TicketManager Blog

Each March they are known by the term “Cinderella story.” College basketball teams that pull off stunning upsets in the NCAA men’s and women’s championships. This year we have two New Jersey schools on the men’s side who fit the bill. Fairleigh Dickinson—a No. 16 seed...

Significant change came to the PGA Tour schedule this year and, as announced by commissioner Jay Monaghan before last week’s Players Championship at TPC Sawgrass, further re-engineering will take place in 2024 with the ultimate goal of keeping the circuit’s top...

Calling a monumentally successful comedian who just appeared in Netflix’s first-ever live broadcast (which went on to be the streamer’s most watched show of the past week) lousy at anything is clearly my own attempt at humor. However, in the opening minutes of...

You wouldn’t be alone if your first thought upon hearing the news that Dick’s Sporting Goods had become the newest corporate partner of the NCAA was, “What took so long?” In other words, now that the NCAA has an official sporting goods retail partner, it seems...

A brief item from Sports Business Journal last week received surprisingly little industry reaction despite the potential of the news to upend the traditional relationship between pro sports leagues and players when it comes to including athlete marketing rights in...

Spend any time with sports marketing professionals these days and inevitably the conversation turns to the glut of jersey sponsorship inventory currently on the market. With baseball season around the corner and only six MLB teams having secured jersey patch deals,...

In the wake of Diamond Sports Group’s massive financial troubles and the weakened economic picture for all regional sports networks thanks to cord cutting, Major League Baseball commissioner Rob Manfred has floated the idea that the league could create a national...

Audi of America and Major League Soccer announced this week that their partnership has been renewed as part of a multi-year deal between the luxury important brand and the league. The two first aligned in 2015, making Audi the official automotive partner of MLS. Since...

A conversation and a news item last week reinforced one of sponsorship’s foundational elements: Brands must keep their eyes on the prize, and the prize is not the attention of fans—which is relatively easy to earn—but rather their goodwill, loyalty, and support. The...

Wireless phone service provider UScellular tweeted findings from an artificial-intelligence-driven experiment it conducted at State Farm Stadium during Sunday’s NFL Super Bowl LVII that showed about 24 percent of attendees missed seeing a least one of the game’s...

First, let’s be clear: This is not a review of Rihanna’s Super Bowl LVII Halftime Show. (Although I do have some thoughts on that.) Instead, this is a look at what Apple Music, the new title sponsor of said show, did—and did not do—with its shiny and expensive new...

Two news items from the past week might signal a return to some successful sponsorship practices of the past. Marking the beginning of its second year as a sponsor of the 23XI Racing NASCAR Cup Series team, financial services app MoneyLion launched MoneyLion Hot Pass,...

A recent article in The Wall Street Journal highlighted a trend among companies reviewing candidates for chief marketing officer and other senior marketing roles, namely that many are “increasingly favoring candidates with deep experience in so-called...

Properties seeking new sources of sponsorship revenue spend a great deal of time focused on emerging categories and brands. The idea, of course, is that fishing in the same pond—continually going back to companies and industries already spending on sports and...

Last week’s news that FIFA will allow the 16 host cities for the 2026 World Cup to sell local marketing rights marks a first for the tournament. On one hand, it marks a departure for one of the first major properties to go all in on the fewer-bigger, less-is-more...

The agreement to put the BMO banking brand on Los Angeles FC’s stadium—as well as a separate sponsorship with Angel City FC—offers some valuable lessons to other sports and entertainment marketers. In particular, the reported 10-year, $100-million deal with LAFC for...

Thanks to the Cincinnati Bengals’ win over the Buffalo Bills Sunday, we now know that the NFL playoffs will not feature a neutral-site AFC Championship Game this weekend. But the possibility has prompted a great deal of discussion about whether the NFL would consider...

While many of the largest and most recognized sponsorships are of the global and national variety, some of the most successful partnerships between brands and sports and entertainment properties are distinctly local. Three partnership deals announced in the past week...

Those of you who keep up with the daily news of the sports business likely saw a headline last week that ONE Championship, which bills itself as the world’s largest martial arts organization, signed a first-time sponsorship agreement with insurance company Prudential...

Market research firm E-Poll, which tracks consumer interest in and response to brands, athletes, celebrities, media programs and properties, issued a report this week that includes a look at the partnership between the NFL and Microsoft. E-Poll concludes that...

It’s not often that sponsorship announcements are made within a judge’s ruling rather than a celebratory media release and/or press conference, but that is what will happen February 11 when an Italian court will declare which of two companies will produce the official...

Before everyone gets back into the routine of five (or more) straight days of working—sans sugar cookies with that morning cup of coffee and weekday afternoon football games—time for some recommendations on what sponsors and rightsholders should consider prioritizing...

A few weeks before the new year, research firm Morning Consult released its Fastest Growing Brands report for 2022. The in-depth look at which brands have increased purchase consideration the most is always fertile ground for finding sponsorship and partnership...

At TicketManager’s Partner Summit in New York City this fall, brand marketers that have implemented a ticket management system discussed the benefits their companies were realizing. Below are edited remarks from three of those sports and entertainment marketers. Seth...

Regardless of its recent troubles on the pitch, English Premier League soccer club Manchester United remains one of the most well-known and valuable sports franchises in the world. Valuations as high as $8.45 billion have been floated in the month since its American...

As the NFL heads into the last three weeks of the regular season, the Philadelphia Eagles are a league-best 13-1, with many predicting the team will ride its current success all the way to the Super Bowl. But the Eagles are also leading on the business side of the...

Just before Halloween, investment services firm Stifel Financial Corp. announced a comprehensive four-year partnership with U.S. Ski & Snowboard, the national governing body that fields teams in seven disciplines: alpine, cross country, freeski, freestyle,...

Over time, brand marketers have adopted a relatively standard process around sponsorship. Identify objectives. Develop a framework for evaluating and selecting the opportunities most likely to meet those goals. Negotiate benefits and fees with properties. Create...

Along with gingerbread, eggnog and peppermint bark, ‘tis the season for advertising and marketing industry spending forecasts outlining what to expect in the year ahead. The outlooks published thus far are in consensus that 2023 should see an overall slowdown in...

By now, any sports or entertainment organizations that have recruited and retained sponsors understand that one-size-fits-all asset packages and activations don’t cut it. Brand partners need to have rights and benefits tailored to their objectives, along with ideas on...

Although various expert forecasters predict consumers will spend somewhere between four and eight percent more on holiday gifts this year versus last, brands and retailers still face a battle to persuade those gift buyers to choose their items. According to research...

The last few months have delivered a litany of unfortunate reminders of the many things that can go wrong between rights holders and brand partners—with sales rights being taken away at the last minute in Qatar and the collapse of FTX, a company that had committed...

Since 2007, the nonprofit organization Council for Responsible Sport has had a mission to help rights holders measure and manage the social and environmental impacts of their events through independent verification and a certification program that reviews...

As FIFA World Cup 2022 opening matches got underway in Qatar amid multiple controversies, soccer’s world governing body issued a press release announcing it had sold out of all of the tournament’s sponsorship packages, with YouTube, Visit Las Vegas and Fine Hygienic...

As the sports business deals with the fallout from FTX’s bankruptcy and the collapse of other cryptocurrency partnerships, many of the lessons to be learned are obvious, revolving around the ramifications of doing massive deals with young companies in a new,...

It has been roughly 35 years since the term “ambush marketing” entered the sports marketing lexicon, and although various media outlets are quick to highlight examples of the practice around each edition of global events such as the Olympic Games and FIFA World Cup,...

NWSL club Angel City FC made quite a splash when it came on the scene in 2020. Although much of the buzz surrounding the team was due to its roster of celebrity owners, sports marketers also took note of a unique component of the expansion franchise’s corporate...

Despite the fact that sponsorship has been a recognized marketing discipline for going on four decades, there is a tremendous divide between brands that understand how to use the medium to receive maximum benefit from their partnerships versus those that treat it as...

It has been difficult to keep up with the torrent of recent good news regarding growth in financial strength and fan support for women’s sports. Reports of soaring team valuations, higher earnings for athletes, new sources of investment for leagues and record-setting...

Although it’s true that in a meeting with Phoenix Suns employees NBA commissioner Adam Silver mentioned the idea of relegating the league’s two worst performing teams to the G League, it’s a safe bet that neither the NBA nor any other major pro sports league will...

Last week’s news that the NBA has relaxed its rules around teams allowing sponsors to promote their partnerships outside North America is just the latest step in U.S. pro sports leagues seeking opportunities to grow revenue and fan bases from around the globe....

Insurance companies in the property/casualty and healthcare fields have long been among the most active sponsors across sports, entertainment and other types of corporate partnerships. And while the presence of major providers in the U.S.—Allstate, Cigna, GEICO, State...

“This has so many applications and, in my opinion, will revolutionize signage moving forward across the world across all of sports.” When executives tout a development at their organization as being revolutionary on a global scale, most people will—and should—take...

While we look forward to sharing more of the information and insights shared by the many panelists and guests at last week’s TicketManager Summit in New York City, below are a few highlights in the immediate wake of the event. Commitment to Measurement. As a longtime...

Online used car buyer and seller Carvana announced last week that it would become the title sponsor of the Professional Pickleball Association beginning in 2023. That agreement was followed the next day by news that Molson Coors had signed a deal making its Vizzy,...

LootMogul, a company that is creating 180 “sports cities” in the metaverse, announced last week that it had reached its first naming rights deal. Hoop Culture, an online retailer of basketball lifestyle apparel and accessories will affix its name to an arena in...

College gridiron fans are familiar with the on-field twists and turns of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln football program, but only those who follow the sports marketing side of things would know that UNL’s athletic department also has been on a journey down a...

The NBA heads to Japan this weekend for two preseason games while the NFL returns to London for a regular season matchup in London. Sunday’s game at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium is the first of five international games this NFL season, with two more in London in October,...

The public fascination with record-setting dates back to the late 19th century, as documented in many reports from the era about new achievements in sport—particularly bicycle racing—as well as new feats of engineering and technology—tallest building, longest bridge,...

Call them what you will—niche sports, minor sports, third-tier sports, etc.—rights holders operating outside the realms of the major professional leagues have long stood on the outside looking in when it comes to earning significant revenues from corporate sponsors....

When news broke recently about the details of the deal between PepsiCo and the NFL to include the new Gatorade Fast Twitch beverage as part of the company’s league-wide partnership, some sports marketing pros and observers were ready to declare a tipping point. As...

The pace at which sports rights holders are finding new ways to get their content in front of audiences is staggering. From establishing a metaverse presence to teaming up with social platforms to launching alternative TV broadcasts, properties are exploring all...

As they have for decades, the questions of what a company should pay, would pay, could pay and ultimately did pay for a sports partnership underlie every deal in our business, as they have for decades. Setting prices and valuing opportunities in the sponsorship...

Is there anyone who doesn’t love University of Nebraska wide receiver DeColdest Crawford’s 30-second spot for SOS Heating & Cooling? And who wouldn’t chuckle over the fact that Buffalo Wild Wings’ newest limited-edition menu item is Sauce Sauce, in partnership...

Last week’s full-scale launch of Twitter Circles received plenty of attention as the social media platform attempts to provide users with 1) a way to communicate information they don’t want to share with the entire world and 2) a way to build and strengthen...

It’s difficult to imagine now, but just a few short years ago, the idea of Las Vegas as a potential location for a pro sports franchise was met with disdain much more often than approval. And for the most part, the main arguments against expanding or relocating...

Companies and individuals who are part of the North American sports and entertainment marketing ecosystem don’t lack for opportunities to join trade groups. Brands have the Association of National Advertisers (ANA), agencies have the American Association of...

A recent TicketManager blog post urged sports and entertainment rights holders to find responsible ways to be flexible and provide additional assets and benefits to brand partners as a hedge against those sponsors rethinking their investments in the light of...

Any time a sports superstar exits the stage, questions abound regarding the vacuum created and the impact it will have on the sport and its fans. That is definitely the case with the G.O.A.T. of women’s tennis, Serena Williams, set to retire after the U.S. Open....

A report last month from global market researcher Forrester reveals that “after a slow start” compared to other regions of the world, enterprises across the European Union are rapidly adopting cloud platforms, cloud-based resources and cloud-native technologies to...

While no sector is immune from the effects of a distressed economy, some will weather the storm better than others. Naturally then, those are the businesses that rise to the top of target lists for partnership sales teams. The categories below represent some of the...

A number of signs have appeared over the past couple of months pointing to the overall outstanding health of major sports leagues and governing bodies. In particular, the NHL and Formula One recently released financial and other reports demonstrating nearly across the...

The extent to which economic uncertainty impacts marketers’ spending on sports and entertainment partnerships becomes a hot topic each time there is fear of an impending recession. Although there will never be a universal response from brands during a downturn—some...

Come the end of August, live-event ticket sellers and purchasers in the state of New York will be operating under a new set of rules, thanks to legislation signed into law earlier this summer that at least one industry expert—TicketIQ’s Jesse Lawrence—has called “the...

With tens of millions of parents and guardians stocking up on supplies and otherwise preparing their kids for a new school year, it’s a suitable time to consider how sports properties and sponsors can do some educating of their own in terms of ensuring that fans and...

For the most part, sports leagues, teams, events and venues have weathered the economic turbulence unleashed by COVID relatively well. But the pandemic opened the industry’s eyes to the possibility of cancelled seasons, empty arenas and the drying up of all major...

Last week’s post questioned whether category exclusivity would remain a prominent element of sponsorships and outlined a number of the factors that have chipped away at its importance to brands over the last few decades. But even though the tide is turning against...

Those who have been around since sports marketing’s early days can recall a time when category exclusivity was an untouchable element of sponsorship agreements. But while most of today’s partnerships between brands and properties still bestow exclusivity, its days as...

Voyager Digital, the U.S.-based crypto firm that offers broking services, has filed for bankruptcy. The company was a model for easy access to loans not commonly offered by traditional banks and advertised high-interest rates appealing to most investors. The opposite...

As consumers, we have grown accustomed to, and perhaps weary of, being asked to share data with apps, websites and the occasional Nigerian prince. But a recent, out-of-the-ordinary data request is one to pay particular attention to, as it has the potential to...

Qatar Airways, in association with Paris Saint-Germain, has agreed to upgrade its shirt sponsorship deal to €60m – €70m per season. Qatar Airways is the state-owned airline of Qatar that employs over 43,000 people worldwide to support its more than 150 international...

Since it won’t actually happen for another two years, the announcement by UCLA and USC that they are taking their talents to the Big Ten lacked the immediate drama of watching Robert Irsay’s moving trucks drive out of Baltimore in the middle of the night some 38 years...

A new national and local media rights deal has been announced for the Boston Marathon. Beginning in 2023, the race will be televised on ESPN and locally in the Boston metro area on WCVB Channel 5. Sister stations in the New England region will simulcast WCVB Channel...

Orange S.A., the French multinational telecommunications corporation formerly known as France Telecom S.A., and the French Football Federation (FFF) have extended their partnership an additional four years. The new agreement will run through 2026. The initial 2018...

Among the many sports business headlines of the past week the news that generated the most discussion and speculation was word of the ten-year deal to stream all MLS matches on a new subscription service from Apple. While most commentary focused on whether the...

Sportradar, a global sports technology & data provider, revealed it intends to hire Eric Conrad to manage & oversee its North American sports content and partnership efforts. His official title will be Managing Director, Strategic Partnerships & Content,...

“I love sports.” “I want to work in sports.” By now, it’s well established that if you really do want to work in sports (or music, or the arts, etc.), you should never utter those phrases during an interview. Demonstrating a total lack of understanding of...

Continuing a pattern of convergence between fashion houses and athletic teams, Fendi has reached terms to outfit AS Roma. It is Fendi’s first-ever sponsorship with AS Roma and will cover the 2022-23 and 2023-24 campaigns. The official launch is scheduled for the end...

Sponsorships done exceptionally well are powerful reminders of what rights holders and their brand partners can accomplish together. They also can spark ideas for new endeavors or improving existing ones. In that inspirational vein, and because it may not have made it...

Investment advisor Gainbridge and Penske Entertainment & The Indianapolis Motor Speedway, host of the eponymous Indy 500, have mutually elected to extend their partnership for multiple years to come. The new term length has not been announced; the original...

During our TicketManager All Access Interview Series podcast conversation, Korn Ferry Tour president Alex Baldwin noted that the circuit had a number of supermarket chains, including Albertsons and Price Cutter, as tournament title sponsors. Those partners, as well as...

Major League Cricket has revealed some major players in the business and tech communities intend to spearhead funding for the recently launched league. Led by Microsoft, a Series A and A1 totaling €42 million (approximately US $44 million), plus an additional €72.6...

Although the dust-up between Alabama’s Nick Saban and Texas A&M’s Jimbo Fisher was an entertaining midweek diversion from similar squabbles in politics and more dreary news about the war in Ukraine and falling financial markets, it was a sideshow to the legitimate...

English Premier League’s Chelsea Football Club and cryptocurrency digital investing platform WhaleFin intend to sign a sleeve deal at a reported £20 million cost. Hyundai has been the primary logo featured for the past four years. Tentative plans are for WhaleFin’s...

A recent JohnWallStreet article cogently summarized a festering situation in the relationship between sports rights holders and their brand partners: access to fan data and the critical insights that stem from it. This is an issue that has been addressed numerous...

Major League Soccer (MLS) and Socios.com have scored a partnership for years to come. 26 teams – out of a possible 28 – are on-board with the deal. Only DC United and Charlotte FC declined based on existing sponsorship contracts that might have presented a possible...

At the same time it is riding a swelling tide of interest in women’s sports, the WNBA is also experiencing significant growth pains, not the least of which is the ability of teams to field a full roster of players while meeting the terms of the league’s hard salary...

Members of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) have started meeting to show a vision for future sponsorship, marketing, branding opportunities ahead of the 2032 Summer Olympiad. 2032 in Brisbane will mark the first year Australia has played the role of host...

The ability to access volumes of data has changed the game for sellers of sponsorships and other sports marketing opportunities. Pitches and presentations are loaded with statistics, insights and information regarding audience fit, consumer behavior, content...

Jordan Spieth is renewing his decade-plus partnership with Under Armour. The agreement will provide coverage until December of 2029 at which time the golfer will be 34 years old. Effectively, it is a four-year extension of his previous deal. Spieth first rose to...

Multiple recent conversations with brand-side marketers have reinforced the idea that one of the most valuable benefits rights holders can offer their corporate partners is making introductions and helping them forge relationships with potential business customers,...

The combined entity behind Yakkertech and BaseballCloud has agreed to a deal to control the Frontier League's distribution and motion capture rights. The two merged in the fourth quarter of last year at a period when advanced performance metrics continue to...

While TicketManager and LAFC made history last month with a first-of-its-kind partnership establishing TicketManager as the MLS club’s official corporate ticket management partner, the agreement is just one in a recent string of deals that signal how sports teams and...

Major League Baseball (MLB) and American Dairy Queen Corporation (DQ) intend to kick off a multi-year integrated marketing partnership this regular season, led by various stars of the game Cody Bellinger, Fernando Tatis Jr., Tim Anderson, and Bryce Harper. Major...

Despite its ubiquity in marketing education and training, a funnel is a terrible symbol to illustrate the progression from awareness and consideration through to sales and loyalty. When you pour something into a funnel, it passes quickly through the top parts on its...

The 2022 Major League Baseball regular season begins after a prolonged labor dispute between owners and players and could benefit from some positive press. One example is Albert Pujols’s return to the St. Louis Cardinals. Another is the Boston Red Sox reinforcing its...

Now that we have more specifics regarding the new on-uniform branding opportunities with MLB teams, sports marketers naturally will be on the lookout to see which franchises and brands are first to close deals and, of course, at what valuation. But industry...

The International Cycling Union (UCI) has named Sir Chris Hoy its ambassador for its World Championships to be held from August 3rd to 13th, 2023. Hoy represents a marked coup for event organizers. He won the gold medal at the Olympics six different times and is also...

With history-making storylines including St Peter’s Cinderella run and the final games of Coach K’s legendary career, this year’s NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship has delivered almost everything fans could want, with the exception of having anything near a perfect...

The Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund’s investment group, LIV Golf, unveils its vision for a new golf tournament. News has broken about the LIV Golf Invitational Series behind a roughly $400 million investment. The initial plan will be for twelve teams of four...

For many legitimate reasons, the focus of sponsorship proposals, discussions, negotiations, media coverage, gossip, etc. is on the cash value of the agreement. But while that amount is typically the most important deal element for the sponsored property, it is far...

This week the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation (OLG) announced a partnership with the NHL to promote its PROLINE+ sportsbook across Canada. Key components of the relationship that will span five years include granting OLG the rights to cross promote and...

Amid the storm surrounding Premier League club Chelsea FC this past week was the news that Three, the club’s jersey sponsor, was “suspending” its sponsorship in the wake of the U.K. government’s sanctions against owner—for now—Roman Abramovich. Two elements of the...

The NBA’s Utah Jazz and the cryptocurrency platform CoinZoom announced a new partnership this week. Exact transaction terms including dollars paid was not disclosed. The Jazz see it as an opportunity to further engage with its fans in several innovative, new ways....

Whether it’s the natural thing to do with spring right around the corner, or it’s a reaction to the bleak headlines of the day, it seems everyone is looking for signs of hope wherever they can find them. Two sports business developments last week indicated shifts in...

UFC the mixed martial arts competitive fighting behemoth and Thorne Health Tech the wellness brand revealed a multi-year partnership that will keep them working in concert with one another for the foreseeable future. Thorne remains an official partner of the UFC...

The day following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the sports dominoes began to fall: UEFA moved the Champions League final from St. Petersburg to Paris, Formula 1 canceled the Russian Grand Prix, the ATP Challenger Tour cancelled this week’s stop in Moscow, and the...

This week Oracle, ranked #82 on Fortune’s top companies with business roots in hardware, cloud, services, and licensing cemented a five-year title sponsorship with the Red Bull Formula One racing team. Initial reports are the deal is worth approximately $500 million –...

Two conversations last week with marketers that recently signed major sports sponsorships give hope that more brands are becoming proactive investors in partnerships rather than mere buyers of sponsorship assets and inventory. Both companies are new to sports...

A Trust in the name of former Denver Broncos owner Pat Bowlen who passed away in 2019 has put the team up for sale. Early indications are the team could garner a record price – not only for the NFL but all major North American professional team sports. The news comes...

The Bengals were not the only ones who came away from Super Bowl LVI with nothing to show for their season-long efforts in getting there. With the notable exceptions of Pepsi’s association with the halftime show and brands with sideline presence such as Nike, Bose,...

With BetMGM opening the latest sports-venue-based retail betting operation last week at Nationals Park in Washington, D.C. on top of a steady stream of announcements of other planned venue-gaming partnerships, the growth opportunities for both sides are abundantly...

The details behind last week’s announcement that Deloitte had become a sponsor of SoFi Stadium and Hollywood Park in Los Angeles sparked the following thought: Management consultancies, which have ventured into the marketing agency space with mixed results over the...

Accelerist, an Austin-based SaaS provider that helps nonprofits source and grow partnerships, has released its 2022 Trend Report, which contains some useful information for sports and entertainment marketing professionals, not just causes and charitable organizations....

A JohnWallStreet article last week noted that big companies including PepsiCo and AB InBev are working with sports sponsorship measurement firm FanAI to help determine their ROI from the hundreds of millions of dollars they pour into partnerships each year. The...

The new year is off to quite a start in the sports business, with a number of noteworthy sponsorship deals, issues and controversies arising in just a few days last week during what is typically a slower time of year for our industry. The Bad After rejecting the...

The Japanese tech giant Rakuten has renewed its sponsorship deal with the Golden State Warriors, which started in 2017. The amount paid - $20 million a year. That figures to be one the larger team jersey collaborations for a long time. Rakuten’s interest belies the...

It is one month until the opening ceremonies of the Beijing Olympic Winter Games. Yet a scan of the digital presence of the five U.S.-based global IOC sponsors might lead you to believe the Games weren’t even happening. No mentions of the Games appear on the website...

As the NFL continues its push to expand the league internationally, the league granted international home marketing rights to 18 different franchises. The rights span 26 different International Home Marketing Areas (IHMA) across eight different countries, giving...

For quite a while now, technology-focused companies have played a major role in sports sponsorship. But over the past few years, the focus has shifted from global B2B IT giants such as AWS, IBM, Oracle, SAP and others that have skillfully used sponsorship to showcase...

Shocking the city of Los Angeles and the sports and entertainment landscape, the era of the Staples Center is coming to an end. Since opening its doors on October 17, 1999, the Staples Center has been home to the Los Angeles Lakers, Clippers, Kings, and Sparks, while...

When French soccer’s Ligue 1 renewed its title sponsorship agreement with Uber Eats last month for a reported $37 million over two years, it bucked a trend by continuing to co-brand its top-flight league. The vast majority of professional sports leagues and...

Sponsors and advertisers only had to think about two audiences in the not very distant past: those in the stadium and those watching on the one TV channel that broadcast the game. Sports were very domestic, so they didn’t have to make plans for one channel per country...

Four distinct partnerships announced within a 24-hour span last Thursday and Friday stood out from the list of other sports business news items and press releases in the email inbox. None of the quartet would be considered a blockbuster and individually would not have...

Shaquille O’Neal is the hardest working guy in the pitch-man business. The NBA Hall of Famer shows up in TV commercials, digital ads and social media spots for products in just about every industry, while also being a serial franchisee, spinning a side gig as a DJ and...

With Major League Baseball locking out players last week, the prospect looms of losing games to a drawn-out fight over the next collective bargaining agreement. While everyone hopes for a settlement before the 2022 baseball season heats up—giving MLB and union...

A quick scan of Olympic and World Cup headlines should be sufficient for sponsors of any global sporting event or organization to realize that it’s no longer if, but when. When will they be called to state their stance on the non-sporting actions of a host country?...

Those of us who have never worked full-time on the corporate side of sponsorship marketing may find ourselves daydreaming about what it would be like to have one of the most coveted roles in sports business. From the outside—and perhaps especially for the salesperson...

Many sports teams and consumer brands run loyalty programs, but only recently have properties and sponsors started to integrate them as part of a sponsorship activation. One difficulty was the “conversion factor” between two points systems. What’s the airline mile...

In the vernacular of sports and other partnerships, corporate sponsors are often referred to as “brands,” while sponsored organizations are typically called properties or rights holders. While this works as industry shorthand, it partially negates the consideration of...

As sports team ownership evolved from being a pet project for high-net worth individuals or families to a true business venture, the standard business imperatives of growth, acquisition and agglomeration changed the ownership landscape. Ownership groups reorganized...

As leagues and teams seek short- and long-term solutions to declining attendance and ticket sales trends, their corporate partners are undoubtedly watching closely and assessing the ramifications for their brands’ ability to reach and interact with fans. With general...

Banking and financial services are two of the traditional cornerstone industries in sports sponsorships. The growth of P2P money transfer apps, mobile payments and digital wallets shifted the key question for consumer finance companies and their partner properties...

In recent conversations with two sports properties, each shared that it was revamping the way it solicits, sells and works with corporate partners. And each was doing the exact opposite of the other. One was adopting an “account-management” structure, eliminating its...

The NCAA has a well-known commercial where they acknowledge that 98% of their student-athletes “will go pro in something other than sports.” The actual figure is north of 99%, but companies should keep these figures in mind when deciding if and how to enter the name,...

As a recent SportsPro article explored, the ongoing development of the metaverse raises a host of questions, challenges and opportunities for sports rights holders and brand partners. Although the metaverse is still in its early stages and will undoubtedly undergo...

Zurich North America’s Will Trumbull, senior marketing manager, and Jean Adams, marketing events manager, graciously joined TicketManager clients and guests for a series of three All Access Round Table discussions last week.  Below are some of the takeaways from those...

Courtesy of Caesars, New Orleans Saints fans became the first in the U.S. to attend a game at a venue bearing the name of a sportsbook, the Caesars Superdome. With the National Hockey League allowing jersey patches starting in the 2022/23 season, Caesars locked up the...

For decades, one of the bedrock benefits in sponsorship agreements has been the designation of the sponsor as an “official partner” or the “official fill-in-the-category-here” of the property being sponsored.  But as the sports and entertainment marketplace has...

Caravel Marketing, organizers of last month’s Sponsorship Mastery Summit—a virtual conference aimed at helping people do a better job of selling sponsorship for events, nonprofits, entertainment and sports—shared with the summit’s attendees results from a...

Foot Locker CMO Jed Berger’s MediaPost interview last week earned a lot of attention for his headline-grabbing quote: “Take brand marketing off your resume.”   Whether he meant that bold statement literally is up for debate, but his meaning was clear: Fair or not,...

Last week’s TicketManager All Access Round Table featured two experienced speakers from Wells Fargo’s Sponsorship Governance & Operations group, which is responsible for sponsorship policy governance, as well as for hospitality programs.  Jason Small, Vice...

In three-plus decades of tracking and monitoring sponsorship of sports, entertainment and other sectors, no category has been more fascinating to chronicle than telecommunications.  From the “Baby Bells” of the ‘80s establishing new brands in the wake of the antitrust...

For someone who teaches a graduate-level university course in sponsorship, the Barstool Sports Arizona Bowl—at just over a month old—is already shaping up as a welcome case study from which to explore a number of relevant sports marketing topics, including:  The value...

This week’s post is inspired by TicketManager CEO and founder Tony Knopp’s “Three Things I Learned in Saas, Sports, Tech & Live Events,” a weekly collection of insights that’s worth reading or watching on LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube or your favorite podcast...

With the announcement that the NHL is introducing sponsor jersey patches for the 2022-23 season, along with word that Monumental Sports & Entertainment is bundling jersey logos for the NBA Wizards, WNBA Mystics and its G League and esports teams into a single...

It’s purely coincidental that this post is being written the day the new Aretha Franklin biopic hits theaters. The theme of respect for what sports marketing professionals do is unfortunately not a new one making its debut in an office near you.  Over my nearly 34...

It has long been my role to share examples of successful sponsorships and the ways brands bring them to life through promotional programs. Common questions I ask of summit and round-table speakers, podcast guests, etc. are: “Can you share an example of how you are...

Simone Biles has become the latest, and arguably most prominent, example of the sometimes crushing pressure elite athletes face.   As a society, we are shifting from Billie Jean King’s assertion that “pressure is a privilege” (repeated without irony in Tokyo last week...

With the quest for Olympic glory finally underway in Japan, the competitions we are witnessing on various screens have a different look and feel thanks to coronavirus restrictions.   But one element remains the same from previous Games: no commercial signage in any of...

As host of MLB All-Star Week, Coors Field was unsurprisingly awash in T-Mobile magenta for last Monday’s Home Run Derby. But viewers of the ESPN broadcast could be forgiven if they were turned off by the overt branding because it was lacking the context of the...

When evaluating sponsorship opportunities, smart marketers go beyond assessing the assets, rights and benefits that a rights holder commits to delivering. They also seek information on whether the property will be a good partner. In addition to due diligence that...

As even non-sports fans know by now, last Thursday was a banner day for collegiate athletes, marking the first time they were able to monetize their name, image and likeness rights without running afoul of the NCAA and risking their eligibility.  The impact of a...

Just before Anheuser-Busch was named Sports Sponsor of the Year by Sports Business Journal last week, TicketManager hosted two online round-table discussions with the company’s Director of Sponsorships, Lisa Woodward. In discussing numerous aspects of managing one of...

NFTs are here. For how long, with what future impact, and who will benefit most may still be up for debate, but the fact that there is a market for them and there is money to be made is not. As leagues, teams and athletes have jumped (or stuck a toe) into marketing...

Little did we know when FTX and the Miami Heat announced their naming rights deal in March that the cryptocurrency exchange would be in the news for an even bigger partnership just a few months later. One of the largest sponsorships in esports’ brief history, the deal...

The sponsorship equation used to be fairly simple. Brands supported teams, athletes, events and other organizations that their consumers and customers were passionate about. Stepping up to become an official sponsor—rather than simply an advertiser or ticket...

Echoing what Live Nation president Joe Berchtold told CNBC last week, recent TicketManager conversations with teams and venues all point to the release of pent-up demand for live sports, music and other entertainment events. The most interesting takeaways from...

As much as everyone involved in sports marketing likes to describe their organizations as data driven, the field itself has long suffered from a lack of empirical evidence proving its effectiveness as a driver of brand objectives. Proof exists. It’s just too often...

If the already postponed Tokyo Olympic Games are able to take place this summer—a matter in some doubt with two months to go before the scheduled opening—they will have overcome the enormous obstacle of Japan’s COVID crisis simply to face a more mundane, but still...

There is no doubt that the continued adoption of legalized sports gambling across the U.S. will be a boon to the sports industry, including the many businesses and brands aligned with leagues, teams, events and players to market their products and services. As every...

Watching the NFL Draft and tracking announcements of endorsement deals signed by top pick Trevor Lawrence and others raises an interesting question. With so much recent attention on paying for performance in sports marketing (from the PGA Tour’s new Player Impact...

It’s not often we get to witness organizations that have reached the pinnacle of their industry collectively demonstrate an egregious lack in judgment, let alone admit to their mistake and backtrack within 48 hours. Yet that is exactly what we saw with the...

On the 100th day before Tokyo 2020 is set to open, An Ad Age “News Alert” went out with the subject line “How Peloton Is Tapping into Olympics Fever without a Sponsorship.” And so it begins. Attention is already focusing on how brands plan to capitalize on the Games....

We had a great series of small-group conversations last week at our TicketManager All Access Round Tables. To encourage transparency, we promised to keep the participants and details private, but here are a few takeaways that don’t disclose anything proprietary. Since...

The terms “partner” and “partnership” have become synonymous with “sponsorship” in the vernacular of sports marketing. Too often though, they are merely just words. So when either a sponsor or rights holder actually lives up to the ideal of being a partner, it...

Last week saw two blockbuster naming rights partnerships revealed. Miami-Dade County landed a 19-year, $135-million deal with cryptocurrency exchange FTX to succeed American Airlines as the title sponsor of the Miami Heat’s waterfront home, followed by...

With most of the sports world excited about and focused on the return of fans to live games, the experience of buying a ticket and attending an event took a couple of unexpected, if not necessarily intentional, knocks recently. First, Triller Fight Club purchased the...

This post is not about structuring sponsorship payment schedules, as interesting and important as that topic may be. No, the headline refers to an emerging category that may become an active player in sports and entertainment partnerships—buy-now-pay-later (BNPL)...

It has been hard for anyone in the business of sports to avoid talk of blockchain technology, cryptocurrency and non-fungible tokens (NFTs) recently, mostly attributable to the eye-popping figures attached to NBA Top Shot moments, but also extending to other...

You can find droves of people working for Twitter, Facebook, Snap, Instagram and other platforms whose jobs are to establish partnerships with sports rightsholders and marketers. Those companies view themselves, essentially, as media partners, much in the same vein as...

In addition to the many long-term effects of COVID-19 on live events, the pandemic is having a near-term impact on sponsorships across sports, entertainment and other types of properties, most notably in downward pressure on the value of sponsorship rights. Compelled...

Although on the radar screens of marketers for some time, the members of Gen Z—complete with consumer behavior radically different from their elders—have reached critical mass, with the oldest now entering their mid-20s. This is a critical time for sports to address...

Just as the 2020 holiday season got underway, the Drone Racing League received a gift from mobile telecom giant T-Mobile in the form of a multi-year partnership that not only includes a sponsorship component granting the brand official status as the DRL’s exclusive...

Super Bowl 2020 is on track to be one of the most expensive games in recent memory. With just days until the big event, the cheapest tickets will set you back around $4,500.   You may be asking: Why does a ticket cost that much?  What’s Driving Prices Up  As our CEO...

You can’t control the product on the field, but you *can* control your guests’ experience with these tips & tricks.

Here are some less-than-obvious ways companies put all their tickets to work.

By Troy Tutt It’s every team’s worst nightmare: your client decides not to renew. What went wrong? Companies will give any number of excuses to be polite and soften the blow. The truth is, customers leaving almost always comes down to one of four reasons. 1. It’s a...

By Tony Knopp Microsoft got sued last week after an employee stole $1.5 million including company Super Bowl tickets. (Check out the indictment here.) How often are employees stealing or abusing sports tickets? As we told the Wall St. Journal: A law is being broken at...

by Derek Goodnature On May 25, 2018, the sweeping new rules known as GDPR went into effect. The regulations significantly change how companies must manage user data for individuals in the European Union, and companies are scrambling to make sense of it. The urgency is...

TicketManager has been selected for the Inc. 5000, the most prestigious ranking of the nation’s fastest-growing private companies. This is the fourth year in a row the Calabasas-based SaaS company has been named to the Inc. 5000. The list represents the...

By Peter Holzberger Few things can land government officials in trouble faster than getting comped or discounted sports tickets. While former EPA Adminstrator Scott Pruitt was no stranger to scandal, one of his final fumbles in the weeks leading up to his resignation...

By Troy Tutt The Wall Street Journal‘s Ruth Simon published a piece today about how the 2017 tax law is causing companies to radically change the way they host client events. The problem? Companies can no longer deduct 50% of the cost of taking customers to live...

By Matt Huff Illinois is back in the spotlight— this time for the enormous sums of money its lawmakers are spending on sports tickets. According to the Illinois State Board of Elections website, Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan’s campaign spent over $700,000 on...

by Sagar Jethani A recession may be coming, and that means company sports tickets are at risk. Defend your ticket program against budget cuts by proving they drive results. The US economy is long overdue for a recession. When that happens, companies are going to look...

By Sagar JethaniHaving fun is serious business. Companies spend north of $600 billion each year taking their clients to sporting events, concerts, upscale restaurants, and a ton of other experiences in the hopes doing so will lead to new or increased business.With...

“How do we get more tickets used?” We hear it nearly every day. One of the first conversations we have as we onboard new customers is how to set goals for their ticket usage.  Without goals, companies become disorganized, and waste, on average, 43% of their ticket...

By Troy Tutt I started my career in sports as a sales guy. I sold season ticket plans and groups for the Cleveland Cavaliers. I soon started managing a book of clients and was responsible for servicing their needs, keeping them happy, and ultimately looking for ways...

By Derek Goodnature Downloading and printing your Cubs tickets at home? That’s so 2016. The Cubs announced last week that ticket buyers will no longer be able to download and print tickets at home. Instead, fans will have two options: Order hard copy tickets to be...

By Matt Huff I’ve seen many reasons why companies don’t use all of their tickets. Sometimes they simply lack awareness of just how many tickets they own and just how many go unused each year. Other times tickets lie dormant because employees have to embark upon a...

By Tony Knopp, Co-founder and CEO, TicketManager I go to prospecting events— a lot of them. So I get to see what works and what doesn’t. Face-to-face marketing is an important part of business development because it cuts through oversaturated airwaves, overflowing...

By Matt Ansis Ever wonder why companies are investing in Customer Relationship Management (CRM) more than ever? The reason is simple: nearly 80 percent of marketing leads fail to convert into sales, and effective customer relationship management helps companies...

By Sagar Jethani Smart companies know that entertaining clients can generate positive business results. So why does it become a major headache for so many of them? And why are those results so hard to measure? Here are ten warning signs that your client entertainment...

The 2016 Rio Olympics are entering day six, and aside from a couple of minor hiccups, the games are already being hailed as a great success. While the athletes occupy the limelight, the U.S. Olympic Committee is also enjoying some well-earned victories renewing...

We make client entertainment easy & prove the ROI. Some companies claim they can do it all for you: venue sourcing, event marketing, expense reporting, customer surveys, website design, social media monitoring, online payments… and so on. Not TicketManager— client...

By Sagar Jethani We are at our wits' end how to keep tickets out of the hands of scalpers... So lamented Charles Dickens at the start of his US book tour in 1867. Ticket scalpers had followed his entourage from city to city, paying men to stand in line and purchase as...

By Paul Kim When we ask companies how they track their client entertainment— everything from season tickets to company events —we often hear the same response: Spreadsheets. Putting it bluntly, this is a terrible idea. When it comes to managing information,...

TicketManager has just been selected by Salesforce.com as one of its “Must-See Apps” for its upcoming Dreamforce conference in San Francisco. We’re thrilled to be recognized out of the 3,000+ apps available on the Salesforce AppExchange for this special distinction....

TicketManager has just been honored by Inc. Magazine for being one of America’s fastest-growing companies for the second year in a row! “The Inc. 5000 list stands out where it really counts,” says Inc. President and Editor-In-Chief Eric Schurenberg. “It honors real...

At TicketManager, we’re always looking for more ways to make it easy for companies to take their clients out to events & experiences they’ll never forget. That’s why we’re thrilled to be selected by Concur Technologies as their App of the Week! Taking clients out...

By Ken Hanscom, Chief Operations Officer, TicketManager Think it’s too late to plan a trip to the 2016 Olympics in Rio? It’s not — not by a long shot. Yes, most fans have already secured their plans for Rio 2016, but I want to share a little secret with you: Not only...

Eight years after the financial crisis, corporations are still under intense scrutiny. Questions remain about the role financial corporations played in the crisis, and whether they were really held accountable for their actions. You expect some of this during an...

By Ken Hanscom, Chief Operations Officer, TicketManager I believe in the power of experiences with others, both personally and professionally. That these experiences build great relationships and drive business. A recent article reminded me not only of the passion I...

Thousands of Patriots and Seahawks fans arrived in Phoenix only to find that they weren’t getting the tickets they were promised. Here’s how it happened.