Digital assets in the sports industry – an untapped revenue source with huge potential

Digital, virtual, online: words we have been hearing more and more in the past decade. Surprisingly, even with the economy changing and forcing business owners to find new revenue streams, some industries, including sport, are still struggling to monetize digital solutions. 

Let’s take a look at changing consumer behavior, what sports clubs are doing to adapt, and what they can do to tackle the challenges of the digital era.

The future of digitalized sports starts now

To see the future of the sports industry, we need to take a look at the younger generations’ practices. Gen Z has the lowest share of time spent watching live sports compared to other generations, caused by the rising popularity of short-form social media content. For sports and entertainment to survive, clubs need to adapt to the changing needs of Millennials, GenZ, and the generations that follow. This can be done in many ways, for example, by integrating short-form videos into their content strategy and reinventing how they approach their no longer ‘traditional’ fan base.

In the past few years, more and more influencers on YouTube started creating content for sport-lovers, from football to bodybuilding. Usually, the most popular videos are those that incorporate some kind of challenge with an increasing interest from top-league athletes who are willing to participate in their fans’ videos. Thanks to these collaborations and the easy to digest content, fans can feel closer to their idols.

Besides the rising number of fan-generated content, another example of the changing markets are the 24/7 online updates coming directly from sports organizations. Ten years ago it was unusual for a club to upload content on a regular basis to social media, showcasing their players not necessarily for their skills, but rather for their personalities, which also fosters a more intimate connection between fans and athletes.

What’s next for sports clubs and events?

A recent PwC report stated that based on these modern-day changes, sports technology infrastructure will soon be reliant on digital assets. These new types of assets have the potential to fundamentally change how fans engage with their favorite teams by offering a new way to connect and interact with each other. There is also a growing expectation among sports fans when it comes to digitalization. The good news is that sports organizations can easily build new revenue streams by integrating these modern, and often untapped technologies — if they can adapt a new mindset and rethink how sports are consumed by fans.

When we are talking about untapped revenue potential, we mean it: a great example is the European Football market. According to Brands in football — The digital game, a new report by Horizm, 682 sponsoring brands activated less than 5% of the total digital inventory available (over €1.5bn)​​ across the Premier League, LaLiga, Serie A, Bundesliga, Ligue 1 and Liga Portugal in 2021 and 2022. Not only does this show the room for improvement for most sports clubs, but also the clubs acting the fastest now will most likely to get ahead of competition and win, going forward.

Get ahead of the game with Seyu

At Seyu, we are working on creating an innovative and customizable solution that can help you to monetize digital assets and leverage fan-generated content. Our solution allows fans everywhere in the world (whether watching live in stadiums or from their own homes) to take selfies, add motivating messages, and post them on giant stadium screens or perimeter LEDs, as well as TV, live broadcast, and social media via a real-time moderated channel. This way fans feel more involved, have more memorable experiences, and become more loyal to the brand.

On top of that, to enable clients to create a highly profitable multi-channel marketing strategy, our team offers online and offline consultations and provides customized promotional assets, as well as help with data capturing. The results speak for themselves: up to this day, we have participated in more than 400 sports events and 17 world events, reaching over 150 000 enthusiastic fans — with an average 320% higher engagement rates compared to other photos from the same events!

A cooperation with Seyu immediately opens 8 new marketing channels to directly reach fans, which can be sold to sponsors or any stakeholders. Within a framework of loyalty marketing campaigns it can generate added revenue by rewarding the high-spending fans with the VIP photo sharing experience, entirely managed automatically by Seyu’s software, which is a compelling upsell solution. In addition, the merchandising part also could gain momentum with the bundled offers. These are the key “quick win” areas, and we did not even talk about smart data, which represents value in the long run from one such collaboration.

About Seyu

‘Seyu – Together for Victory!’ is a real-time moderated, branded, fan-generated content provider. Seyu is a technology solution for sports fans that enables them to motivate their favorite teams or athletes from anywhere in the world. The company uses partners’ existing IT infrastructure to allow fans around the world to post photos to stadium LEDs and other digital surfaces during sports events through a moderated channel and then instantly share them on social media in branded frames. The service, which has been proven to be successful at more than 400 sports events, is one of the leading sports tech services in Hungary, and lovers of international sports are regularly able to enjoy its benefits as well.

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