Global Fútbol

Sponsorship in sport is changing in so many ways, from the terms used to the assets and activations that can be written into contracts. Digital transformation has been a catalyst for this evolution too, with so many new and developing trends, such as Web3, NFTs or the Metaverse. An interesting discussion on how sports properties should approach emerging tech companies and brands broke out at the 2022 World Football Summit in Seville, in the talk titled ‘Breaking the Fourth Wall: Innovation-based partnerships make hay in new tech-savvy industry’.

LaLiga commercial and marketing director Jorge de la Vega participated in that discussion and spoke about the challenges that a competition like LaLiga faces when evaluating which partners to work with in these emerging fields.

He said: “When we are looking for new partners, we need to evaluate many different things, such as if it's a good brand or not, if it's a long-term partnership or not, if the activation plan is good for us. We need to really appreciate the good things a partner could offer to LaLiga.”

When dealing with digital technology sectors that are unfamiliar, it’s even more important to find the right partners. As De La Vega continued: “We normally as a property feel comfortable talking about ourselves, about how good we are and the rights or assets we can offer. But, we should go in another way to build marketing strategies with a brand. It's not easy because they know about themselves much more than we do. It's not easy as a property to learn in this space every single day, because the speed is crazy, so having the top partners and the right partners in every vertical can help you to take decisions for the future. We don't know how these things are going to evolve, but we're sure that we need to keep growing and learning with our partners.”

One of the other panellists was Esteve Calzada, the chief commercial officer at City Football Group, which holds a major stake in LaLiga Santander side Girona FC. He spoke from a club’s perspective about the similar pressures to be an early adopter, as well as the challenges that come with this.

Calzada stated: “From a technology perspective, we need to see how far we can go. We are trying to put our feet in each of the different ongoing initiatives. Our strategy is 'let's try to make sure that we participate in every space'. If there's a new social media platform that is gaining momentum, we also want to be there. I feel LaLiga has also been very prolific in terms of embracing partners from the tokens space, NFTs, etc. But, If you ask me how it's going to look in five years' time, I wish I had the answer.”

Calzada discussed the risks of rushing into a sponsorship contract with a partner in an emerging tech industry, pointing out that it’s not just a risk if the company or field doesn’t reach expectations. It can also be problematic if expectations are exceeded but a club or property is locked into an undervalued contract.

On this, the City Football Group director added: “You don't want to realise that you think you've done an amazing deal two years ago, but then another opportunity comes up and you realise it's blocked because you gave too much of an exclusivity or weren't concrete enough in the definition of the category. That's challenging and involves a lot of lawyers that have to have a look. When you're a global property, it's even more challenging because the legislation is different across countries.”

From sponsorship to partnership

During this World Football Summit panel, the speakers also reflected on the wider changes to sponsorship. LaLiga’s De La Vega explained: “We shifted from saying 'sponsorship' to saying 'partnership'. It was a semantic concept, but I think we all want to convey that it has to be much more than just getting the money from a brand and giving some assets. It has to be a wider concept.”

This part of the football industry has also become a lot more focused on fan engagement in recent years, moving on from pure revenue generation. De La Vega continued: “We have many different ways of connecting with our fans. There are some who follow LaLiga every single day and we're creating different touch points with these hard-core fans, but we've also got fans who only connect maybe once a week when they watch a game. Our digital team have been working in an incredible way for five years to create these touch points, for example with our LaLiga Fantasy game.”

Some of these touch points can be created through digital technology partnerships, as is the case with LaLiga’s embracing of blockchain technology or the partnership with EA SPORTS FC that will start in 2023/24.

De La Vega concluded: “We understand that blockchain is an opportunity in terms of revenue, but we see it as an added opportunity to increase fan engagement. The fans will connect with us with the idea of being the owner of something related to LaLiga. Fan engagement is so important and it’s about what a partner can add. The best example, I would say, is how we’re growing with our future title sponsor EA Sports FC. We definitely believe that will boost our fan engagement, having such a top partner as EA Sports FC.”