speedŸ Increase in Football in 2011 due to Argentina Vs
breakers lie ahead for this elite sport. The biggest Venezuela friendly & in 2012 because of Audi Summit
impact from a non-cricketing perspective in the Ÿ Increase in other sports in 2010 due to
sporting arena HAD been provided by the arrival of Commonwealth Games & Formula 1 in 2011, 2012 &
2013
Formula One in India.
Not so golf. From Rs 327 million in 2008, after
hitting a high of Rs 375 million in 2012, it was down
to Rs 280 million in 2013 and will fall even further in
2014. Two of the three biggest professional golf
Ÿ Football went up from Rs 85 million to Rs 142
events in India (Indian Open is the biggest) 90,000+ spectators were witness to the
million,
but in Marathons it rose from Rs 285 million to
Avantha Masters, and Gujarat Kensville Challenge – inaugural Indian Grand Prix at the Jaypee Group's
Rs 420 million
have been discontinued and will not be held this Buddh Circuit in Noida in 2011, a historic landmark
year onwards.
in the annals of F1. It's been all reverse gear since
Left with only three international events in the then, with attendance dropping to just under expensive sport may well have ended, though Jaypee
International, the promoters of the Buddh
SAIL-SBI Open, Panasonic Open India, and Indian 50,000 in 2012 and to around 40,000 last year.
International
Circuit, have maintained a brave front
Open (though there is also a question mark over the
This year there will be no Indian GP and the
and
continue
to
insist otherwise.
fate of POI), the Professional Golf Tour of India could talk in the paddock as well as within F1 is that
see a drop of close to 40 per cent – from $6 million in India's tryst with the world's most glamorous and
10
CRICKET AND FOOTBALL WILL BOTH
CO-EXIST IN OUR MARKETING CALENDAR
different target audiences, manage this factor?
Homi Battiwalla
EVP, Pepsico India
W
hat are the main factors that come
into play for your company while
choosing a sport, event or team for
sponsorship?
For a youth brand like ours, it's imperative to
always have a thinking cap on. We continuously
evaluate interesting properties to leverage brand
Pepsi's proposition. Our efforts are not only
towards being relevant to what the Gen X is
expecting from Pepsi, but also identify emerging
trends ahead of time and incorporate these
insights into our campaigns. Being a true youth
soul mate, Pepsi has always taken the lead in
celebrating newer and emerging youth passions –
cricket, movies, music and football too. The brand
has successfully created memorable campaigns
and experiences for the youth today.
It is said that sponsoring a sport might lead to
alienation of fans from other sports. Is that an
important criterion to be considered? How
does a company like yours, which deals with
I don't agree with you here. Cricket is a sport
which Pepsi has been associated with for close to
two decades; and when we launched our first ever
football campaign in the country in 2011, it didn't
mean that we were alienating ourselves from
cricket. For us at brand Pepsi, cricket is one of the
strongest youth platforms only after Bollywood,
and football is emerging in India like never before.
We are proud to be associated with both sporting
platforms and going forward, cricket and football
will both co-exist in our marketing calendar.
It is said that in sponsorship it is not what you
have bought, but what you do with it.
Activation around a property can be much
more expensive and stretch limited time and
resources available with the organization.
What kind of budgets would go into such
activities? Please give examples of some
cutting-edge activation that has been
undertaken by your company in the sports
space.
For us at Pepsi, we don't associate with a youth
platform for a short time. We believe in longstanding strong associations that spread over
years. Take cricket and Bollywood for example. We
have been associated with these youth passions
for years now and have always launched pathbreaking campaigns to bring this alive. From
11
campaigns such as Yehi Hai Right Choice Baby,
Nothing Official About it, Yeh Dil Mange More,
Change the Game all have a strong recall in the
mind of the consumers.
What methodologies are utilized to measure
the exposure for the brand and success of the
sponsorship to justify the ROI?
To measure the success of any campaign, tangible
as well as intangible tools are available to
marketers. We continuously evaluate our
campaigns through a combination of each of these
tools. We have in place regular tracking tools
which are run by renowned research agencies like
Nielsen/IMRB that help us quantify the impact of
sponsorship on Brand Salience, Equity and share
movements by triangulating media inputs.
Separately we also use statistical modeling to
triangulate Spends vs Impact to assess ROI.
Pepsi taking the IPL title rights has been a
huge brand lift for the IPL. But it also surprised
market watchers in that there was a thought
doing the rounds that it would be a brand
needing to build a national brand recall as well
as presence that was likely to bid for the rights.
Pepsi as well as the second-highest bidder
Airtel already has/had that. So what were the
key reasons in making an investment
commitment that was twice the existing deal
value?
We are delighted that we have succeeded in
rebranding the tournament as Pepsi-IPL, thus
cementing a five-year partnership between two
brands which enjoy an iconic status not only in
India but globally. With our continuing
sponsorship of the ICC World Cup, we are now the
biggest supporters of the game of cricket. With the
successful bidding, we have reaffirmed our
passion and commitment to this sport.
To add further, we also believe that no large scale
association with cricket is possible in India
without a sizeable IPL presence. IPL – the biggest
cricket event in the subcontinent – has now
become the new face of Indian cricket which
combines the best of cricket with entertainment,
regional club passion, and international glamour.
Now, with this association we hope to catapult
brand Pepsi to an even higher orbit as the most
universal, popular, trend-setting youth brand. The
title association of Pepsi IPL and other benefits
will allow brand Pepsi and other PepsiCo brands
to gain more than conventional sponsorship
benefits and generate immense universality across
the country.
Pepsi has been associated with the sport for close
to two decades now and is known for its
memorable and path-breaking campaigns. Apart
from Bollywood, cricket is the single largest youth
passion in the country and we are confident that
Pepsi IPL will give us a multiplier higher than our
investment. Our belief is reinstated due to three
reasons:
Ÿ History of Cricket & IPL association –
Historically, we have gained tremendously through
cricket / IPL association, both in terms of cost per
rating point (CPRP) and the benefits for the
brands we have been able to derive from the
broadcaster. Pepsi and cricket are synonymous
with each other and the same echoes through
consumer feedback on our campaigns over the
years
Ÿ Long-term strategic investment – We see this
investment as a long-term strategic fit spread over
a five-year horizon, which will get better every
year as we go about activating this property in
partnership with brand IPL. We realize the power
of being a 'title sponsor' and are confident to
derive 5-6 times value for the investment we have
made
Ÿ Right timing – The timing of the tournament is
ideal given that packaged beverages is an impulse
category and nearly 50% of consumption happens
in these months
As the IPL title rights holder till 2017, how
much of a bearing will the move have on
Pepsi's battle with Coke for leadership in the
Indian market?
Our contract with IPL has very strong anti-ambush
marketing clauses. As title sponsor, we will also
strengthen our associations across all aspects of
IPL, including franchise partnerships.
12
FOOTBALL A MICROCOSM OF
THE SHORT
NON-CRICKET TAIL
W
hat is Real Madrid worth? According to a
report put out in April 2013 by Forbes
magazine, which placed the Spanish
giants at the top of the heap in 2012 among football
teams across the globe, it is $3.3 billion! And what
was the sum total of On Ground sponsorship monies
that Indian football attracted in the 2012 calendar
year? All of Rs 164.5 million ($3.05 million at
exchange rates prevailing then)!
Please note, though, that this was still almost
twice what the Beautiful Game garnered four years
earlier in 2008, where ground sponsorships stood
at a miserable Rs 89.5 million.
This in a country that has the history – Durand
Cup dates back to 1888, Rovers Cup to 1891, and IFA
Shield to 1893 – that has the population, and that
has enough young people playing as well as
watching the game.
So where is the problem? There is no critical
mass of young people watching Indian football,
either at club level or the national team, is the
straight answer.
Nothing new here and not something that has
not already been much lamented upon. The million-
dollar question is really whether that can change?
Yes, but...
The YES part first.
FIFA president Sepp Blatter has described
India as football's "sleeping giant", alluding to the
potential for growth that a country of 1.2 billion
holds. It is this potential that the game's global
governing body was looking at when it exhorted
India to go the extra mile to ensure that it got
hosting rights for the 2017 Under-17 World Cup.
And it is this potential that ensured FIFA itself
went the extra mile while granting India the right to
host the U-17 World Cup. And with it, one of the
major 'buts' will perforce be fast-tracked towards
resolution, which is infrastructure development.
With India given the mandate to host the U-17
World Cup, also come guarantees from the host
centres of stadiums that are world class. And
because this tournament is not the World Cup, fears
that there will be a lot of white elephants a la South
Africa will not arise. Upgrading existing facilities is
what is being envisioned. Capacity that is being
talked about is for 15,000 seating and under, which
is actually what club football in India requires,
considering the stage it is in at the moment.
FIFA awarding India the rights to host the 2017
edition of the event means not just major
infrastructural advances for the game in India, but
also a massive push for youth and grassroots
development of football, the bedrock upon which
the sport can really build a story going forward.
And the BUT part…
All stadiums in the country are either owned
by state or local municipal corporations, leaving
football officials at the mercy of bureaucracies and
political dispensations with a vested interest in
maintaining status quo, and by extension little
interest in improving facilities.
Coming back to the sponsorship front, the
money coming into the game may have gone up but
it is a poor advertisement for the game that the
national team today has no shirt sponsor after
consumer electronics giant Panasonic declined to
renew after the contract expired in December 2012,
though the upside is that that the I-League now has
a title sponsor in telecom company Airtel after a
fairly long gap.
It is ironic that institutional side ONGC, the
league's title rights-holder for many years, is out of
the I-League after the All India Football Federation
(AIFF) decreed that the team needs a separate
holding company if it was to continue in the top
flight of Indian football.
On the flip side, a big positive in 2013 of course
was the induction of the JSW Steel-owned
Bengaluru FC into the I-League. The impact of the
entry of the corporate entity into India's top tier of
club football has been immediate, what with the
new team sitting at the top of the I-League table on
points going into the winter break in what is but its
inaugural season. Whether it will ultimately be
crowned I-League champions remains to be seen,
that it will be in contention for top honors is a
certainty.
As already pointed out, there is money coming
into the game, and multiple grassroots initiatives
cropping up across the country, as various players
13
big and small look to leverage the potential that
football offers.
The biggest deal of course being the agreement
the AIFF signed in late 2010 with IMG Reliance
(IMG-R), an equal joint venture between the world's
biggest sports management company and India's
richest corporate.
The agreement, valued at Rs 7 billion ($140
million) over 15 years, gave IMG-R all commercial
rights to the professional game in India.
With plans for the Indian Super League (ISL), a
franchise-based league, moving forward in a
calibrated manner, and with the recent
announcement that the country's biggest broadcast
network Star India had taken an equity position in
the tournament, expectations around the ISL, which
is scheduled to see its inaugural edition in late 2014,
have gone up several notches.
More so because the interim also witnessed
the failure of Premier League Soccer (PLS), a
franchise-based football league set up in West
Bengal along the lines of cricket's Indian Premier
League and America's MLS, to take off as planned in
early 2012.
The still-born PLS offers a good case study of
not just the potential this market offers but also its
pitfalls. A league featuring semi-retired stars like
Argentina striker Hernan Crespo and Italy's World
Cup-winning captain Fabio Cannavaro could not
only garner global attention, but also attract serious
money as well. The fact that six franchises that were
to feature in the first edition of the league attracted
buyers who collectively committed Rs700m+ for a
tournament confined to just one Indian state speaks
for itself.
The PLS' failure is just as illustrative of the
challenges potential investors in football are
confronting. And the reasons were almost wholly
political in nature and all about patronage. PLS was
conceived when the Left Front government that had
been ruling the West Bengal state in an
uninterrupted 35-year reign was on its last legs. Put
simply, it was a change of government, and by
extension, loss of patronage, that put paid to the
plans the India Football Association (IFA), the
controlling body for the sport in West Bengal, and its
commercial partners Celebrity Management Group,
had laid out.
Fast forwarding to the present, if there is a lot
riding on the ISL, the expectations around the
I-League have also gone up several notches – in the
wake of IMG-R's commitment to refurbish and
spruce up India's top-tier club football tournament.
The U-17 World Cup is some way down the
road. In the near term, it is the ISL that is expected to
give football much to talk about in the second half of
2014.
14
A TIME OF UNRIVALLED OPPORTUNITY
FOR INDIAN SPORTS FEDERATIONS
Remarkably, the people making the decisions
on Indian TV sport were based outside the
country – ESPN Star Sports in Singapore (the
earlier Star Sports in Hong Kong), Ten Sports in
Dubai, Nimbus in Singapore.
Peter Hutton
Chief Executive Officer
MP&Silva
F
or the first time in 20 years, I'm in a job that
isn't primarily about Sport in India. In many
ways it's a relief.
Outside cricket, the sports bodies were slow
to change from the Gandhi-era model. Reliant on
Central Government funding, run by honorary
secretaries, the federations didn't have the skill
sets to market their sports to participants,
broadcasters or sponsors.
The benefits of running a sports body were
always considerable: Olympic tickets, foreign trips,
social importance. As a result, change at the top
has been slow.
It led to a pay TV environment that was
unique in that a high proportion of Indian TV
rights fees were paid for international rather than
Indian sport, and the sport was presented in a
language which was alien to the common man.
Now that tide has turned. In the last year, Star
has followed Nimbus in exiting Singapore, Ten has
moved from Dubai. All the decision makers are
suddenly in India, and investing in Hindi language
content is at the heart of the business for Star
Sports.
It means a time of unrivalled opportunity for
the Indian sports federations. Star's investment in
University cricket is a good example of finding
value where broadcasters had previously seen
none. The Indian content business should thrive.
The channel business by contrast is a tougher
proposition. Regulatory frustrations are still
limiting the pay TV income for the territory and no
one is making money. The most transparent of the
businesses in financial terms is Ten Sports, who
announce their figures as part of the Zee Group.
The clear pattern in the Ten figures is they
get better when they have no India cricket tours in
a financial year. The pattern of major events
leading to sizeable losses for the broadcaster is
well established, and yet competition is keeping
acquisition prices high.
Why does everyone bother? Because Sports
is the unique driver of the pay TV business
worldwide, and is not susceptible to the time shift
phenomenon where more and more people
around the world are watching entertainment
content on delay through catch-up services or
broadband.
Of course, I couldn't possibly ignore India
going forward. It's still the most interesting TV
market going forward and full of potential. With
the ICC rights coming up later this year we may
see further headline deals being announced and I
look forward to being further confounded by a
fascinating area.
15
THE GAME CHANGER
country and generate significant interest and
following for this campaign.
Ÿ The State Associations will be motivated to
identify the best available talent for the national
championship and festivals organised by AIFF.
Kushal Das
General Secretary
All India Football Federation
T
he U-17 FIFA World Cup 2017 will be a
game changer for engaging the youth and
communities in football, and reignite the
passion and interest of our youth towards Indian
football.
Ÿ The most important aspect is to create a
program to identify the best talent and develop a
competitive U-17 Indian team. In a country like
India, talent identification is not an easy task,
especially with the lack of technical inputs in many
states. Our endeavour would be to speak to our
partners, mainly companies like Coca-Cola, which
support youth competitions (Coca-Cola Cup), to
work with the All India Football Federation (AIFF)
for targeted talent identification through the
competition which engages schools, districts, and
finally the national championship. The message
will be clear direction to identify talent for the U17 World Cup in 2017 (boys born in January 2000
and after). It may be called "Road to 2017". This
will have a clear connect with the youth across the
Ÿ We would like to engage the I-League clubs. As
part of the licensing criteria, it is a requirement for
them to have U-14 teams. The AIFF plans to select
at least 60 boys to be placed in two Academies
specifically for the U-17 World Cup. These
academies will engage the best coaches and we
plan to organise a league/tournament with
participation of the I-League clubs and the AIFF
Academies so we can continuously identify new
talent.
Ÿ The Academies will have the best exposure in
age group tournaments across the world.
Hopefully some potential stars may be identified,
who may get offers to join top-level European club
academies, which may also help in creating youth
icons before the tournament.
Ÿ This of course is not just a one-off target but an
ongoing one. The Indian U-17 team will be eligible
to try and qualify for the AFC U-16 championship
in 2016 before playing the World Cup in 2017. It
will also be our endeavour to qualify for the U-17
World Cup in 2019 and so on. So in other words,
this gives a clear goal towards youth development
and creating youth icons with whom the millions
of young fans in the country can identify and
connect and thereby raise the level of Indian
football. These young footballers with the right
technical skills and training will eventually be the
platform for the U-20, U-22, and senior national
teams.
These are some of my thoughts on how
important a tournament like the U-17 World Cup
is to connect with young Indians and change the
landscape of Indian football. I believe this is the
tipping point for Indian football.
Needless to say, we will do our best to ensure
a world class event so that we can aspire for
perhaps the U-20 World Cup in the near future!
16
FOOTBALL IS GOING TO BE BIG IN INDIA
Viral Oza
Marketing Director
Nokia India
W
hat are the main factors that come
into play for your company while
choosing a sport, event or team for
sponsorship?
One, that the sport has to be appreciated by the
viewers, and second that the sport should treat us
as partners and jointly promote the event, and of
course should also allow consumer engagement.
It is said that in sponsorship it is not what you
have bought, but what you do with it.
Activation around a property can be much
more expensive and stretch limited time and
resources available with the organization.
What kind of budgets would go into such
activities? Please give examples of some
cutting-edge activation that has been
undertaken by your company in the sports
space.
Classic example is our association with the IPL
team, Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR). We have,
normally, over the last 5 years, put in 1:2 monies
behind activating the whole sponsorship – saleslinked contests, sending consumers to watch
matches, giving them an opportunity of a life time
to meet SRK and KKR players. Our communication
related to IPL has always being about taking a step
forward, be it asking consumers for tips on
relieving tension of the players etc.
How much of the company's sponsorship
budget is earmarked for sports-focused
properties?
About 10-12% of the Nokia's sponsorship budget
is earmarked for sports-related properties.
In choosing what to sponsor, marketing
executives often aim to match the event to the
image of their brand. Due to the dearth of high-
17
profile national-level sporting events in India,
it might be necessary to spread the budget
across sports and geographies. Please explain
the methodology followed by your team.
Nokia chose to delink from Champions League
as well as an assessment of the long term
future of the Champions League as a property
from a brand like Nokia's point of view.
We believe in one sport, one nation. Taking the
KKR example, though it's a Kolkata-based
franchisee, our IPL-related offers have always
been across the nation, be it flying the consumer
from Kerala all the way to Kolkata.
The only reason we parted ways with the property
is because they moved the event to South Africa.
Otherwise the property delivered 11X ROI.
What methodologies are utilised to measure
the exposure for the brand and success of the
sponsorship to justify the RoI on the
sponsorship and activation around it?
We have very strict metrics on Brand KPIs, Digital
engagement, Sales, and we follow Repucom to
measure the exposure value – Nokia believes in a
minimum 3X ROI in any sponsorship that we do
Nokia's association with KKR is seen as a
"package deal" and extension of Shah Rukh
Khan's endorsement deal with Nokia. Beyond
that, please offer some case study pointers on
some unique activations Nokia has done with
KKR.
Not really. Though it was initiated because of SRK,
the sponsorship was a punt that has worked very
well.
Please elaborate on the value derived from
associating with just one team rather than
being a central sponsor for the IPL.
All I can say is that we have 7X returns for the last
5 editions of the IPL.
Nokia was title sponsor for the Champions
Trophy for only a year. Please expand on why
The association with Shillong Lajong FC is
interesting. How does Nokia plan to evolve the
association? Are there any plans on the
youth/talent development side?
This was a very hardworking decision. Football is
big in NE and our cricket sponsorships did not
reflect a rub off, hence this association. Football is
going to be big in India and we have seen the club
culture grow at a very rapid pace; this is the
principle reason behind signing up with FC
Barcelona as India Partners.
18
THE BUCK
STOPS AT TV
I
ndian sports TV broadcasting was, is, and will
continue to be dominated by Cricket for the
foreseeable future, contributing to 80 to 85% of
the total television sports media revenues.
The year 2011 was a phenomenal year for
sports broadcasters, with media revenue up by 50%
compared to the previous year on the back of India
hosting (and winning) the ICC ODI World Cup as
well as the IPL registering a peak year. The Indian
Grand Prix 2011 was also very popular in India, with
the inaugural edition delivering the high ratings for
the Formula One race.
However, other sports are also gaining
prominence, especially Football, though interest
remains predominantly for international
leagues/tournaments. That is expected as the ILeague improves as a television-friendly product
and also with the launch of the Indian Super League
(ISL) later this year.
Other sports such as Badminton and Hockey
have started making their presence felt because of
improved performances by Indian players in the
international arena, coupled with increased
investments flowing into the two sports due to the
launch of the Indian Badminton League (IBL) and
the Hockey India League (HIL) respectively.
What is common to Cricket, Football, Hockey
and Badminton? The way the country's lead
broadcaster STAR is looking to become the network
that controls all the significant television real estate
that is out there in these sports, but also takes equity
positions in tournaments such as ISL, in which it is a
35% stakeholder.
And it is not as if the rival networks are just
sitting by. Multi Screen Media (MSM) aka Sony
Entertainment Television, which holds the rights to
Indian sport's biggest annual jamboree – the Indian
Premier League – is also putting its all behind
another sport that SportzPower bets will become
big in India going forward – Basketball.
Some months ahead of the announcement last
October that the National Basketball Association
(NBA) had entered into a multi-year partnership
with the Reliance Foundation to launch a
comprehensive school-based youth Basketball
program in India, MSM's sports channel Sony SIX
had entered into a multi-year television
partnership.
That was followed up in October with the
announcement of an expansion of their existing
deal, which will see more NBA games and
programming broadcast in India than ever before.
Just as this report was being finalized, came
the news hot off the press that Sony SIX had won the
exclusive broadcast rights to the 2014 and 2018
FIFA World Cups for $90 million. The deal also
includes rights to broadcast the Under-17 World
Cup 2017 to be hosted by India.
This latest acquisition by Sony SIX comes on
the back of broadcasting the UEFA and CONMEBOL
matches from the 2014 FIFA World Cup qualifying
rounds, in addition to acquiring the rights for
qualifiers for UEFA Euro 2016 and UEFA Euro 2016.
This acquisition massively strengthens the
channel's equity vis-a-vis quality Football telecast
in India.
Then there is Neo Sport, which has
repositioned itself as a niche player after the loss of
BCCI rights to STAR. It is putting a lot of investment
behind Golf, not just on air but through sister
concern Nimbus Sport. Nimbus signed a three-year
contract with the Indian Golf Union (IGU) in 2011
that sees the sportscaster market and deliver the
Indian Masters as well as the Indian Open.
But as already noted, the big news in Indian
sports TV broadcasting remains Cricket. A slugfest
is expected when the ICC media rights come up for
bidding. And further down the road an even bigger
one when the BCCI issues tenders for the next cycle
of rights to its crown jewel – the IPL.
The battle royale that is developing in the UK
market over key football rights between dominant
player SKY and telecom giant BT could well be
replicated in the Indian market over the next five
years, but with prized cricket properties being the
bone of contention.
BT's push into sports broadcasting has gained
massive heft with the confirmation by UEFA that BT
Sport has won the 2015–18 Champions League and
Europa League media rights for the UK territory. BT
Sport will pay £897 million ($1.4 billion, 1.1 billion
euros) for the rights to 350 games, becoming the
first UK broadcaster to win exclusive rights to all
matches in both European tournaments.
SportzPower sees a similar scenario unfolding
around two big-ticket cricket properties that open
for bidding over the next five years – the ICC cricket
19
20
21
rights and the Indian Premier League telecast
rights. Between the two, it is the IPL that will be the
bigger draw, seeing as how MSM has garnered such
massive profits from being the rights holder of the
biggest property the sport has on offer.
We reckon the bidding for IPL in the next cycle
(2018-2027) could well go as high as $2 billion+,
which means Rs 120 billion (at current exchange
rates) could potentially be the investment
commitment that whoever finally wins the rights
will have to make.
And who would likely be in the running here?
That Sony and STAR will be there is a given.
SportzPower will be more interested in the
moves that Mukesh Ambani-controlled Reliance Jio
Infocom, which has just got its unified telecom
licence, will be making for this particular high value
cricket property.
Before its latest coup, BT's move into acquiring
a piece of English Premier football rights in the UK
earlier in 2013, breaking the traditional lock that
STAR's sister network SKY had on it, was the big
news as far as UK football rights bidding was
concerned.
Highlights of Media Spends on TV
Ÿ Increase in 2011 due to ICC World Cup & good
IPL
SportzPower expects Reliance Jio Infocom to
have a similar disruptive impact on the IPL rights
bidding.
would be football. For the three-year current cycle of
EPL rights, STAR has committed $150 million. It can
only go up post 2015.
As for the ICC rights piece, considering that it
went for $1.1 billion last time round, it is reasonable
to assume that the next cycle (2016 onwards) will
go for a higher price.
Mukesh Ambani's ambitions around sport are
gradually being unfolded and in terms of scale and
ambition they are huge. Stands to reason therefore
that Reliance Jio Infocom could well prove the Joker in
the pack when the next round of big ticket cricket
rights bidding comes into play.
Then there are of course the cricket rights for
England, Australia, and going to the next tier which
3500
3000
3000
2500
2250
2250
2000
2000
Media
Spends
1450
1500
1150
1000
500
Ÿ 2013 is flat on 2012. This is owing to less
number of cricket matches India played and also
that the series under question had more Test
matches
Ÿ Media industry had grown nearly parallel with
0
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
Source - GroupM ESP
the inflation rates
Figures mentioned are in Crores (1 Crore = 10 Million)
22
23
ENABLING A PARADIGM SHIFT
Nitin Kukreja
President (Sports)
Star India
A
t Star India, we are excited to be at the
forefront of a sweeping change to the
sports viewership landscape.
When we decided to make a foray in the sports
genre, the first thing we questioned was the belief
that India is a 'one sport, one language country'.
Our first attempt has been to make sports
viewership more inclusive. In the last 15 years in
India, entertainment and movie channels have
gone local with a vengeance; however, sports has
remained aloof from localization. Telecast of
cricket was limited to English, a language spoken
by less than 10% of India. Introducing
commentary in Hindi in Cricket, followed by other
sports, has made the action accessible for a much
wider audience. We have taken this a step further
by launching India's first 24x7 Hindi sports
channel – Star Sports 3. We see potential to go
even more local – both in terms of language and
content.
Cricket too, as we know it, is restricted to the
senior men's team international cricket. We have
widened the scope of cricket to under-19 cricket,
women's cricket, and university cricket – with
much encouraging results. Our appetite here, and
as we discovered, the viewer's appetite too, is only
constrained by supply!
Pockets of passion exist across the country
for a variety of local sports, but these have never
been tapped or harnessed in the way they should
have been. Apart from cricket, sport as we know it
was restricted only to international soccer leagues,
motor sports and the like – no homegrown, local
sports leagues of the kind that exist in most other
markets, most notably the USA. We matched intent
with investment – thus the Hockey India League,
Indian Badminton League, and Kolkata Football
League made their debut on our channels in the
last one year. Not only did this get significant
support from viewers in all parts of the country, it
has resulted in providing visibility of a whole new
generation of players and talent across sports.
Unlike previous years, a young talented
sportsperson who is passionate about hockey,
football or badminton sees a viable avenue to
pursue their sport of choice, possibly make a
career out of it.
Viewers today consume content on multiple
screens beyond TV – the internet, the smartphone
and the tablet. Why then would Star be limited to
TV? This thought gave birth to starsports.com – a
platform that provides a rich and personalized
experience to sports fans, unlike anything on TV.
Viewers can pause, rewind and relive the
moments that they want to see, not what the TV
broadcaster has chosen for them to see.
We believe that these initiatives have set the
ball rolling and will create serious momentum in
transforming the way sports is played and
consumed in the country. However, it is a fact that
much more remains to be done before India can
claim pride of place in the international sports
arena.
Beyond broadcasters, the mind-set of the
entire ecosystem – the sports federations, the
government and the news media and advertisers
needs to change so that a variety of sports get the
money, resources, infrastructure and coverage that
they deserve. The government has a huge role to
play – by allocating adequate monies, developing
stadiums and infrastructure, and putting in
enabling policies in place. The sports federations
must enable and nurture talent, and work together
with other stakeholders to promote and market
the game.
In a young country like India, sports have a
crucial role to play in youth development and can
even be a huge generator of employment. It will
take a spirit of partnership with federations and
people with vision to take sports to the next level
in this country.
24
TEAM SPONSORSHIP
- ALL ABOUT THE
BOYS IN BLUE
800
700
685
612
610
600
Cricket
500
I
f there is one area that validates the proposition
that Sport in India is all about Cricket, then the
endorsement arena is certainly it. It is not
happy reading on the Team Sponsorship front if you
are a non-Cricket proponent. In the six years under
review, Cricket accounted for a low of 91 per cent in
2012 and a high of 97 per cent in 2009 of overall
Team Sponsorship monies.
Football
424
A clear positive in 2012 of course was the
launch of the 'rebel' World Series Hockey (WSH) copromoted by the de-recognized Indian Hockey
Federation (IHF) and Nimbus Sport. What WSH
showed up in stark relief was that though Cricket
has long past taken over the mantle of our National
sport, the sticks sport has still got game.
Others
400
300
200
100
65
10
Having said that, the trends shown in 2012
look to be a pointer to better things to come for nonCricket team sports with Football and Hockey both
coming into the reckoning. For Football in
particular, it is safe to say that these numbers are but
a fraction of what is possible if there is a better
mining of the potential the game holds in India.
What we've also noticed is that a major part of
Football team sponsorship number has come from
Indian Brands associating with European Football
Clubs – Airtel & Manchester United, Nokia with FC
Barcelona, Tata Tea with Arsenal and Inter Milan,
among others.
425
425
3
17
3
28
3
31
35
8
44
24
0
2008
2009
2010
It also revealed that, given the right platform,
there are enough brands willing to explore the
unknown. In 2008, when tire major Bridgestone
considered IPL as a medium for brand
communication, it was put off by the price tags for
premium rights. For example, real estate company
DLF, at that time, was paying Rs 400 million per year
for the title sponsorship of IPL. So, Bridgestone
made a modest entry into cricket as a co-sponsor of
IPL franchise Mumbai Indians.
2011
2012
2013
Source - GroupM ESP
Figures mentioned are in Crores (1 Crore = 10 Million)
Revenue Allocations Around Team Sponsorship
Ÿ Increase in Cricket in 2011 due to addition of 2 IPL
teams. Dip in 2012 because franchise Kochi Tuskers
eliminated from IPL
Ÿ Increase in Football due to Brands like Airtel, Nokia,
Tata Tea, etc. signing deals with European Football Clubs
Ÿ Increase in other sports in 2011 due to Formula 1.
Ÿ Increase in 2012 because Sahara renewed Hockey
India deal in better value & emergence of World Series
Hockey
Four years later, in 2012, the decision to
become the title sponsor for World Series Hockey Ÿ Increase in 2013 due to Hockey India League and
Indian Badminton League
(WSH), came easy. For one, the investment was low:
Bridgestone was paying Rs 20 million per year in a
three-year deal. And it gave the tire company an
opportunity to target North India, a market where
hockey is popular and where Bridgestone was
25
weak. South India had always been Bridgestone's
strong market and the association with Mumbai
Indians was good enough to deliver there.
seeing that WSH died a premature death due to it
being a non-sanctioned league is another story in
itself.
From Bridgestone's perspective, even if the
company's return on investment (RoI) from WSH
was Rs 100 million worth of media mileage
annually, they would have been happy. That they
were not able to fully test that theory as it turned out
WSH remained a short-lived event as the
establishment ensured it would go down in history
as the hockey equivalent of the Zee Grouppromoted Indian Cricket League (ICL), which was
followed and bettered many times over by the IPL.
What IPL did to ICL, the Hockey India League
(HIL) has effectively done to WSH. The successful
launch of HIL and the IBL has set the stage for
franchise-based leagues, with more already
running and in the offing – wrestling, kabbadi,
boxing, tennis, athletics. All this action augurs well
and promises to attract more money into team
sponsorships and rewards for players in noncricket offerings.
26
WHEN IT COMES
TO TALENT, MONEY
CHASING DHONI & CO
A
nd if Cricket overwhelmingly dominates
Team Sponsorships, the same is the case on
the Athlete Management side. The Big Boys
of Indian sport's brand endorsement bandwagon
are cricketers. And it doesn't make any difference
whether they are active on the field or retired. They
are the ones who are grabbing all the attention, and
the moolah that goes with it.
In the six years under review, the gap between
the cricket stars and the best of the rest has only
been increasing on the endorsement value index.
That is not going to change in relative terms
but in absolute terms, as the money and
investments coming in to sports increases, so too
will the trickle-down to other sports.
A case in point being India's badminton ace
Saina Nehwal, who in 2012 signed a three-year deal
worth Rs 400 million with sports management firm
Rhiti Sports, soon after her bronze-medal feat in the
London Olympic Games.
That said, Rhiti and Saina have recently parted
ways, an indicator that non-cricketers have a long
wait ahead before they can hope to have a sniff at the
kind of monies the top cricketers command.
27
500
450
400
360
Cricket
350
Others
281
300
256
250
246
120
118
100
50
8.2
7.5
8.1
10.6
12
21.7
0
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
Source - GroupM ESP
Figures mentioned are in Crores (1 Crore = 10 Million)
Who Is Getting What in Athlete Management
Ÿ Increase in Endorsement values of Other Sports in 2011 because of World Cup and Commonwealth Games performance
Ÿ Increase is also due to the increase in endorsement value and number of endorsements for Indian cricket team players – e.g. Sachin Tendulkar, MS Dhoni, Virat Kohli,
Suresh Raina, etc.
28
OTHER SPORTS ARE STEADILY
CARVING A NICHE
Bunty Sajdeh
Chief Executive Officer
Cornerstone Sport & Entertainment
W
hat were the trends in investments
in brand endorsement from 2008 to
2013?
2008 was an interesting year in terms of brand
endorsements. Due to the global meltdown,
markets worldwide had taken a beating and
economies were reeling from the subprime crisis.
Incidentally, 2008 was also the year the IPL was
launched in India which gave brands a lucrative
new platform of brand advertising. It was
interesting to note that the general market
environment at the time did not drastically effect
the investments brands made in the IPL that year.
In terms of brand endorsements over the years,
what is most noticeable is that brands are putting
in a lot more research before embarking on an
association with a Celebrity, be it from sports or
entertainment.
The science behind an association has become
paramount today. With the aid of social media, one
can easily identify each celebrity's fan base in
terms of demographics, which in turn is
used to determine whether the brand and
the celebrity are speaking to the same
audience. In terms of commercials involved,
it is largely dependent on the popularity of
the said celebrity. Successful performances
of celebrities in their respective fields are
directly proportional to their perceived
market value.
This period has seen the retirements of
the Indian greats – Ganguly, Dravid,
Kumble and Laxman – as well as the
greatest, in Sachin. We would assume
that Sachin and Dravid will retain their
brand salience, but not so the others.
Please share your point of view.
Ganguly, Kumble, and Laxman were seldom
perceived as individuals who would carry
brands. It was more of a personal choice on
their part to focus on their Cricket rather
than commercial commitments. While each
of them had their own persona and
individuality, Ganguly, often being the most
flamboyant of the lot, still did not see as
many endorsements as cricketers today. This
is partly due to the fact that the sports
management industry was still in a very
nascent stage during that time, coupled with
Sachin dominating the endorsement space.
Over the years, sports management agencies
29
such as ours have refined the way brands perceive
athletes. While Sachin was and will be the poster
child of Indian cricket for the perceivable future,
Dravid was very comfortable in the space he had
carved out for himself. Dravid's image was and
still is the boy next door, controversy free,
intelligent, and well-spoken. These are traits
which will always attract brands no matter what
the age. Sachin on the other hand is difficult to
compare with the rest of the players. The respect
and reverence he enjoys around the world is
seldom seen in sport. He will continue to carry
that aura around with him.
Each set of players represent the current trends
and styles of their respective generation. The likes
of Virat, Rohit, Dhawan, and Raina are prime
examples of the evolution of Indian Cricket. They
are clued in to things like their image off the field
and their social media interaction etc. These
parameters directly affect how brands perceive
them and will hence determine the kind of
endorsements they attract. Agencies such as
Cornerstone also play a vital role in identifying
each individual's strengths and weaknesses and
will in turn help mould their personalities and
image to suit the best of both worlds.
Then there is the fading of the next tier big
names – Sehwag, Yuvraj, Gambhir, Harbhajan,
Zaheer. Also we've seen new players taking the
baton – Virat Kohli, Shikhar Dhawan, Suresh
Raina, Rohit Sharma. What is their future
looking like?
How are other sports athletes contributing to
the industry and how is their future looking
like?
Age catches up with us all and athletes are subject
to this saying more than any. Once stalwarts of the
India cricket team, the likes of Sehwag, Yuvraj,
Gambhir, Harbhajan, Zaheer have all been
dominating in the their respective disciplines at
their peak. Both generations of cricketers have an
important role to play during this passage of
change. It is up to the senior members who are in
the twilight of their career to guide and nurture
the younger players and make sure the legacy,
which was passed down to them as youngsters, is
in safe hands. The incoming crop of younger
Cricketers should respect prevailing customs
which have been passed down, while at the same
time bringing their own individuality to the game.
Other sports in India have slowly and steadily
carved out a niche for themselves. In recent years,
Abhinav Bindra has put shooting on the map by
winning India's first Olympic Gold Medal. Sania
Mirza reformed women's tennis in India by
becoming the first Indian woman to win a Grand
Slam title in doubles. Our performance in the
recently concluded London Olympic Games was
testament to other sports gaining popularity in the
country. Saina Nehwal has made badminton
popular again by giving the otherwise Chinese
dominated sport a new face. Dipika Pallikal has
been consistently beating top-ranked players in
squash to become the first woman from India to
break into the Top 10 in the world. Sunil Chhetri
has recently become the highest goal scorer for
India overtaking Baichung Bhutia. What this does
is give brands an entirely new dimension to work
with when it comes to associating with athletes.
30
SHORTER AND NEWER FORMATS
KEY DRIVERS FOR GROWTH
higher viewership as compared to analogue
audiences for Sports channels.
Prasanth Kumar
Managing Partner
GroupM India, Central Trading Group
W
hat were the trends in investments
in sports from 2008 to 2013?
Sports investments have been trending the same
as overall market TV ADEX (investments highly
dependent on nature of the tournaments and the
kind of teams participating). With the advent of
HIL, IBL, Indian F1, and the upcoming ISL, it
augurs well for Sports advertising in India. Shorter
and newer formats would be the key drivers for
growth for all sports (cricket, football, hockey etc).
Promotion of these properties in a big way by both
sponsors and broadcasters likely to set the trend
for non-cricket advertising spends in India.
This period has also been marked by the
switch from analog to digital which would have
had a disruptive impact. What influence has it
had in the period under review?
Higher traction among digital audiences – 25%
Between 2008 and 2013, the ratings in Cricket
have been going down but that can also be
explained by the fact that the television
viewing universe has been incrementally
expanding. How are the numbers playing out
here, both in terms of rating and ad rates?
Cricket ratings are more or less stable between
2010 and 2013 – no significant drop in ratings
across ODI, Test and T20. Investments still skewed
with 90-95% of Sports spends on Cricket and this
is likely to continue in future too. Tournaments
involving class A teams like Australia, England,
South Africa prosper better from advertising POV.
With Star promoting EPL with Hindi
commentary, FIFA World Cup next year, IMG
launching Indian Super League – will Football
be the alternate sport in India?
Hindi commentary is a positive; however, quality
of content and commentators could impact
viewership. Football likely to emerge as an
alternate sport in India, but would do so on the
long term. Some of the FIFA matches in 2010 have
rated as high as IPL matches and the tournament
average was at 1.41. Higher ratings were observed
in 2006 FIFA too. FIFA factor is a huge draw for the
viewership. FIFA in 2014 to be a huge draw for
advertisers in India too.
31
WE ARE A NATIONAL BRAND AND ADDRESS
CONSUMERS ACROSS GEOGRAPHIES
What methodologies are utilized to
measure the exposure for the brand and
success of the sponsorship to justify the
ROI on the sponsorship and activation
around it?
Basant Dhawan
General Manager – Media
Vodafone India
W
hat are the main factors that
come into play for your
company while choosing a
sport, event or team for sponsorship?
It is a combination of reach and consumer's
connect with the sport that contributes to
this decision.
In choosing what to sponsor, marketing
executives often aim to match the event to
the image of their brand. Due to the
dearth of high-profile national-level
sporting events in India, it might be
necessary to spread the budget across
sports and geographies. Please explain
the methodology followed by your team.
We are a national brand and address
consumers across geographies. The scale of
activation may vary in certain geographies
but the consumer experience and
engagement is kept standard.
The measures for determining the ROI vary
from sport to sport. It broadly includes
media value generated, impact on brand
metrics and brand engagement generated.
The F1 association in India is more of an
extension of a global partnership. Having
said that, are there any unique
insights/brand uplifts that F1 has
delivered for Vodafone in this market?
F1 has enabled us to reach out to our
enterprise and SME consumer base to drive
brand adoption and loyalty amongst these
segments.
32
33
DIGITAL MEDIA SCORE BIG WITH
EARLY ADOPTION
I
ndia today stands at the threshold of a major
digital revolution in the making. Digital India is
growing rapidly, boasting the world's third
largest online population that is also the second
fastest growing.
Indian consumers are fast adapting to multiplatform digital consumption which is expected to
grow further as broadband becomes accessible
(faster and cheaper), combined with cheaper smart
phones and connected devices. India, with a large
and growing digital literate population, has its
unique challenges, but presents immense potential
across several developing and underdeveloped
sectors (sports, travel, online entertainment,
healthcare, communication, government services,
education etc.) with windfall opportunities for
growth.
Sport on digital media has still some ways to go
however. As per Comscore's last report, while reach
of sports within the web population is slightly
better than some of the BRICs nations, time spent is
lowest and almost half of the Global average.
Sport consumption is largely driven by cricket
with leading sites being ESPN's Cricinfo, Yahoo
Cricket, Cricbuzz. The consumption is largely
limited to score updates, news consumption, blogs
etc.
While Live Streaming of most series is
available, the consumer adoption is limited and
streaming quality is a large reason for this with
bandwidth still being a challenge.
Advertiser adoption on digital sports is also
largely limited to sponsorships. While properties
like IPL have tried selling spot buys, they have met
with limited success so far.
All this does not mean the potential does not
exist. Consumer interest is clearly growing but have
been impeded by poor infrastructure. The fact that
better bandwidth speeds have helped grow
Reach of Sports Category
Worldwide
China
India
Russia
Brazil
consumption clearly points out that once
technologies like 4G, etc. become embedded, this
will explode.
The strategic use of digital media will be
particularly critical for the non-cricket sports in
India, not just in terms of reaching out to the existing
community, but growing the fan base. There are
practical considerations that need to be taken into
account as well. In television, there is the cost
impediment, in print there is the space impediment.
Digital is the future and sports administrators that
embrace this reality will be the ones that score.
Average Time Spent on Sports Category
(Minutes)
55.1
38%
20%
31.0
26%
29.6
51.3
24%
53%
50.1
Source - GroupM ESP
34
ON THE
FRONT FOOT
E
ven as 2013 has wound up, Indian Sports'
biggest blockbuster – the IPL – goes into
2014 with many questions to answer.
Primarily those that have been raised by the spotfixing scandal that rocked the cosy crossrelationships that have thrived in India's most high
profile by-invitation-only Super Club.
As for the IPL's owner, the Board of Control for
Cricket in India (BCCI), the world's richest and by
extension most powerful cricketing body, has been
made to realize the hard way that it cannot take for
granted an endless money flow from its
stakeholders. With the Sahara Group pulling the
plug on both the IPL as well as its lead sponsorship
of the Indian cricket team, the BCCI has had to come
to terms with the market correction around the
sponsorship monies advertisers are willing to put
behind its big-ticket properties as well as the prices
it can demand for the sale of a new franchise (if it
chooses to open bidding next year).
Does this imply that Indian Sport's most high
value property is going down? Most certainly not.
It's more like a course correction and price
correction. And whatever may be the short-term
pull-backs, in the long run, accountability, better
corporate governance, more transparency, are all
good for not just the IPL, but the BCCI too.
As for other sports, the big
news of 2014 will be the inaugural
edition of the IMG-Reliance-Star coowned Indian Super League, the
franchise-based tournament that is
set to bring all the bells and whistles
associated with the IPL to football.
There is also the commitment that
IMG Reliance, the commercial rights
holders for football in the country,
has to improve the country's top-tier
soccer tournament. The I-League
clubs will be hoping that IMG-R
walks the talk on that front, though
the prevailing sentiment is one of
wariness as to what the future holds.
Additionally, both the Hockey
Indian League and the Indian
Badminton League will be
conducting their second editions in
2014, the deliveries around which
will be critical to how the respective
sports improve monetization.
All in all, 2014 has more
upsides than down. While there will
be no Indian Grand Prix next year,
there will be more leagues, sports
like basketball are making rapid
strides, and the whole wellness and
fitness movement is gaining
ever-increasing traction, which in
turn means more interest in sport as
a participation activity and not just
as spectator engagement.
35
More Power to Sports,
we say!
About GroupM
GroupM is the leading global media investment management operation, part of the WPP Group. It serves as the parent
company to WPP media agencies including Mindshare, Maxus, MEC, MediaCom, and Motivator in India. GroupM India
also have several niche specialist units across content, digital and experiential marketing, as well as consulting. Our
primary purpose is to maximize the performance of WPP's media communications agencies on behalf of our clients,
our stakeholders and our people by operating as a parent and collaborator in performance-enhancing activities such
as trading, content creation, sports, digital, finance, proprietary tool development and other business-critical
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positions. The focus of GroupM is the intelligent application of physical and intellectual scale to benefit trading,
innovation, and new communication services, to bring competitive advantage to our clients and our companies.
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About GroupM ESP
GroupM ESP specializes in evaluating, negotiating, developing, activating and measuring strategic content
platforms & partnerships around movies, music, sports, live, celebs and characters. Uniquely positioned at the
intersection of the media and the sports & entertainment industries, our teams focus on developing
innovative content strategies and solutions with a digital core that embed our clients and their brands in
consumer passion points through multimedia leverage and multifaceted partnerships.
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Suku Murti
+91 9820 349536
suku.murti@groupm.com
Vinit Karnik
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About SportzPower
SportzPower is the media brand from Sportz Network Pvt Ltd, an independently-owned company operating
in the significant areas of media, marketing, and events in India's fast developing sports industry.
SportzPower has established itself as a credible source for current and comprehensive information,
knowledge and insight to a targeted audience involved in the business and management of sports.
SportzPower's online and offline properties are designed with an aim to benefit professionals from all sports
industry stakeholders in the Indian and international markets, through direct or indirect participation.
CO-FOUNDERS
Thomas Abraham
+91 9821 213266
thomas@sportzpower.com
C.P. Thomas
+91 9820 268020
cpthomas@sportzpower.com
Pooja Chaudhri
+91 9820 515445
pooja@sportzpower.com