The Secret to Winning the World Cup of Engagement? Owning the Fan Connection
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The world’s most popular sporting event, the FIFA World Cup, is set to kick off in June and headlines another outstanding summer of sport - with Wimbledon, the Commonwealth Games, and the F1 World Championship among the star-studded supporting cast.
These events are the perfect opportunity for sports stars, teams and brands to secure high-value, long-term relationships with billions of consumers. But in an always-on world, fandom no longer follows a neat, linear path. Fan engagement is spread across stadiums, content feeds, and commerce platforms. And without a way to connect beyond those moments, interest peaks - but quickly fades.
The demand is there and the stakes are high: the average UK sports fan will spend £116,188 on supporting their home team and athletes over a lifetime, and they increasingly want to vicariously experience their heroes’ lifestyles. The real challenge for organisations this summer? Keeping that spend in their ecosystem, owning the fan connection and sustaining engagement for longer than ever - all by introducing a single fan ID that unifies interactions.
What Paris 2024 got right about modern fandom
Models of fan behaviour like the Psychological Continuum Model show that sports fandom develops through stages: awareness ➝ attraction ➝ attachment ➝ allegiance. If organisations don’t actively push fans beyond attraction, engagement tends to plateau or churn. And a significant challenge for past global events has been maintaining this peak tournament interest. Take UEFA Euro 2024.
Europe’s flagship international football tournament achieved a global audience of around 5 billion viewers. Yet in the UK, for instance, TV viewership for 2024’s final dropped dramatically from the 2021 edition (31m to 23.8m) and adult linear impacts were down 14% across the whole month. Plus, online social engagement fell by almost a fifth once the final whistle blew.
2024’s other prize event fared a little differently. Dubbed the ‘digital Olympics’ and even the ‘TikTok Olympics’, the Paris Games debuted a digital strategy that generated 412 billion social media engagements, a 290% increase on Tokyo. The official Olympic TikTok account jumped from 8.5 million followers to 14.5 million, and even Warner Bros. Discovery secured a record number of new paid streaming subscribers.
From live Q&As with athletes to user-generated content, behind-the-scenes stories to adaptive, multilingual experiences, the Games spoke the language of modern fans. But how did the Olympics capture this digital engagement and turn that moment of attention into fandom - and what can sports brands learn from this activity?
Fan identity is the foundation of long-term value
At the Paris Olympics, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) deployed a new Fan Data Platform to capture scattered fan behaviour. The platform powered personalised experiences based on fans’ preferred athletes, teams, or sports, delivering content, campaigns, and offers that strengthened engagement and connection.
Similarly, Apply Digital recently partnered with an American sports league where we supported the integration of a unified ID to help connect experiences across team and league fan touchpoints.These connected fan ecosystems can link fans, data, partners, and commerce. Importantly, they ensure moments of passion are captured, nurtured, and extended beyond the season into sustained engagement and revenue.
Sports brands can win by creating lifestyle ‘worlds’
In the digital age, sports fandom has transformed. Social media’s always-on culture means fans can access their favourite teams’ ‘worlds’ - fans want to live like the athletes, eat like them, decorate their homes like them, even visit the same holiday destinations.
It’s why sports stars’ personal brands are so popular, and their influences extend into everyday lifestyle. Take how Lewis Hamilton’s off-track fashion choices have driven interest in luxury streetwear and sustainability, with fans buying into his fashion drops and eco-friendly products alongside standard F1 merch. Meanwhile, basketball star Steph Curry’s latest off-season workout video, shot to promote his new book release, has helped followers to copy his pre-game warm-ups and recovery tools for closer engagement (and bigger book sales) than ever.
But with fandom now having countless entry points, sports organisations need that one central connecting hub that links each fan to a single ID to tap into their passions. This way, teams can turn fleeting impressions into lasting interest and devise digital experiences that can be the foundation of long-term fan value.
If fandom is personal, it starts with identity
The success of the Olympics and the American sports league proves that fan engagement doesn’t come from fleeting moments of attention, but long-term connection. Fandom is a journey, not a peak, and we must look past one-off impressions to tell stories that last well beyond the medal ceremony.
For teams and organisations, the lesson ahead of the summer’s sport is clear: while the action takes place in the real world, keeping fans continually engaged, and building real communities, lies in how they're connected online.
Explore our latest research report, The Fandom Advantage, to discover how brands can tap into the power of sports to build deeper, longer-lasting relationships with their audiences.
Ready to elevate your fan engagement today? Contact Apply Digital to find out how we can help your sports business thrive in 2026 and beyond.
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