As football’s popularity continues to grow among Australians, venues can capitalise on Optus Sport’s considerable coverage of the sport to complement an established live sport offering.
Football – more commonly known as soccer in Australia – is the world’s most popular sport, and has a large following nation-wide. It is particularly popular at the grassroots level in Australia, and has created an avid group of soccer fans who love following the professional leagues including the Premier League, widely regarded as the best in the world.
Research from GfK Australia in 2015 showed that there are at least five million football fans in Australia, with 29 per cent opting to watch the sport in pubs or clubs at least once a month. As the sports’ popularity has grown quite a bit since then, it’s safe to assume so will those fan numbers and their willingness to watch football outside of the home.
Optus Sport has the broadcast rights to football’s most popular competitions, tournaments and players with exclusive live rights to the Premier League, Euro 2020 and selected Barclays FA Women’s Super League matches, and live rights to selected J-League matches and a host of international matches – making it a win-win for pubs and their patrons alike.
With a broad gamut of live sport coverage an essential offering for a significant majority of pubs, Optus Sport’s football selections make for an excellent complement to any pub’s sporting schedule. Due to its broadcast times and flexible commercials, including Optus Sport in your live sports package can broaden your venue’s appeal and attract a wider range of punter to your pub.
Working together with Optus Sport
Optus Sport is transforming how it works with venues – not just in growing its venue base but how it actually engages with venues that broadcast its channels. A current focus is assisting pubs in becoming local hotspots for football and forming relationships with local Premier League fan clubs and grassroots football teams. For example, venues can build a following and promote themselves as the local home of Liverpool or Manchester United – while also backing the Sunday football club around the corner.
Scott Davoren is leading the commercial venue/public broadcast arm for Optus Sport and is transforming it from the ground up. His focus is to continue to drive growth via strong relationships with venues, forming key partnerships and leveraging global events such as Euro 2020 (now being held in 2021 due to COVID). It is one of the-largest and most competitive football events in the world and is exclusive to Optus Sport in June and July this year.
“Since 2016 Optus Sport has built one of the world’s premier football viewing experiences for consumers, we now want to take that experience and help venues build out a compelling football experience for their patrons. As a fan of sport, I don’t think there’s a better way of watching live sport than in a venue with a group of friends or a bunch of other passionate fans, and that is the experience we want to help venues build with Optus Sport,” stated Davoren.
Euro 2020 (now being held in 2021 due to COVID) is a great opportunity to try out Optus Sport and see how it can help you grow your football-loving patronage and engage even more with local sports fans.
Reach out to Optus Sport to start a discussion on how it can work with your venue at https://sport.optus.com.au/venues or by emailing OptusSportVenueEnquiries@optus.com.au