The arrival of Britain’s sporting summer is set to lift the mood of the nation, says our Senior Agency Sales Partner James Phillips, who explores our latest sport insight in this new blog post
Britain’s summer of sport has officially begun with England, Scotland and Wales all kicking off their respective campaigns at the Euro 2020 football championships.
Interest in the pandemic-delayed tournament is set to be absolutely huge this year and will be magnified not only by interest in how each of the home nation teams fare (not forgetting the small matter of England versus Scotland on Friday 18th June) but also by the country’s emergence from lockdown and a return to socialising and growing consumer confidence.
And while football fans - myself included - are set to gobble up a whole month’s worth of international football, the tournament is also set to feed the UK economy a much needed cash boost with fans expected to spend as much as £143 million watching the action unfold at live games, in pubs and fan zone or with friend and family at home (I, for one, cannot wait to light up the BBQ and get the beers in!).
Ozone’s overall sport audience and content engagement has grown since the end of the English Premier League football season, as Britain’s sporting summer begins
Interestingly, that spending forecast, by The Centre for Economics and Business Research and as reported by The Times, estimates that footy fans will spend £37 million on match-day tickets, a further £2 million will be spent on food and drink in stadiums, and £720 million will be spent in pubs - £104 million more than without the football. That’s a lot of drinks!
What’s even more encouraging for both sport fans and the economy this year is that this summer is a summer like no other. With Wimbledon returning, the British and Irish Lions touring South Africa and (fingers-crossed) the Tokyo Olympics taking place in July and August, sport is going to pepper a summer of fun for British consumers. Combined with (again, fingers-crossed) success for the home nations’ sporting superstars, we fully expect the nation’s millions of sport fans - from the die-hard to those seeking a feel-good factor - to turn to us for our premium publishers’ breadth and depth of sport editorial.
According to PAMCo, Ozone reaches 84% of Great Britain’s sport fans each month, whom we see persistently; 60% of them return to us daily; 90% return weekly.
We know that fans turn to Ozone to follow sport news and events. Even in the build up to Britain’s sporting summer, it’s been a busy few months of sporting news and events - and our sport fans have turned to our expert coverage, live reporting and in-depth analysis to get their sporting fix in their millions and frequently.
As a hugely emotive topic among sport fans, we saw this passion boil over in mid-April when a breakaway European Super League was announced. In the week the news broke, we saw sport page views increase by a massive +29% week on week, with our sport audience also growing +19% in the same period.
Interest in the negatively received league peaked on 20th April as daily sport page views hit 8.8m when UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson called the clubs involved in the Super League a “cartel”.
Elsewhere, success for English clubs in Europe’s two top club cup competitions boosted our weekly sport audience and engagement with our coverage. In the week that Chelsea beat Manchester City in the all English Champions League final our weekly sport audience and engagement with the category increased by +10% respectively week on week.
Big news and events, including the European Super League, all-English Champions League final, and the start of Euro 2020, drives huge engagement with our football content
Yet again, with the beginning of Euro 2020 at the weekend, we have seen the category grow, with page views and unique users increasing +15% and +23% respectively week on week. At the weekend we saw engagement peaking, with Saturday’s 25.2m page views +30% higher than the 7-day average last week.
We will continue to track the performance of our football content as the tournament unfolds. The opportunity for advertisers to reach millions of footy fans as they follow the tournament - through the highs and the lows - is something we here at The Ozone Project are excited about.
And while football takes centre stage for the moment, tennis, rugby and the Olympics are set to carry on a summer of sporting success for the nation. The chart below shows engagement with each of the sport categories changing over time. Note the +98% growth in rugby content consumption when the British and Irish Lions squad was announced in May. We’ve also highlighted a +94% increase in tennis content consumption during the French Open, likely driven by interest in Naomi Osaka.
Engagement with our other sports content also increases during big news and events, notably with the British & Irish Lions squad announcement and furore over Naomi Osaka’s French Open withdrawal
We are rather fortunate at Ozone to have access to such a depth of previous reader behaviour and content consumption. While we can’t predict future behaviour, it does act as a unique barometer as to the mood of the nation. It will be riveting to see how that mood changes over the coming months as the story of Britain’s sporting summer unfolds.
