{"id":25396,"date":"2024-04-15T08:56:56","date_gmt":"2024-04-15T13:56:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/fleishmanhillard.com\/?p=25396"},"modified":"2024-04-19T09:23:10","modified_gmt":"2024-04-19T14:23:10","slug":"womens-basketball-surging-popularity-opportunity-for-brands","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fleishmanhillard.com\/2024\/04\/womens-basketball-surging-popularity-opportunity-for-brands\/","title":{"rendered":"The Surging Popularity of Women\u2019s Basketball and the Opportunity for Brands"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"container\">\n                                            <div class=\"row\">\n                                                <div class=\"col-md-10 col-lg-9 offset-lg-1\">\n                                                    <p>The NCAA Division 1 Men\u2019s and Women\u2019s Basketball Tournaments bring together casual and serious college basketball fans to cheer on their favorite teams and players, and more often than not, programs and prospects that fans have never had a rooting interest in before. Year after year, the tournaments deliver incredibly compelling storylines. This year\u2019s story, undoubtedly, is the surge in popularity of the women\u2019s game.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n                                                <\/div>\n                                            <\/div>\n                                        <\/div>\n\n<div class=\"container\">\n                                            <div class=\"row\">\n                                                <div class=\"col-md-10 col-lg-9 offset-lg-1\">\n                                                    <p>Since the tournament\u2019s founding in 1939, the NCAA Division 1 Basketball Tournament\u00a0has been synonymous with the men\u2019s tournament, and while the men\u2019s game remains extremely popular \u2013 there\u2019s been a paradigm shift. For the first time ever, more people watched the women\u2019s championship game than the men\u2019s, according to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nielsen.com\/news-center\/2024\/womens-college-basketball-championship-draws-record-breaking-18-9-million-viewers\/#:~:text=Women's%20College%20Basketball%20Championship%20Game%20Draws%20Record%2DBreaking%2018.9%20Million%20Viewers&amp;text=Nielsen\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Nielsen<\/a>. Additionally, this year\u2019s women\u2019s tournament generated 60% more earned media coverage than the men\u2019s tournament, while also setting <a href=\"https:\/\/www.forbes.com\/sites\/bradadgate\/2024\/04\/08\/the-2024-womens-ncaa-basketball-tournament-set-numerous-records\/?sh=53da6acf4841\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">viewing records<\/a> across all six rounds.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n                                                <\/div>\n                                            <\/div>\n                                        <\/div>\n\n<div class=\"container\">\n                                            <div class=\"row\">\n                                                <div class=\"col-md-10 col-lg-9 offset-lg-1\">\n                                                    <p>The women\u2019s game is taking center stage \u2013 with growing popularity and interest in the teams and their all-star rosters \u2013 carving out new and exciting marketing and communications opportunities for brands. Now the question is just how big this opportunity will be and which brands will be at the forefront of advancing women\u2019s sports.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n                                                <\/div>\n                                            <\/div>\n                                        <\/div>\n\n<div class=\"container\">\n                                            <div class=\"row\">\n                                                <div class=\"col-md-10 col-lg-9 offset-lg-1\">\n                                                    <p>We identified three takeaways from this year\u2019s tournament, the trends to watch and the opportunities for next year and beyond.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n                                                <\/div>\n                                            <\/div>\n                                        <\/div>\n\n<div class=\"container\">\n                                            <div class=\"row\">\n                                                <div class=\"col-md-10 col-lg-9 offset-lg-1\">\n                                                    <ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<div class=\"container\">\n<div class=\"row\">\n<div class=\"col-md-10 col-lg-9 offset-lg-1\">\n<li><strong>Drafting off the Popularity of the Tournament Remains a Winning Proposition: <\/strong>March is often when brands try to attach themselves to the men\u2019s or women\u2019s tournaments to better connect with their target audience. Now, seeing the opportunity to drive visibility and conversation, other organizations are getting in the game, too. During the tournament, it \u201cleaked\u201d that the Big3 offered Caitlin Clark, the University of Iowa\u2019s record-breaking player, $5 million to suit up for the 3-on-3 league \u2013 a \u201chistoric offer\u201d to a \u201cgenerational athlete,\u201d according to Ice Cube. The offer generated 1.5K original stories, so don\u2019t be surprised if you see other professional teams or leagues, or upstarts looking to draft off emerging players, leveraging the popularity of the tournament in the future. Brands can get in the game too, as long as there\u2019s an authentic connection to an athlete or another component of the tournament, e.g., team, coach, etc.\u00a0\u00a0<\/li><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div class=\"container\">\n<div class=\"row\">\n<div class=\"col-md-10 col-lg-9 offset-lg-1\">\n<li><strong>Women Athletes Deliver Proven Value: <\/strong>Watch any sporting event and you\u2019ll see professional athletes during the commercial breaks. But this March \u2013 those athletes were predominantly non-professional women athletes. For those brands that wanted to connect with consumers using current college basketball athletes, there were more well-known women superstars in college basketball than men to choose from. That\u2019s particularly evident when reviewing internet search volume for March, where Clark generated 900% more searches than two of the more popular men&#8217;s basketball athletes in Zach Edey of Purdue University or Dalton Knect of the University of Tennessee. Moving forward, brands would do well to identify the rising stars in the women\u2019s game \u2013&nbsp; now \u2013, to build their playbook for sponsorships and NIL deals headed into next season. An added benefit of utilizing the top women\u2019s players \u2013 they\u2019re staying in college (and at leading schools) longer than their male counterparts, providing a longer runway and better opportunities for brands to curate authentic connections with their growing fanbases.&nbsp;<\/li><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div class=\"container\">\n<div class=\"row\">\n<div class=\"col-md-10 col-lg-9 offset-lg-1\">\n<li><strong>Leverage Media with Cultural Influence: <\/strong>One of the more interesting moments during this year\u2019s tournaments was Angel Reese, Louisiana State University\u2019s (LSU) star player, declaring for the WNBA Draft, even though she still had a year of college eligibility left. The interesting part wasn&#8217;t that Reese declared for the Draft, it\u2019s HOW she did it \u2013 with a feature in Vogue (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.vogue.com\/article\/angel-reese-is-taking-her-talents-to-the-wnba\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Angel Reese Is Taking Her Talents to the WNBA<\/a>). Until now, you may not have put Vogue and women\u2019s college basketball in the same category, but the match-up of Reese\u2019s crossover star power, and the popularity of women athletics, made this exclusive one to remember. The Vogue story delivered significant conversation around Reese\u2019s decision, generating 8.5K earned media stories that continue to drive conversation today, and solidify her position as a budding WNBA superstar. In the article, Reese said of her decision to share the news exclusively with Vogue, \u201cI didn\u2019t want anything to be basic.\u201d Not only was Reese not \u201cbasic,\u201d she opened the door for brands to target more culturally focused outlets like Vogue, as opposed to relying solely on sports outlets.<\/li><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/ul>\n\n                                                <\/div>\n                                            <\/div>\n                                        <\/div>\n\n<div class=\"container\">\n                                            <div class=\"row\">\n                                                <div class=\"col-md-10 col-lg-9 offset-lg-1\">\n                                                    <p>What once was a moment dominated by the men\u2019s tournament has shifted dramatically. Women\u2019s players are the rising superstars, taking their lion\u2019s share of the brand opportunities. With several of the women\u2019s game greats declaring for the Draft, there\u2019s optimism and interest to see how their phenomenon evolves, and who will rise next.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n                                                <\/div>\n                                            <\/div>\n                                        <\/div>\n\n<div class=\"container\">\n                                            <div class=\"row\">\n                                                <div class=\"col-md-10 col-lg-9 offset-lg-1\">\n                                                    <p>March continues to be one of the greatest times of the year for brands to connect with fans through their shared love of basketball. For those interested in joining the conversation, laying the groundwork for more inclusive partnerships and activations starts now.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n                                                <\/div>\n                                            <\/div>\n                                        <\/div>\n\n<div class=\"container\">\n                                            <div class=\"row\">\n                                                <div class=\"col-md-10 col-lg-9 offset-lg-1\">\n                                                    <p><em>Chris Potter, Gabby Hawley, Miranda Xie, Matt Groch and Steve Hickok contributed to this article.<\/em><\/p>\n\n                                                <\/div>\n                                            <\/div>\n                                        <\/div>\n\n<div class=\"container\">\n                                            <div class=\"row\">\n                                                <div class=\"col-md-10 col-lg-9 offset-lg-1\">\n                                                    <figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"535\" src=\"https:\/\/fleishmanhillard.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/FHsports_MarchMadness_Linkedin_1200x627-copy-1024x535.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-25397\" srcset=\"https:\/\/fleishmanhillard.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/FHsports_MarchMadness_Linkedin_1200x627-copy-1024x535.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/fleishmanhillard.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/FHsports_MarchMadness_Linkedin_1200x627-copy-300x157.jpg 300w, https:\/\/fleishmanhillard.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/FHsports_MarchMadness_Linkedin_1200x627-copy-768x401.jpg 768w, https:\/\/fleishmanhillard.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/FHsports_MarchMadness_Linkedin_1200x627-copy.jpg 1200w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n                                                <\/div>\n                                            <\/div>\n                                        <\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The NCAA Division 1 Men\u2019s and Women\u2019s Basketball Tournaments bring together casual and serious college basketball fans to cheer on their favorite teams and players, and more often than not, programs and prospects that fans have never had a rooting interest in before. Year after year, the tournaments deliver incredibly compelling storylines. This year\u2019s story, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":25398,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":true,"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-25396","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-expertise"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fleishmanhillard.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25396","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fleishmanhillard.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fleishmanhillard.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fleishmanhillard.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/26"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fleishmanhillard.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25396"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/fleishmanhillard.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25396\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fleishmanhillard.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25398"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fleishmanhillard.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25396"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fleishmanhillard.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25396"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fleishmanhillard.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25396"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}