Women’s sport has been on the rise for a number of years.
The 2019 Women’s World Cup had 1.12 billion viewers globally. In the UK, England’s semi-final loss against the USA attracted a peak audience of 11.7 million on the BBC and it became the country’s most-watched TV programme of 2019. Before that, the largest TV audience for a single women’s sporting event belonged to the Rio 2016 women’s field hockey gold medal match between the Netherlands and Great Britain. This accumulated a 5.5 million viewing audience.
A Sport England study showed a year-on-year increase in the number of active women and Statista shows the number of women who participate in any kind of sport or physical activity in England is slowly and steadily increasing. As of 2019, approximately 17.8 million women participate at least twice a month at any intensity or duration. This is an increase from 17.33 million women in 2016.
The FA announced in 2020 it plans to sell the television rights for the Women’s Super League for the 2021-2022 season and national newspaper The Daily Telegraph now has a regular supplement dedicated to women’s sport.
Pepsi, Three, Visa and Vitality have all made significant investments into women’s sport.
The momentum exists but there is still a long way to go.
The value of women’s sport is hard to define. We know it helps young girls’ self-esteem. We know female athletes are positive role models. We know the more we see women’s sport in mainstream media, the more revenue it will generate, supporters will increase and more girls will take up sport.
But there is still an opportunity to do more.
At Performance Communications, we are committed to helping our clients cut through the noise. And we want to support women’s sport to raise its profile.
Over the years, we have helped brands, rights holders and industry bodies define their sports sponsorship strategy and promote the work that they do.
We’re storytellers and we want to help tell your story by developing creative, insightful campaigns and driving earned media.
The opportunity to do more is now.
