A traditionally fragmented landscape for high school sports is becoming an attractive target for top-tier corporate marketers, thanks in part to advancements in digital technology, a rise in showcase prep sports events, and a critical need among many schools for additional sports funding.
Long a challenging environment to amass audience scale given the highly provincial nature of high school sports, several developing companies have begun to amass sizable audiences that are comparable to many other forms of sports media.
BigTeams, a Northern Virginia-based provider of website and software solutions for high school athletic programs,
works with more than 4,600 schools representing every U.S. state. High school sports portals such as USA Today High School Sports and MaxPreps routinely generate seven-figure monthly audiences with heavy rates of consumption and strong advertising.
“The cliche of herding cats in high school is still partially true, but it’s really beginning to change,” said Clay Walker, BigTeams chief executive. Walker was hired last year from USA Today Sports Media Group to lead a major national expansion for the company.
“This is big and it’s definitely coming,” Walker said. “And you have started to see really big brands like a Dick’s Sporting Goods, an Under Armour, an Olive Garden, brands of that serious stature, invest in the space. We are definitely getting closer as an industry to really unlocking this segment.”
Several prevailing trends are fueling the audience growth and sponsor involvement. Continued advances in mobile and streaming technology have made it far easier for parents, friends and family members of student athletes — the segments that represent the vast majority of the audience for high school sports content — to consume high-quality programming and to do so in larger amounts.
The latest several years have also seen an exponential rise in the number of elite camps, showcase events, bowl games and invitational tournaments in high school sports, representing a large new set of naming-rights inventory and other activation possibilities entering the marketplace in addition to creating more content.
American Family Insurance has served as the title sponsor of the High School Slam Dunk & 3-Point Championships, and uses high school sports as a platform to compete in a marketplace that includes rivals and massive sports spenders Geico, State Farm, Nationwide and Farmers.
“We see this as a really fertile space for messaging,” said Dwayne Maddox, American Family Insurance media and brand manager, noting the high school market is a source of new drivers in need of auto insurance. “For a company like ours that has aspirations to grow and be a bit scrappier, high school aligns perfectly since it’s also all about having goals.”
Several major companies activating in high school have also veered from traditional sales-driven marketing into more cause-related activities.
Dick’s Sporting Goods operates the Sports Matter initiative in partnership with DonorsChoose.org in which it hosts a crowdfunding initiative to boost individual contributions for high school sports programs. The campaign clearly has a halo effect back to the retail brand, as a greater population of high school athletes likely means a greater need for apparel and equipment that Dick’s sells. But Sports Matter also includes a component in which Dick’s matches up to $1.5 million in donations, with the company’s foundation heavily involved.
“There is a real funding crisis in high school sports that we’re trying to bring attention to and alleviate,” said Ryan Eckel, Dick’s vice president of brand and sports marketing. “We have an audience of people we can speak to that really care about this issue, just like we do. So more than a brand play, this is a real mission for us.”
