CULTUREBALL

The 2024 Super Bowl attracted the largest television audience since the moon landing and this summer with 124 million viewers, almost twice as many as watched the last US Presidential debate. This summer, over 4 billion people from every corner of the world tuned in to the 2024 Olympic Games.

A revolution is underway in Women’s sport. Audiences expanding by over 20% year on year. National, NGO and corporate strategies of sustainability, diversity and inclusion are being authenticated in sport. Gulf States are making unprecedented investments into sport infrastructure, injecting billions of dollars into sport properties, accelerating and expanding the reach and resonance of global events and franchises as they evolve their state identity.

New business models are emerging. The new consumer is seeking a heightened, immersive sport experience as technology revolutionises how sport is consumed, co-created and socialised. Sport is shifting stock prices and valuations. Sport has become a more investable asset than real estate. And it’s only going to grow as an asset class.

Sport is no longer merely culturally pervasive; it is the epicentre of contemporary culture. Sport is universal in a diverse and fragmented world. The central meaning system we use to help make sense of ourselves and to others. The stories, athletes, the moments, the rituals, the technologies, the systems. This is sport culture And we are using these cultural expressions every day to build meaning.

SPORT IS MORE INTEGRAL TO MARKETING THAN EVER BEFORE

Looking for amplification, equity and engaging consumers in a connected-but-fragmented world, some 250,000 brands are battling for awareness, affinity and/or sales through an association with sport.

Only few are winners. The rest are picking up participation trophies.

Winning requires a new paradigm. One that puts cultural branding at its heart and embraces the participant and fans identity needs from sport to create a meaningful, effective and welcome presence for brands in a rich world of legends, icons and emotions.

Winning means embracing the sub-cultures, understanding how, why and where participants and fans consume sport experiences and to what end. And positioning your brand to be integral to sport culture, not just another transactional, self-obsessed player.

CULTUREBALL: Partners with over 100 years’ experience of working in the C-suites of global and national powerhouse brands in sport, we train, strategize and manage implementation for brands who truly want to make a difference to, with and in sport.

TIM PARKINSON - PARTNER, HEAD OF SME

Over a career spanning 30 years in leadership positions with global sports brands Nike, Under Armour and Umbro as CMO, Global Advertising Director and Executive Creative Director, Tim Parkinson has led the creation of some of the most iconic campaigns in the history of sport marketing.

These include Nike FIFA World Cup and Olympic initiatives, award-winning storytelling around athlete superstars LeBron James, Cristiano Ronaldo, Steph Curry and Serena Williams and culture-shaping campaigns on behalf of the English and Brazilian F.A.s, the USA Dream Team and China Olympics Team. His work with FIFA, the IOC and NBA has positioned him as one of the most sought-after consultants in the marketing of sport.

Tim also led Diageo’s acquisitions and activation valuable global sport properties in his position as SVP Content based in New York. Formula 1, PGA, MLB and WTA platforms were integrated and became central to marketing experiences across Johnnie Walker, Guinness and Smirnoff.

In 2019, Tim joined the academic community reading a PhD at Birkbeck, University of London and researching the athlete activist. He was tasked with developing the institute’s sport marketing module for doctorate students. He brings a unique combination of international practical experience, consumer insights and research-based modelling to offer the most innovative and disruptive perspective for brands that are native to sport or want to maximise their sport strategy.

SPORT MARKETING EXCELLENCE

Customisable interactive training programme for senior and mid level brand marketing executives.

A complete immersion into the contemporary sport marketplace - the brands, the subcultures, the athletes - with over 50 case studies detailing the marketing paradigm, cultural branding, storytelling platform and the role of mega-events.

Over 30hrs in total including 10 workshop sessions, the programme is delivered on in-person and/or virtual platforms and co-developed with Birkbeck, University of London.

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SPORT MARKETING BLUEPRINTS

Strategy building for brands aiming to maximise their association with sport and its new consumers.

Includes brand audit, research design, full cultural strategy, activation planning, dissemination and reception strategies, manifesto building, channel strategies and KPI setting.

Our unique process and skilled consultants will ensure an authentic, meaningful brand equipped with an actionable strategy to deliver disruptively across the world or in your own backyard.

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SPORT MARKETING SCAFFOLDING

Building the optimum infrastructure for execution of brand marketing activations through third party recruitment and management.

We design and manage a world class support system for your brand to deliver a winning execution of strategy.

Includes oversight of content creators, media and sponsorship rights, sourcing and acquisition of sport properties, influencer and athlete recruitment. Our experienced negotiators drive enormous value and and ensure world-class quality control.

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The Sport Marketing Excellence programme is an immersive executive skills building course for brand marketers looking to make an impact in the world of sport.

Developed by industry insiders with over 100 years experience of working with global and national powerhouse brands and in conjunction with Birkbeck College at the University of London, SME offers unique perspective on what it takes to win in sport.

A fully customisable programme, SME offers up to 30 hours of intense learning, workshops and assessment tasks to give marketing management the tools to build an authentic business-building presence and avoid the pitfalls within the site of our most meaningful identity-shaping experiences.

SAMPLE PROGRAMME

SAMPLE PROGRAMME (CONT)

Sport Marketing Blueprints is a brand cultural strategy development and activation plan-process developed for world leading sports brands including Nike, Umbro, Converse, NBA and Manchester City Football Group, SMB is Sport Culture Vultures’ iterative approach to building an understandable, actionable and effective strategic approach to maximising a brand’s presence in sport furnished with tactical activations.

Brands are made meaningful in community social discourse on digital platforms. We identify and define the sport-centric stories consumers are sharing, identifying tensions and seeking to identify opportunities for the brand to solve and enhance the participant/fan sport experience. SMB identiifies a brand’s Point of Entry into social discourses and the necessary aesthetic, messaging, products, experiences and contributions to attain an authentic voice.

Our consumer modelling is research validated and moves beyond behaviour to understanding context, consumption motivations and identify future trajectory. A process that ensures saliency, affinity and driving penetration and sales. Our activation strategies - evidenced in global award winning campaigns across iconic sport brands - guarantee cultural originality and disruption.

Situation Analysis

Brand Audit

Story Analysis

P.O.E.*

Cultural Strategy

Cutural Activation

*(Point of Entry into Culture)

THE SCV PROCESS

Establishing partnership context through detailing desired outcomes, programme objectives, key personnel inputs/outputs and decision-making. Covers business status and growth trajectory, value chain and future innovations,

Brand performance (econometrics, ROI, etc), market position, key equities, competition, stakeholders, consumer touchpoints, consumer attitudes and usage and meaning creation vehicles (activation history)

Discourses in sport relevant to owned properties, brand objectives and corporate strategy. Social media and influencer based analytic of profile, salience, engagement and consumer meaning creation capacity.

Where the brand can authentically intervene in sports discourse and enhance the consumer sport experience/create affective brand affinity based on research-validated modelling of sports consumption

Moving stakeholders to the desired outcome through behaviours, commitments and messaging including leadership, organisational and resource implications

Full consumer journey through physical, virtual and social activation including GTM strategy, content needs, transmedia plan, distribution and retail amp;ification, ROI, athkete and infleuncer identification, channel startegy and more

World class execution requires world class partners. Sport Marketing Scaffolding leverages global networks built over the last three decades at the very pinnacle of the sport marketplace, CULTUREBALL will create the most creative, innovative and effective ecosystem for brands and ensure its maximisation and optimum delivery.

From content and experience creators in all four corners of the globe to elite athletes at the top of their profession, from the local club operators to the multi-platform media owners, SMS deploys proven virtual management systems to create a cohesive and aligned sport activation team at the service of your brand.

Across commercial, administrative and academic communities, we offer unequalled access to the leaders, policy makers and innovators that are shaping the modern consumer’s sport experience and delivering cutting edge products and services. Our relationships with FIFA, UEFA and IOC host committees, NGOs and sport administation bodies in New York, London, Shanghai and Tokyo. Our experience with award-winning advertising and communications agencies, sport influencers and our track record of connecting sport with the adjacent cultures of music, fashion and art will make your SMS solution a diverse, contemporary, seamless and profoundly creative resource at your fingertips with a central point of control.

CONNECTING THE CULTURAL ECOSYSTEM OF SPORT

CULTUREBALL’s granular identification of culural stakeholders enables the generation of a Managed Virtual Network as in the example below constructed for a leading car manufacturer’s activation of a national team Olympic sponsorship property.

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HEAD OFFICE

5 Morecoombe Close,

London KT2 7JQ

Tel: +44 7944471510

Email:enquiries@cultureball.com

SATELITTE OFFICES:

New York

Singapore