Women’s football in the spotlight

This year Lieke has not only shone on the pitch for FC Barcelona Femení but also (together with Messi and Pogba) in the Lay’s TV commercial of Champions League sponsor PepsiCo. After six years as sponsor of the UEFA Champions League, PepsiCo last year extended their partnership with UEFA to the Women’s Champions League and Women’s EUROS. UEFA will no doubt have been delighted to connect a new major name as a sponsor to their women’s competitions. But will this investment in UEFA women’s football help Pepsi reach a much larger public?

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The short answer is: no. There is a lot of overlap between the audience for men’s football and those who watch women’s football. Virtually everyone who is interested in women’s football also follows the men’s game. And the attention you get as a sponsor around the men’s Champions League final is obviously much greater than the exposure through the women’s final. So the sponsor gains little in terms of reach. That said, I firmly believe that women’s football is a valuable sponsor asset and a great complement to sponsorships in the men’s game.

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Fortunately UEFA, as the rights holder, also understands that women’s football deserves its own spotlight. They have announced a string of changes to bring it out of the shade of the men’s game. Alongside a revamped competition format and a fairer reward structure, these new steps will also involve a rebranding of the Women’s Champions League, including its own logo and anthem. The development towards an independent positioning was already very cautiously started last year, with the women’s final being assigned its own location (Gothenburg) instead of serving as a ‘warm-up event’ for the men’s final.

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A rebranding is exactly what is needed to show sponsors that the added value of women’s football may not lie in a larger audience, but in the more congenial image of the women’s sport. Research shows that people tend to find women’s football more inspiring, clean, inclusive and family-oriented than men’s football: all of which are values you as a sponsor want to be associated with. And it is precisely through this different image that an investment in a partnership with women’s football increases the sponsorship impact on the brand.

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Women’s football deserves a spotlight of its own. Not just to highlight talented players like Lieke, but above all to leverage the success of football sponsorships. It has a unique commercial value for the big brands in football. In three years’ time, companies will be fighting over women’s football sponsorships.