Marketing Professional Sports to Pink Customers
“Honey, get your own beer. I’m watching the game.” As the number of women sports fans is increasing, marketers are scrambling to capitalize on this huge segment. The majority of household budgets are also controlled by women. This creates a gaping hole in prior marketing efforts that were targeted solely to men.
The Women’s Sports Foundation determined women account for approximately 40 percent of fans for men’s professional sports. When marketers consider that the sports industry in the United States collects nearly $213 billion annually, a potential loss of $85.2 billion causes the sports industry to stop and pay attention.
While the stereotypical sports fan has long been composed of males, ignoring the growth potential of female fans will have drastic effects on the profits and success of teams and sponsors.
Because of the large size of this target, there are many ways to segment it for marketing purposes, such as: age, geographic location, income, marital status, whether or not they are parents or not, among others. Research continues to be collected to better understand the different segments and what they want.
So how does a men’s professional sports team attract and keep a female audience?
The biggest hurdle facing a professional team is obtaining initial interest. Many teams are making sporting events more of a family affair because of the hold women have over discretionary budget purse-strings. According to the Canadian Broadcast Company (CBC), the president of TrendSight Group in Chicago, Marti Barletta, stated, “Women buy 80 percent of just about everything in the consumer economy.”
In a panel discussion at the University of Oregon in 2006, Lisa Walker, co-owner and Director of Marketing for the Keizer, Oregon, Volcanoes, noted that the “equity” of that franchise lies with families. She commented on the importance of teams surveying the customer base to determine what the fans want and then delivering it. If the team is targeting families and women as decision-makers it is important that concurrent marketing to other targets not offend or put-off that family market. Women are educated about and understand the game; don’t underestimate them.
At the same panel discussion, Angela Batinovich, Majority Owner and Managing Partner of the Portland Lumberjacks, discussed how women are interested in feeling an emotional connection with the team and its players. Women are interested in knowing personal details about the players’ backgrounds. They have a community interest by the players.
Sex appeal also drives female fans. NASCAR and Harlequin Enterprises Ltd. have agreed to create NASCAR-themed romance novels for female fans.
Increasingly, teams are discovering that not only are women interested and educated in professional sports teams, they want to be acknowledged as fans. As teams have begun to notice the female fan-base, the selection of female fan apparel has grown incrementally with merchandise sales. The statistics are hard to ignore. Women account for 43 percent of NFL fans, 46 percent of NBA fans, 40 percent of NASCAR fans, 28 percent of MLB fans, and 26 percent of recreational anglers are women. This isn’t an exhaustive list of professional sports but it does highlight the fact that female sports fans can no longer be ignored.
During the 2006 NBA playoffs, the number of female viewers of ESPN grew an amazing 33 percent. Since 2000, the number of female viewers of NBA games, on the TNT network, has increased 42 percent.
The message is clear—female fans are here to stay. They represent a huge and largely untapped market for professional sports teams. Marketers need to listen to what the female fan wants and deliver it to keep a large, loyal customer group. Liza Shamis quoted to CBC, “When we’re watching the games sometimes the guys will be like, ‘Hey go make use some food.’ – And I say, ‘Are you kidding me? The game is on; I’m not making anything.’”