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Brands interested in investing in esports during the coronavirus-enforced shutdown of live sports should not act too hastily, a top sports investor has warned.
Speaking during the first instalment of SportsPro’s Insider Series on 22nd April, Deepen Parikh, a partner at Courtside Ventures, an early-stage investment firm which holds a stake in esports organisation 100 Thieves, said that investments in competitive gaming are “going through the roof” while traditional sport remains in hiatus.
Despite that influx of capital, Parikh warned brands against rushing into esports with the same strategies as they would in traditional sports, saying past deals have failed because of a lack of understanding.
Parikh was keen to stress that esports rewards brands capable of creating an endemic relationship with fans.
“In terms of brands re-thinking sponsorship and pushing them heavily into esports, I still think it comes down to, if you’re a traditional sports sponsor at the end of the day, sports aren’t going away,” he said.
“It’s not a matter of if sports come back – it’s a matter of when. From a broadcast perspective, that is going to be sooner rather than later – in spectator sports – but audiences are really hungry for sports content.
“There is certainly a scale back in terms of budgets entirely across all of entertainment and media. I do think that esports presents a very compelling opportunity to have a closer, more endemic relationship with the audience, which I think is fascinating. But, we have also seen a lot of brands get burned over time because they think that esports is the same as traditional sports and they treat their sponsorships strategies the same [way].
“So, I think you have to be an endemic brand, or build an endemic strategy to appeal to gaming and esports audiences, and that is not necessarily the same as traditional sports.”
Brands interested in investing in esports during the coronavirus-enforced shutdown of live sports should not act too hastily, a top sports investor has warned.
Speaking during the first instalment of SportsPro’s Insider Series on 22nd April, Deepen Parikh, a partner at Courtside Ventures, an early-stage investment firm which holds a stake in esports organisation 100 Thieves, said that investments in competitive gaming are “going through the roof” while traditional sport remains in hiatus.
Despite that influx of capital, Parikh warned brands against rushing into esports with the same strategies as they would in traditional sports, saying past deals have failed because of a lack of understanding.
Parikh was keen to stress that esports rewards brands capable of creating an endemic relationship with fans.
“In terms of brands re-thinking sponsorship and pushing them heavily into esports, I still think it comes down to, if you’re a traditional sports sponsor at the end of the day, sports aren’t going away,” he said.
“It’s not a matter of if sports come back – it’s a matter of when. From a broadcast perspective, that is going to be sooner rather than later – in spectator sports – but audiences are really hungry for sports content.
“There is certainly a scale back in terms of budgets entirely across all of entertainment and media. I do think that esports presents a very compelling opportunity to have a closer, more endemic relationship with the audience, which I think is fascinating. But, we have also seen a lot of brands get burned over time because they think that esports is the same as traditional sports and they treat their sponsorships strategies the same [way].
“So, I think you have to be an endemic brand, or build an endemic strategy to appeal to gaming and esports audiences, and that is not necessarily the same as traditional sports.”
