The landscape of women’s sports is up for grabs, and organizations have an unprecedented opportunity to take market share by putting their data to work.
Women’s sports have exploded in popularity, transforming the landscape of athletics and presenting new opportunities for brands to engage with fan bases. Over the last three years, revenue generated by women’s elite sports globally has grown by more than 300% and is poised to continue an upward trajectory in 2025 and beyond. Attendance reached all-time highs at NCAA women’s volleyball and Final Four matchups. Broadcast deals for the National Women’s Soccer League broke records. The number of sponsorships in women’s professional sports increased by 22% in 2024, showing investors are looking more closely than ever at opportunities in this market.
How can women’s sports leaders meet this moment and prepare for a wave of growth to come?
Solid data foundations are often key to successful organizations. In a digital world, marketability comes from being able to understand fan behavior, preferences and engagement levels, and translate that data to sponsors and investors. However, many struggle with this because of how quickly the importance of data has grown and the lack of internal business investment in this area.
The good news is, there are wide-ranging opportunities for women’s sports. Below we dive into what could be holding back women’s sports from optimizing and leveraging their data, share examples of organizations that appear to be making progress, and explore steps leaders can consider to win more.
Invest in operations
Historically, sports leagues have typically focused on building up their roster of players and home venues to attract more fans and sponsors. Today, just having the best players on the best field may no longer be enough — it’s becoming increasingly important to invest in the right talent to run operations as well. Recruiting the right product manager can be just as important as drafting the right power forward.
Consider two properties that have both acquired new star players, leading to notable increases in average game attendance compared to years’ past. The presence of these players has attracted several mid-tier sponsorships, providing a financial boost for both operations. This combination of increased attendance and sponsorship revenue has made both confident they’ll consider this year a success.
As time goes by those sponsors are beginning to ask what kind of engagement their activations are getting across owned platforms. They want to make sure their content is aligned with the right audiences and understand ROI from their investment.
Property No. 1 spent time building up their internal and external product teams to conduct a deep assessment into their existing digital fan experience. They worked with engineers and data scientists to identify how their proprietary insights can be leveraged and analyzed to create value for sponsors, both existing and prospective. This forward-thinking team integrated first-, second- and third-party data to build full-picture insights on fan engagement, reach and campaign effectiveness. Sponsors were delighted by the insights because they proved the right audiences were seeing their messages and they unlocked retargeting opportunities. They grew their campaigns with property No. 1.
Property No. 2 didn’t think much about their product teams or the value of fan data, so when it came time to share insights with sponsors, they could only share basic data fields such as names and emails. Sponsors were not as impressed and wanted more specific audience intelligence — where did these fans live, what kind of income did they have and what other brands did they follow? Without those valuable data insights, and the ability to target customers or engage with fans deeply, they decided not to renew their campaigns with Property No. 2.
Exchanging value for data
Fan data is a new currency in sports, and leagues are adapting to that shift. For example, the WNBA, recognizing a growing fan base, developed a new app that prioritizes easy engagement for both avid and casual fans, while integrating key features such as schedules, game highlights and trends. Short-form content personalized for each fan, based on the team and players most important to them, was designed to help create deeper fan engagement and more monthly users.
By delivering a compelling, personalized digital experience for fans, organizations can be rewarded with more quality data from users.
This was evident at the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris, when the International Olympic Committee saw its fan engagement numbers balloon after investing in a fan data platform that supports segmentation and personalization capabilities. Strengthening one aspect of their digital operations contributed to a positive feedback loop: data in, personalized messages out. Fan engagement in, diversified marketing and commercial strategies out. At the Milan-Cortina Olympics, the IOC expects to be able to predict which content will resonate most with their fans to inform custom campaigns — ones that understand and celebrate their unique preferences. Applying technology to analyze fan data allows marketers to lean into the multidimensional nature of humans. It can open opportunities for engagement not only around team or athlete performance content, for example, but inspiration, community and entertainment content, too.
Personalization capabilities aren’t just a nice-to-have: Nearly 3 in 4 consumers are more likely to purchase from brands that deliver personalized experiences — and they spend 37% more with those brands. As such, investing in the operational data foundations that make personalization possible is a strategic business move.
Building on momentum
The organizations that can carve out this niche, strive to understand what fans care about most and serve up data as a competitive differentiator will not only rely on players and viewership numbers as their most valuable assets. They are positioning themselves to win more sponsorships and advertising dollars, which could lead to more diversified revenue streams that can secure their futures. And if they’re able to personalize experiences for fans within their own venue walls and owned platforms — they’re opening the door to possibly more engagement and loyalty for women’s sports.
Building an impactful data strategy starts with dedicated tech talent that can solidify foundations and pair multiparty insights. To meet this moment, leaders should conduct a review of their current data capabilities, look for gaps in operational talent, and seek the support of strategic advisers. Data is redefining competition — and at this stage in the game, organizations should be playing offense.
Michelle McGuire Christian is chief commercial officer at Deloitte’s ConvergeCONSUMER and Li-Shen Lee is a principal at Deloitte.
4
