Mumbai: What will never vanish into obscurity? India's persistent passion for sports & cricket India is set to host the prestigious ICC ODI World Cup for the first time, commencing on 5 October, bringing excitement to sports fans everywhere. Since the 2019 World Cup broke the previous viewership record with 2.6 billion viewers, the 2023 ICC World Cup is expected to bring in a substantially higher audience and will give marketers a chance to shape their brand value through enriching advertising opportunities.
Aligning with Diwali, the biggest Indian festival, the ICC Cricket Tournament will open broader avenues for advertisers and digital marketers to showcase their brands to the huge cricket audience.
Shift of cricket advertising efforts from linear TV to CTV
For previous cricket matches in India, mobile phones and linear TV were the most critical advertising channels for marketers to build a brand. With the higher penetration of CTV devices, it offers advertisers a route to audiences tuned in on a bigger screen.
As per the FICCI-EY report, CTVs in India reached to 10 million in 2022 and are predicted to surpass 40 million by 2025. MiTV (Xiaomi TV) and Samsung dominate the market, with 11 per cent and 10 per cent shipments, respectively. Approximately 83 per cent of smart TV owners consume content via the internet, with 84 per cent of households with more than one person watching CTV at home, according to the 2022 CTV report released by MediaSmart.
Based on BARC reports, 700 million viewers in India watch their sports on smart TVs, with cricket being the frontrunner among various sports. The data from the Interactive Advertising Bureau shows it is estimated that 73 per cent of media buyers and advertisers are shifting their budgets away from linear TV to CTV and OTT. Few CTV players provide an outstream ad solution. The ad will be displayed when the TV is switched on, so users' focus will not be distracted by the content. Moreover, advertisers can easily track the performance based on the actions the audience takes and how long the video creative is watched.
The demand for advertisers to promote their campaigns on the big screen surges by 30–40 per cent in the festive season. Major industries like FMCG, auto, e-commerce, fin-tech, and consumer durables are focusing their advertising efforts on CTVs to launch their festive campaigns. During the 2019 World Cup, the topmost consumer electronics companies—Samsung, MiTV, Sony, LG, and Panasonic—reported almost a 100% spike in sales of large-screen TVs compared to the previous year.
ICC is a critical window for gaming & e-sports industry
As per KPMG India, the Indian gaming industry is set to reach a revenue of $2.8 billion this year. In Google Playstore India, among Top30 gaming apps in AppAnnie July 2023, 10 per cent of apps are sports-related games. Real money gaming is a key driver for Indian game monetization owing to increasing "willing to pay" users and technological evolution. The average revenue per paying user increased by 11 per cent to reach $20 per year in FY22, with 2 million new paying users being added each month, said BCG 2022.
During the 2023 IPL, MOCA was tapping into the power of the event and successfully helped Winzo, one of the largest gaming platforms in India, greatly expand its user base, and its revenue saw a two-fold increase compared with a pre-IPL period by cooperating with top OEM App Store and premium in-app traffic suppliers.
For India, being a cricket-loving nation, the upcoming ICC World Cup opens up tons of opportunities for marketers in the gaming industry to build brand awareness and drive sales. It is an important time window for gaming apps to make maximum revenue, especially in the real money game category, where the ROI is expected to increase and turn positive before and during cricket matches; however, as I see it, the deposit will drop 50–70 per cent once the match ends.
The first-ever hosting of the ICC in India presents a valuable chance for marketers to capitalise on, especially as it aligns with the festive season when users have additional disposable income to spend. The top priority of the marketers will be to seize users' attention and elevate engagement with the best performing advertising solutions.
In conclusion, advertising in the ICC will be a hot deal for all the marketers to leverage; however, it will also not be a cakewalk being a part of this group. With a highly desirable space, naturally, the ad rates during the tournament period being telecasted across all platforms will spike by nearly 30–40 per cent. As per industry news, take OTT as an example: select India-only matches shall cost up to Rs 30 lakh per ten seconds.
Making the most coveted spot a challenge for marketers to claim. yet not impossible to achieve. Amid the big fanfare of cricket, fan’s enthusiasm & the festive fervor in the air, this is a prime time for digital marketers to take the plunge & hit it out of the ballpark.
To fully capitalise on the ICC World Cup and elevate brands to new heights, MOCA India vice president Rameshwar Thakur, advises advertisers to strategise media campaigns in advance by pre-booking premium inventory that provides innovative ad formats to showcase brands to a precisely targeted audience at reasonable rates.
This article has been authored by MOCA Technology India vice president Rameshwar Thakur.
