Blog: Madden NFL

For decades, rights holders have prioritised (and relied upon) exponentially increasing broadcast revenues as a mechanism for sustainability and growth, a legacy approach that is in dire need of a review with ‘ D-day’ for sporting rights upon us in 2021.

Amazon-owned Twitch is no newcomer to sports. However, in a deliberate move to double down, Amazon has conceded that it needs to improve the discoverability of live sporting events for its platform users – so, as of last Wednesday, ‘Sports’ has become a standalone category with the return of Twitch.

Sony , EA , and Activision were among companies to postpone marketing events and product release efforts in light of the current protests against police brutality and racism in the United States. The current situation is a stark reminder that just because there is a COVID-19 crisis out there, it doesn’t mean that other world problems are on hold in the meantime.

In 2003, FIFA updated its primary logo to include the words ‘For the Game. For the World.’ Fast forward 17 years and governments around the world are instructing their citizens to stay inside. Now it is almost as if Nike consulted FIFA on its latest marketing campaign ‘Play Inside, Play for the World’, imploring enamored fans to play for the 7.

Sports as a product is feeling the squeeze of the peak attention economy. Sports fans in the traditional sense are ageing, and appealing to a younger digitally-native audience is a fundamental issue that rights holders can no longer ignore.

The NFL continues expanding its reach with the news that it is providing both video and audio content to global streaming services Spotify and Tidal. This follows the NFL’s recently- announced partnerships with social platforms TikTok, Reddit, Facebook and YouTube.

While sharing pizza has already become synonymous with watching sports, e-sports could be about to leverage that same instilled behaviour. Restaurant chain Pizza Hut made history this July when it became the first brand to secure naming rights for a virtual football stadium in an agreement with Madden NFL creator EA Sports.