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On the heels of a record-breaking Women’s March Madness, and with a few months to go until the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup, it should come as no surprise that some brands are turning their attention to women’s soccer.
Visa, for one, acknowledged the 100-day countdown mark by adding 33 women’s soccer players to its Team Visa program, which has sponsored more than 500 athletes from around the world since 2000—54% of them being women, Andrea Fairchild, SVP and head of sponsorships at Visa, told Marketing Brew.
The roster: Three women on the new lineup are professional soccer players in the US: Mallory Swanson, Sam Mewis, and Catarina Macario.
As part of the program, Visa, an official partner of FIFA women’s soccer, provides its athletes with benefits like mental health resources, financial literacy training, business development opportunities, and support for philanthropic efforts they might be engaged in, according to Fairchild. They’re selected for their athletic achievements and “display of shared values,” she said.
“We don’t just look for the star players,” Fairchild told Marketing Brew. “We want to make sure that these individuals are creating impact, and they’re really determined to leave the game better than they found it.”
Brand wins: Visa sponsors a number of leagues and sporting events—including the Olympics, Paralympics, the US Soccer Federation (including the men’s and women’s national teams), and the NFL—which has helped boost its global reach, Fairchild explained.
“From a sponsorship perspective, our sports portfolio is the biggest,” Fairchild said. “The biggest investment for us is within sports.”
Part of that investment is in women’s sports, including the World Cup this summer, in an effort to “close that gap” in marketing spend on men’s versus women’s sports, she added. It’s also likely a good bet in terms of ROI, according to Fairchild. The last Women’s World Cup in 2019 drew a record 1.12 billion viewers, per FIFA. As of late January, over half a million tickets had already been sold for this year’s tournament, taking place in Australia and New Zealand, the association said.
Big picture: Brands are starting to think differently about how they partner with women’s sports, perhaps in part due to calls from women athletes for deals that are on par with what male athletes are offered.