Bengaluru: The dominance of Indian cricket in terms of commerce is no secret – it accounts to a total of 45% of the total cricket revenues generated in the global cricket market. In fact, post-pandemic, the cricket market has been shaken but not as much as the other sports.
When India plays a game, an estimated 400 million watch them play and this, in turn, is the reason why brands are eager to invest each time India is playing a series. Even when they are playing two, at the same time.
While we step into the 7th month of the year 2021, the game of cricket moves into a young feel as a dynamic young team led by Shikar Dhawan and Rahul Dravid as the coach, take on Sri Lanka in the ODI and T20 series starting 13th July 2021; all this, while a Virat Kohli led team, is on a tour in England.
Investing in cricket has been a matter of both prestige and pragmatism for brands.
And this time it is no different as we see crypto brands entering the arena.
The title sponsor of the India v Sri Lanka T20I series is CoinDCX who seems to have smartly chosen a series that despite not having big names like Virat Kohli, Ravichandran Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja associated with it is still projected to draw a huge audience that could give them a good return of investment.
New-age tech brands are not shying away from tapping the cricket market because it has enough niches to accommodate a variety of marketing goals. With a young audience who is always tuned into cricket (more than 50% of India’s cricket watching audience, which is cumulatively estimated at around 700 million viewers by BARC), it makes particular sense for newer brands looking to target a younger audience.
Bhairav Shanth, the co-founder of ITW, a decade-old sports consulting firm that holds on-ground advertising and sponsorship rights for cricket in Sri Lanka, India and a host of other countries, thinks there is a good reason why young brands are exploring the cricket market as a global platform.
“The game of cricket in India has its own niche, therefore it has always been sponsored by iconic brands and we at ITW try in every way possible to cater to the needs and the present market. A Crypto-Asset exchange platform as a pioneer in this segment of sponsorship was the need of the hour as it not only creates curiosity but also indicates the progressive Indian economy”, he said.
ITW has consulted many new brands looking to create buzz by leveraging cricket guiding them on how to extract the best ROI from their association.
It’s easy to think smaller cricket properties have little strategic value, but the truth is cricket investments are like cricket team selections. You pick horses for courses for the most effective outcomes.
