The new commercial battleground: Designing sports propositions around audience need

From audience advantage to commercial advantage

The first article in this series argued that sports organizations need to move beyond the fanbase. The practical value of better audience understanding is sharper decision-making: which audiences to prioritize, which propositions to redesign, where to invest, where to stop spending, and how to give partners more precise routes to value. 

This second article takes that argument into the commercial model. 

For clubs, leagues, teams, venues and rightsholders, the next phase of growth will not come from simply selling more of the same assets. It will come from designing propositions around what different audiences actually need, then building the capability to adapt those propositions as behaviors, tastes and technology evolve. 

That is a global sports challenge. Football provides some of the clearest evidence because the economics, stadium assets and commercial models are well documented. But the underlying shift is broader. Across sport, audiences are fragmenting, expectations are rising and engagement is moving across physical, digital and third-party environments. 

The commercial question is no longer only ‘how big is our audience?’ It is ‘which audience relationships are most valuable, what do they need and how do we show up for them in the places they want to engage?’ 

Media rights cannot carry the whole model

The pressure is not that sport is losing value, but instead the pressure is that the sources of value are changing. 

PwC’s 2026 Global Sports Survey points to a more mixed growth picture, with sports executives expecting commercial and sponsorship growth to partly counteract a slowdown in media rights growth over the next three to five years. It also highlights a sharper divergence between premium and non-premium properties, meaning the biggest events and leagues may continue to command strong rights value while others face more pressure.  

For many sports organizations, relying on media rights alone is becoming a less resilient strategy. The commercial response should not be to add more products and hope audiences buy them. It should be to build a more diversified model around audience need. Sponsorship, hospitality, ticketing, membership, retail, content, digital products, venue use and partnerships all become stronger when designed around specific audiences rather than generic fan assumptions. 

Without that understanding, organizations risk creating more products without creating more relevance. 

A commercial model designed from the audience back

Picture the same sports organization trying to grow five different relationships: 

• A local family wants a day out that feels easy, safe and good value. 

• A premium customer wants access, service, privacy and a reason to bring clients back. 

• A younger digital fan may never attend regularly, but wants content, personality, interaction and limited-edition drops. 

• A local resident may care about whether the venue creates jobs, facilities and community value. 

• A sponsor wants measurable access to a defined audience, not a broad claim about reach. 

The organization could treat these as separate revenue lines: tickets, hospitality, retail, membership, community, sponsorship. The stronger approach is to treat them as different audience needs, then design propositions around them. 

That shift moves commercial strategy away from asking ‘what can we sell?’ and towards more useful questions: what does this audience value enough to act on? What experience would make the relationship stronger? What role should the venue, content, partner or digital channel play? What would make the proposition relevant now and how might it need to change in two years? 

Audience understanding is not just insight for marketing. It is the foundation for proposition strategy, pricing, partnership development, operating model design and investment decisions. 

Sponsorship is moving from exposure to precision

Sponsorship has long been one of sport’s great commercial strengths. But the market is becoming more demanding. Brands are under pressure to prove impact. They want to understand who they are reaching, how those audiences behave and whether partnerships are shifting awareness, consideration, conversion or loyalty. Visibility still matters, but visibility alone is no longer enough. 

Nielsen’s 2025 Global Sports Report argues that reaching today’s sports fans requires the right sponsorship strategy and measurement framework, with brands needing authentic connections with target audiences rather than broad exposure alone. 

Better audience understanding changes the sponsorship conversation. A club, league or rightsholder with a clear view of its segments can give partners more than badge association. It can help a brand understand whether it is reaching young urban fans, families, premium business audiences, women’s sport followers, international supporters, local communities or high-frequency digital engagers. 

That creates a stronger partner proposition: tailored activations around real behaviors, measurable engagement across physical and digital channels, and clearer links between sponsorship, content, experience and conversion. 

The value is no longer only in the size of the audience. It is in the quality, relevance and measurability of the relationship. 

Matchday, hospitality and venues need to work harder

The same shift is happening in matchday, hospitality and venue strategy. 

Deloitte’s Football Money League 2025 found that matchday revenue for the top 20 revenue-generating football clubs grew 11% year on year, making it the fastest-growing revenue stream for those clubs. Matchday revenue also surpassed €2bn for the first time. 

In the Premier League, Deloitte found that matchday revenue increased by 5% in 2023/24 to surpass £900m for the first time, with 2024/25 expected to approach £1bn. 

This growth is not just about selling more tickets. It reflects a broader move towards premium experiences, better stadium utilization and stronger yield from physical assets. The risk is assuming that rising demand means every audience wants the same matchday proposition: 

• A lifelong supporter may value affordability, atmosphere and tradition. 

• A family may value ease, safety and a better day-out experience. 

• A premium customer may value access, service and networking. 

• A tourist may value memory, retail and content. 

• A local resident may care less about the fixture and more about whether the venue adds value to the area. 

A stronger commercial model recognizes those differences. Matchday becomes a portfolio of propositions: general admission, family packages, flexible memberships, premium hospitality, local resident access, tourism offers, food and beverage, retail, content and post-event engagement. 

The stadium or arena is also becoming a broader commercial platform. Deloitte’s Football Money League 2026 found that the top 20 Money League clubs generated €12.4bn in revenue in 2024/25, an 11% increase on the previous year. Commercial revenues reached €5.3bn and represented the largest share of revenue for the third consecutive year. 

Tottenham Hotspur Stadium is one of the clearest examples. Its commercial revenue has included sponsorship, merchandising and other revenues such as third-party events, visitor attractions, conferences and events, with NFL, boxing, rugby and music concerts contributing to non-football revenues. 

The lesson is not simply to host more events. The opportunity is to understand which audiences the venue can serve beyond core fans, then use that understanding to shape programming, pricing, partnerships, hospitality, retail, local engagement and future investment. 

Owned channels will not be enough on their own

Retail, content and membership allow sports organizations to build direct relationships with audiences. But these channels only create meaningful value when they are designed around behavior. 

A global fan who may never attend a match can still buy merchandise, consume content, subscribe to digital products, engage with partners and influence the cultural reach of the organization: 

• A younger fan may care more about player-led content, creator collaborations or limited-edition drops than traditional membership. 

• A local supporter may care more about ticket access, community value and recognition. 

• A casual follower may only engage around major moments, but may still be commercially valuable if the proposition is timely and relevant. 

The harder challenge is that audiences will not always choose to engage where the organization wants them to. They may spend more time with creators than club channels, more time on short-form video than official apps, more time in group chats than membership portals, or more time in gaming and fantasy environments than traditional content ecosystems. 

That does not make owned channels irrelevant. It makes them part of a wider engagement model. The sports organizations that grow will need to show up where audiences want to be engaged, with propositions that feel useful in those environments. 

Manchester City’s 2024/25 annual report shows how leading clubs are expanding commercial partnerships around technology, operations and fan experience, with 11 new partners joining the men’s portfolio and a record number of deals focused on the women’s team. The club also highlighted technology-driven partnerships designed to enhance operations and fan experience. 

Commercial growth is increasingly tied to the ability to connect audience insight, content, commerce, partnerships and experience across multiple environments. 

The model needs to adapt as audiences move

A more audience-led commercial model cannot be static. 

Segmentation, personas and research can help organizations understand audiences today. The bigger opportunity is building a model that can keep learning as behaviors change. Synthetic personas, future-casting and test-and-learn proposition design can all help organizations explore where audiences may be going, not only where they are now. 

This matters because commercial models are difficult to change quickly. Membership structures, hospitality products, venue investments, sponsorship packages and digital platforms can all become outdated if they are designed around a fixed view of the audience. 

The more advanced organizations will build adaptability into the model. They will use data, insight and experimentation to test new propositions, refine bundles, adapt content, change pricing, improve partner offers and respond faster to emerging behaviors. 

That is where operating model becomes as important as strategy. Sports organizations need the data, governance, technology and ways of working to move from insight to action quickly. Otherwise, segmentation remains an interesting exercise rather than a commercial capability. 

Elixirr’s view

For sports organizations, the new commercial battleground is not simply about finding more revenue. It is about building a more intelligent, resilient and audience-led commercial model. 

That starts with designing around what audiences need, beyond the standard definition of a fan. But it also requires the capability to adapt as those needs change. The organizations that succeed will be those that can keep learning, keep evolving their propositions and keep showing up in the places their audiences want to engage. 

We help sports organizations connect those dots. We bring together sport sector expertise, customer insight, commercial strategy and transformation capability to help clubs, leagues, venues and rightsholders understand their audiences, design stronger propositions and build the operating capabilities needed to deliver them. 

The organizations that get this right will not simply generate more revenue from existing assets. They will build better businesses: more relevant to audiences, more valuable to partners, more resilient against media rights pressure and better equipped to grow across physical, digital and community-led ecosystems.