Tom Dobson, acting CMO of NAB, joined an all-female power panel at Cannes Lion this week to discuss the opportunities and need for brands to invest in women’s sports.
Joined by Kathryn Swallow, worldwide head of deodorants, Unilever and Bridget Sponsky, executive director, brand, sports and sponsorship marketing, Ally, the panel passionately discussed equitable investment in women’s sports, media coverage and primetime challenges and the critical role brands play in fostering a more inclusive and equitable sports environment. It was moderated by Aruna Natarajan, chief client officer at EssenceMediacom.
The visibility of high-profile women in sports is on the rise and women are making their mark and inspiring future generations. Brands play a critical role in promoting, supporting and funding women’s sports and these three executives, including our very own Aussie, Dobson, shared stories of women’s sporting excellence, and how to sustain and build it from such a low base.
The panel started with some startling stats – globally, women receive less than four per cent of media coverage in sports. In India, just one per cent of girls play football and 68 per cent of girls do not feel comfortable in clubs or movement spaces to name a few.
Dobson discussed how NAB started sponsoring the Women’s AFL in 2017, when the launch of the Elite League was brought forward by several years. This partnership has been a part of NAB’s broader commitment to supporting the AFL, including its junior programs, but the biggest one of the first issues that they needed to address was a lack of change rooms.
“We had a huge issue when the Women’s League was created. Guess what? Hundreds of sporting locations didn’t have female change facilities. So the bank worked with state government in investment in the infrastructure, just basic things like this felt monumental” he said.
The panel said that media coverage for women’s sports is key to its success. Sponsky detailed the challenges it faced in North America.
“The biggest revenue driver in sports is media, but women were actually receiving less than four per cent of that media coverage. Today, I think we’re looking at a number around 15 per cent. But that’s really by and large, because of emerging media platforms and women athletes themselves are creating their own media companies to talk about women’s sports, but we’re seeing less than four per cent of it. And so that’s really what charged us and we made that pledge of 60 per cent and we had to commit to it,” she said.
Dobson then added in Australia, social media content by athletes drives 60 per cent of interest of young people in women’s sport. NAB then turned its focus to social media channels such as TikTok to amplify coverage for women.
Women’s sports fans are looking for connection, excitement and to become a part of a movement, Dobson added, so looking at ROI for marketing needs a different lens as the engagement scores are significantly higher.
One only has to remember the mania that surrounded the Matilda’s at the Women’s World Cup. It had an enormous impact on the Australian football public psyche, with the quarter-final against France becoming the most-watched sports event since the Sydney Olympics with more than 7.2 million people tuning in. These are significant commercial opportunities for brands and media alike. The discussion highlighted the transformative impact of investing in women’s sports, not only for business benefits but also for fostering a more inclusive and equitable sports environment.
