With young and female entrepreneurship on the rise, it’s no surprise that digitally savvy millennials are excelling in the eCommerce space. Millennials are turning their side hustles into full-time endeavors using social media platforms and web integrations to acquire customers and build communities.

Meet Suhina Kohli Bahl, the 25-year old creative brain behind Dubai’s new online fashion brand Curador, an exciting new fashion label set to tap into the Middle East’s tech retail potential with the launch of an e-commerce website this month. Here, she listed her experience and observation into a usable recommendation to help millennial entrepreneurs like her. 

BE CLEAR, SHOW YOUR PERSONALITY AND SPEAK OUT YOUR PURPOSE

It is not easy, that’s not a secret. Launching a new product is frightening; how can one stand out and be heard? Most young entrepreneurs struggle to be noticed.

The key is to be clear and be bold in declaring who you are, what your product is and how your product solves a problem in a fresh, dynamic way. Sometimes an entrepreneur is too close to see themselves. You must step back and know who you are and what you are offering, even if what you are offering is a gentle, kind, calm option. As a person, I am an explorer who loves to experiment with my style. I always look for something new, something that excites me, and these must reflect on the brand. At Curador, expect a range of fresh, edgy and unique designs in all my collection.

BE VISIBLE: GET SEEN EVERYWHERE

Here is where we, millennials, have the ultimate advantage. Being seen everywhere now is less about being seen in person than being found online in as many modalities as possible. The more extensive your digital footprint, the higher the chances of you being discovered. Naturally, your home base is your website, but then you want to use social networks to intersect your different buyer segments at multiple decision points in their buyers' journeys.

In fashion e-commerce, content development such as regular photo shoot and video shoots are the new product demo, which no longer needs to believe and in person at a stand-up booth in the mall. Google says that almost 50% of internet users will look for videos related to a product or service before visiting a store.

In addition to videos, blog posts and articles that offer helpful tips work well, as does your backstory.

PROMOTE! PROMOTE! PROMOTE!

Marketing and PR are very important. Marketing experts create an environment for the brand to get noticed by journalists, podcasters and television bookers. In each case, they will want to see who you are and what you have to offer. Use these requests to inspire your content. Otherwise, it can feel overwhelming. Remember, an article that appeals to one show’s audience is likely something another audience would enjoy as well.

Content can also be repurposed to extend your reach without your having to come up with new material continually. An article can be chunked into tweets and summarized into short-form videos or a slide deck. Every podcast, TV show, blog, newspaper and magazine needs content. Furthermore, a series of articles can become a white paper and, with perhaps a few more images, graphics and not too many words, evolve into a short e-book.

Once you have a podcast or interview, you can have it transcribed, which can then become articles, blog posts or newsletter features and be syndicated out to various properties across your network. It will feel like an intense process at first, but it is remarkable how quickly it becomes second nature.

COLLABORATION IS KEY

People can help you. You must ask for help. The road to entrepreneurship is rarely uninhabited, no matter which industry you are in. Those who have experienced some success already experience similar original content pressures. They can help you, and you can help them via a technique that has gained traction for many years now: collaboration, or “collabs,” as they are known in vernacular.

At Curador, my aim is to turn collabs into an art form, it could be designer collaboration where we mix our designs to reach a different segment and can be both beneficial for our brands but know that it is not all a bed of roses, however, as sometimes you will realize that collaboration doesn't always lead immediately and automatically to huge exposure or great results. So, make sure to work with the right companies and developing strong working relationships.

TELL YOUR STORY WELL AND RIGHT

Your buyers buy more than your product; they buy the complete package -- your why, your history and your principles. With Curador, we have created a brand pillar: Create, Curate, Carry. I would like to take people on a fashion journey around the world with style and fashion. Curador by SKB is always searching for something new and fresh to offer our customers. Expect never before seen designs inspired by our world travels. All of these kinds of details contribute to the folklore of a brand. The story defends your price, illustrates the value and makes you stand out as an aspirational brand.

Millennials who are determined to succeed can do so. It takes conviction, courage and consistent messaging with bold imagery and stories that explain, entertain and compel buyers to take action.

Launching of Curador by SKB Online Store this Month

By introducing an online store, the brand aims to reach a wider audience – particularly capturing the attention of a tech-savvy millennial market.Curador by SKB will allow its international customer base to order at the click of a button, with those residing in Dubai able to collect items at the store of their choice or opt for the convenience of home delivery. An in-store e-reservation service will be introduced this month, following the opening of a catalog showroom at Tiffany Tower in Jumeirah Lake Towers (JLT) last August 2018.

This web-based portal will enable customers to acquire the brand’s contemporary, ready-to-wear style offerings, which are known for adopting some of the finest sartorial customs from around the globe.

The online store, named Curador by SKB, will offer the full range of brand fashion items.

Instinctif Partners supported the development of Mobily's Annual Report, which won the top prize in the 'Digital'category at the Middle East Investor Relations Association's annual awards 

Saudi telecoms provider Mobily (Etisalat Etihad Company, TADAWUL ticker: 7020) has been recognised for best practice corporate reporting at the Middle East Investor Relations Association's annual awards, taking the top prize for Best Digital Annual Report. Mobily worked with international business communications consultancy, Instinctif Partners, to develop its digital and printed annual report for the 2017 financial year.

Established in 2004, Mobily is the second-largest telecommunications operator in Saudi Arabia. Instinctif Partners has worked with Mobily for three consecutive years, supporting the development of its annual reports in 2015, 2016 and 2017. Instinctif Partners drew on its global depth of experience in corporate reporting and best practice Investor Relations to develop the concept, design and content of the 2017 Annual Report.

Tareq Al Angari, Executive General Manager of Investor Relations at Mobily, commented:

"We are proud to have won Best Digital Annual Report at the MEIRA Awards, demonstrating that the content, design and user experience of our Annual Report microsite was of the very highest quality. The delivery of such materials forms part of our strategy for meeting best practice standards when communicating with the investment community, and we are pleased to be recognised for our leadership in Saudi and GCC markets. 

It was a pleasure to work with Instinctif Partners on our Annual Report for the third consecutive year and their counsel throughout the process was of considerable value. Furthermore, the contributions and dedication of Mobily's teamwere essential in producing the Annual Report. Without their collective efforts, we would have never won the award." 

The theme of Mobily's award winning Annual Report, 'Rising to the Challenge', emphasizes the company's ongoing commitment to delivering value to its customers across Saudi Arabia, while developing a new strategy for growth.

Samantha Bartel, Managing Partner, Instinctif Partners Middle East, stated:

"It has been our pleasure to work alongside Mobily to develop and build a comprehensive and impactful Annual Report. I am proud of both the vision and diligence of the Instinctif Partners team in producing this Annual Report, which is a true reflection of the strategy and achievements of Mobily in 2017. Our consultancy offer enables effective and targeted communication by our clients, reaching stakeholders including investors, analysts and financial media. Both of our businesses have robust and positive reputations in their respective industries, and this award is a testament to that recognition." 

Instinctif Partners' work on Mobily's 2017 Annual Report suite included print, film and digital. The Digital Annual Report, first developed in 2016, was designed to allow investors, analysts, shareholders and other members of the financial community to quickly and efficiently locate the information they require.

Over the last year, Instinctif Partners' international teams have developed and produced 8 Annual Reports, for clients across a range of sectors including Financial Services, Real Estate, Retail, Food & Beverage, Energy, Mining, Construction and Telecommunications.

Tini Sevak has joined CNN to lead its international data strategy, create new solutions that further inform business intelligence and provide commercial partners with sophisticated ways to utilise campaign insight.

As Vice President, Audiences and Data, at CNN International Commercial (CNNIC), Sevak oversees a global team of data and research specialists using Turner resources as well as out-of-house capabilities. Through a mix of audience insights, digital analytics and commercial data innovation, the Audiences & Data Group sits at the heart of CNNIC to ensure measurable and actionable data insights drive client campaigns as well as the commercial strategy of CNN International.

Sevak is part of CNNIC’s Senior Management Team and reports directly to CNNIC President Rani Raad.

“A key part of transforming our business has been to ensure that data is at the heart of everything that we do,” said Rani Raad. “Having already seen our Audiences and Data Group introduce improved business intelligence and client solutions, I am delighted that Tini will now be at the forefront of driving us forward with new ideas and solutions that give greater accountability to clients and sophisticated data-driven insight into decision-making, campaigns and partnerships.”

Joining CNN from data and analytics provider YouGov, where she was Global Director of Data Applications, Sevak previously spent over 14 years at media agencies Mindshare and Starcom working with digital, data, analytics and technology to lead client transformation by turning insights into actions that drive business decisions. Clients spanned categories such as pharmaceuticals, automotive, finance, telecommunication, and FMCG.

"The increased pace of change in data and technology is providing new and better ways to understand, define and measure audiences not just for CNN but for our clients", said Tini Sevak. "I am thrilled to be joining the #1 international news brand in TV and digital with a remit to build on what CNN is already doing to strike the balance between creativity and data in the development of truly innovative content solutions. Content is, and will continue to be, key even as the definition of TV evolves, and I’m looking forward to how data can play an even bigger role in the future of our business and inform how and when to talk to our audiences.”

As a data industry leader, Sevak has spoken at major events such as DMexco, Festival of Marketing, and Marketing Week Live. Over the past two years she has been a jury member of i-com’s Data Science Hackathon challenge and is currently shortlisted for ‘Role Model of the Year’ by Computing’s Women in IT Excellence Awards.

This year's The Maritime Standard Awards will have top BBC TV journalist Tim Willcox as Master of Ceremonies. The Awards, which take place at Atlantis The Palm, Dubai on Monday October 15th, are one of the most prestigious and glittering occasions in the global maritime industry calendar.

Trevor Pereira, managing director of TMS, says, "We are very fortunate to have secured Tim's services. He is a true professional, who has interviewed prime ministers and presidents in a long and distinguished career, and will add a real touch of quality to proceedings."

One of the most widely watched presenters on BBC News, anchoring in the TV studio and on location, Tim presents on BBC1, BBC World, News Channel and BBC 4 along with BBC radio outlets. He also presents the Business Briefing and Dateline London and has covered most of the big breaking news stories of the past 25 years.

Tim's recent work has included presenting World News America from Washington DC, covering the Catalan crisis from Barcelona, leading the BBC on the ground coverage of major disasters including the Genoa bridge collapse, the crisis in Ukraine and the super typhoon Haiyan from the Philippines.

In addition to his work as a journalist, Tim has made cameo acting appearances in a number of television dramas and films, including roles in State of Play, Jonathan Creek, 102 Dalmatians, The 33 and Clueless.

The Maritime Standard (TMS) Awards has earned the right to be referred to as the region's premiere shipping and maritime awards event. All of the TMS Awards held to date have received the patronage of His Highness Sheikh Ahmed bin Saeed Al Maktoum and have each been attended by over 700 of the region's shipping industry elite, including chairmen, chief executives and directors from leading shipping companies, ports, terminal operators and maritime companies and organisations. 

For the inaugural event in 2014, PR guru, journalist and writer Alastair Campbell was master of ceremonies, while in 2015 Dutch soccer legend, Ruud Gullit compered the event. In 2016 former CNN news anchor, Jim Clancy, was on stage to lead proceedings, while last year Bollywood superstar and former Miss Universe, Lara Dutta, hosted the show.

Dubai-based digital marketing agency Nexa won two awards at the 2018 MENA Search Awards, retaining the 'Best Integrated Campaign' award for the second year in succession, while adding the prize of 'Best Use of Search - Health'. The awards recognise the expertise, talent and achievements of professionals within the search industry (SEO, PPC, content and performance marketing) in the Middle East & North Africa.

The 'Best Integrated Campaign' category recognises a campaign that has achieved outstanding results using a variety of both online and offline activity. Nexa won this award for its work with an established tour operator in the UAE. Whilst their business had grown, there was an increasing reliance on business generated from traditional tour operators who had driven down sales/profit margins as their influence on bookings had increased. The challenge was to build a relationship, create trust and drive credibility of this operator over their competitors as well as to drive relevant and qualified traffic onto the website, that convert into qualified sales opportunities.

The campaign focus was centred around content and inbound marketing using the HubSpot marketing and sales platform with social media, search (organic and paid) and marketing automation (email, workflows and lead scoring - all powered by HubSpot) being integral in targeted content distribution. The tourism and hospitality sector is highly competitive in the UAE so Nexa needed to find a way to engage with potential customers before other operators and drive prospects to the call centre. Over the last 12 months, Nexa reported that overall website traffic increased by 42% year on year with website and call centre conversions increasing by 23% and 17% respectively.

On winning the award, Amit Vyas, CEO of Nexa, said, "We are delighted to have won 'Best Integrated Campaign' for the second year running. Our unique approach allows us to solve our clients' real-life problems by creating actionable strategies that integrate offline and online activities, while enabling them to create stronger customer relationships that directly translate to sales. Nexa prides itself in standing out from the crowd and being at the forefront of the latest marketing techniques and trends. This award not only recognises that approach, but the skill and dedication of the team to deliver the best results for our clients."  

At last year's inaugural MENA Search Awards, Nexa won the 'Best Integrated Campaign' award for its work with The College of Fashion and Design (CFD) based in Dubai.  

In addition to the 'Best Integrated Campaign' Nexa won the award for 'Best Use of Search - Health' for a 12-month campaign aimed at driving individuals to their client's website looking for information about medical conditions, treatments and services - ultimately aimed at increasing footfall and revenue at their clinics. Through the use of display ads, strategically constructed blogs and search campaigns, Nexa delivered a 21% increase in organic traffic and an ROI of over 500%.

Nizar Edaili, Group Head of Projects, Marketing & Business Development at GMCClinics, explains how this campaign has helped develop their business, "In an ever-competitive environment, GMCClinics needed to find a way to reach our niche target market with the accurate and reliable information that relates to both our business strategic goals and the customer's medical and health needs. Shifting from the traditional old school marketing we opted to trial digital marketing campaigns. Since starting work with Nexa, and seeing the improved results, we are approaching the market and our strategic goals with digital first mentality.  Thank you Team Nexa for showing us what's possible with digital marketing."

Nexa were also shortlisted in the 'Best Arabic PPC Campaign' and 'Best Large Integrated Agency' categories.

This year the awards were announced on Thursday 20th September at the Madinat Jumeirah Resort.

Despite having one of the more vibrant startup scenes in the region, entrepreneurs in Egypt have been struggling with maintaining revenues, raising finance and acquiring good talent. Egypt’s economic woes and subsequent currency devaluation seem to have had a knock-on effect on the country’s startup ecosystem.

This was the general consensus at the Cairo edition of Wamda’s flagship Mix N' Mentor event on the 27th of September, where leading figures from the startup ecosystem met at The GrEEK Campus to discuss these challenges.

Participants included Ahmed Alfi from Sawari Ventures, Khaled Ismail from Kiangel, Moustafa Khater from Flat6Labs, Mohamed Bahaa, Managing Partner at NGage Consulting, Habiba Helmy, MINT Hub Director at EG Bank,Tarek Assaad, Managing Partner at Algebra Ventures, and Amr Saleh, co-founder and chief executive officer at Elkrem.

On a positive note, Fares Ghandour, Partner at Wamda, observed: “The year 2018 has been a landmark year for Egyptian startups. We have seen a number of companies closing bigger and later stage investment rounds. The local market is huge and holds enormous potential for building great companies. Our recent twin investments in Aqarmap and CrowdAnalyzer are testament to our confidence in the market.” 

But Ghandour tempered his optimism with caution. “While we don’t doubt the market’s potential, there are still many hurdles which stakeholders across the ecosystem must address together. The currency devaluation has had an effect on the startup scene - there is a funding gap that must be addressed, as well as an issue with recruiting or retaining experienced talent. With Mix N’ Mentor, we hope to bring these people together to share experiences and come up with ways to advance the country’s entrepreneurial landscape,” he said.

Egypt’s Central Bank floated its currency back in November 2016, devaluing the Pound by 48 per cent in order to secure a $12 billion loan from the International Monetary Fund (IMF). As a result, purchasing power has declined and inflation has soared while borrowing costs for businesses have also increased, putting pressure on aspiring entrepreneurs and startups.

“The devaluation affected startups in two ways, one in the market itself – the amount of revenues has declined because a lot of people aren’t able to purchase anymore,” said Amr Saleh, co-founder and chief executive officer at Elkrem, which provides hardware and software tools for developers to build blockchain-enabled products. “We haven’t faced this problem because our market is global, it’s affected us more on the talent side, we’re not able to find talent.”

Hiring senior staff is a common problem among many of the startups who attended the event. Egypt in general has high quality university graduates, particularly engineers, who are increasingly being poached by global companies. Local companies are now competing with international firms for good talent.

“The biggest problem, especially for senior talent, is we don’t have enough money in the system to pay them,” said Ahmed Alfi, chairman of Sawari Ventures, a Middle East and North Africa (Mena) focused venture capital (VC) firm. “People outside are betting on our talent, we need them to bet on our talent here. Top engineers shouldn’t go anywhere [outside of Egypt] to go work for a startup.”

According to panellists, to tackle this problem there must be more financing options, investors, incubators and accelerators as well as changes to the regulatory system to enable startups to give stock options to employees.

During the break-out mentoring sessions, entrepreneurs sought advice from the likes of Paul Huynh, a former Google executive and Tarek Assaad, managing partner at Algebra Ventures, an Egypt-based VC. Those who attended the sessions highlighted that besides talent, customer acquisition and fund raising are two key problems encountered by startups in Egypt.

Despite these challenges, a sense of optimism prevailed. With a population of some 100 million, Egypt is the Middle East’s largest market, despite the lower purchasing power when compared to the GCC. Cairo alone has a population of 26 million, making it one of the largest cities in Africa and a sizeable market for startups looking to test out ideas and scale their product.

Sawari Ventures recently announced EGP1 billion fund, while Flat6Labs Cairo’s managing director Moustafa Khater hinted at a new offer for startups next year. The government is also encouraging the growth of the startup sector as a driver of the economy, which is enjoying a steady rise in foreign direct investment.

“The awareness among the government is there, there is awareness that we have to make life easier for entrepreneurs and the people funding them to achieve economic growth,” said Alfi. “Seven years ago this audience would have been 90 per cent people in the first or second year out of university, but the talent pool now coming into startups is substantially more experienced and they are better investments because of that experience.”

These “better investments” are likely to maintain momentum in Egypt’s startup sector and push the market forward.

The World CEO Forum is set to take place aboard the historic Queen Elizabeth II from the 21st-24th October in Dubai. Bringing together influential delegates from across the globe, the key focus of the forum will be to set the stage for many forthcoming business opportunities leading up to the Expo 2020. The event will be attended by internationally recognized CEOs, entrepreneurs and thought leaders such as Heather Mills, a world record holder, charity campaigner, and the CEO and founder of VBites, a multi award-winning, plant-based ethical nutrition food company. 

“I am delighted and very excited to speak at the World CEO Forum representing the United Kingdom. I will be talking about world health and the ever-increasing challenges facing affordable healthcare. We are seeing a dramatic change in what people eat and the health benefits of better diet choices. Simple solutions and lifestyle choices can make a huge difference in preventing obesity and such serious illnesses like diabetes and heart diseases associated with it”, says Heather Mills. 

“We are working on a number of initiatives aimed to make people more active, to eat better and enjoy a longer and more healthy life. I look forward to meeting regional and global leaders, sharing ideas, thoughts, suggestions and answering questions”, added Heather. 

Young Arab Leaders, the mentorship program launched under the patronage of His Highness Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President and Prime Minister of the United Arab Emirates and Ruler of Dubai, will introduce some of their top leaders who achieved commendable success since joining YAL initiative. YAL members will lead the panel discussion titled “Bringing the Middle East to the International Marketplace”.

The forum will also be welcoming many more successful entrepreneurs and industry pioneers who will discuss a range of current and future trends. Saud Salim Al Mazrouei, Director of SAIF Zone is one of the prominent event speakers and the platinum sponsor of the World CEO Forum. Gold sponsor Maxim Frolov, who is Vice President of Global at Kaspersky Lab, will be talking about The Rise of Cyber Crime in Banking and Nicolas Marullo, President & CEO of CINCO, Canadian experiential marketing agency, will cover the topic of Engaging a Generation.  Amr Banaja, the CEO of the General Entertainment Authority (GEA) in Saudi Arabia will be talking about Saudi’s 2030 vision.

The World CEO Forum will feature various panel discussions and keynote presentations that will address economic growth in the Middle East, the rise of emerging technologies, smart city and blockchain developments, and the future of leadership amongst many other future shaping topics. 

Be Internet Awesome—our digital safety and citizenship program for children—is now available to more than 400 million Arabic speakers as Abtal Al Internet. The program is designed in a way that simplifies the world of internet safety and digital citizenship in a language children feel comfortable with. Developed in collaboration with online safety experts like the Family Online Safety Institute, the Internet Keep Safe Coalition and ConnectSafely, the program offers tools for parents and educators so everyone has the tools they need to help children be safer online.

“A’alam Al Internet”—our digital safety game for children

We surveyed more than 200 teachers in the Arab world to learn about their experience with online safety in the classroom. We found that 98 percent of teachers believe that online safety should be part of the curriculum, and one in three teachers reported that they had witnessed an online safety incident (sharing personal information or cyberbullying, for example) in their school. However, 75 percent of teachers said they don’t have the necessary resources to teach online safety to their students.

We hope that by making Be Internet Awesome’s classroom curriculum available in Arabic, we can give these educators the tools and methods they need to teach digital safety fundamentals. We’re excited to give children in Arabic-speaking communities and elsewhere in the world more access to the learning opportunities online

Australia-based marketing technology company Simple has opened a London office and announced its EMEA management team a month after an investment round worth

AUD $17m to expand its Intelligent Marketing Platform globally.

Simple has appointed Joe Jarrett, former CEO of global marketing and brand asset management platform Adgistics, as managing director, EMEA, heading up a highly experienced team.

Wolfgang von Enckevort also joins Simple as global chief technology officer, based in London. Mr von Enckevort has held chief technologist and executive management roles at several multinational advertising and marketing software firms and comes to Simple after establishing award-winning customer engagement and Microsoft solution consultancy Vepro.

Simple, whose marketing resource management platform is powered by Microsoft, is moving quickly to establish its brand in the EMEA market, expanding its existing footprint in Australasia and the United States. Simple's customer base includes a number of blue-chip brands in the financial services, retail, entertainment and gaming sectors including Westpac Group.

"The combination of Simple's experience in marketing and Microsoft's technology stack will redefine the marketing execution landscape," Mr Jarrett said. "Our new capability will enable organisations to rapidly integrate marketing data from multiple sources to generate insights and improve marketing performance without losing sight of the value of creativity."

"Marketing has become too fragmented with CMOs now directly owning relationships with up to 50 different technology platforms and sometimes more. This means 50 different but often overlapping sets of data," Mr Jarrertt said. "If you can't join all the activity together to understand and demonstrate the return on your marketing investment, then there's a cost to that complexity. Simple helps marketers claw back that cost."

The EMEA launch enables Simple to capitalise on momentum generated with the global unveiling of Simple's Intelligent Marketing Platform onstage at Microsoft's Inspire partners' conference in July, leveraging the engineering and marketing support Simple receives as a Microsoft Cloud Solution Provider.

Smart integrations for enterprises already working within Microsoft's services ecosystem will be a key differentiator in EMEA, according to Mr von Enckevort.

"Introducing Simple's Intelligent Marketing Platform to the Microsoft Business Solution ecosystem presents us with the unique opportunity to reinvent marketing operations management for enterprise and corporate organisations - at scale and anywhere in the world," Mr von Enckevort said.

Also joining Simple's EMEA team is sales director Mike Brothers, who was previously vice-president at Intellectsoft, and has worked with a number of startups in leading-edge technologies including martech, blockchain and IoT.

Simple chief executive officer Aden Forrest said marketers were grappling with an increasingly fragmented process and a burgeoning landscape of 7000 technology providers, most of which were only concerned with their little piece of the marketing puzzle.

"Chief marketing officers must show that the end-to-end marketing process delivers, from brand management, collaboration and resource allocation, to distribution channels and results -- that's intelligent marketing," Mr Forrest said. "Simple is the engine that powers the process and the brain that tells you what's working and what isn't."

From equal pay agreements to amazing comeback stories, record audiences and new media deals, women’s sports are in the spotlight now more than ever.

While they often don’t receive the same level of attention as men’s sports, a new Nielsen Sports research project highlights untapped potential and new commercial opportunities for rights holders, brands and media.

84% OF SPORTS FANS ARE INTERESTED IN WOMEN’S SPORTS

A survey across eight key markets around the world (U.S., U.K., France, Italy, Germany, Spain, Australia and New Zealand) found that 84% of sports fans are interested in women’s sports. Of those, 51% are male, which confirms that women’s sports engage a gender-balanced audience.

Interest levels in the women’s versions of specific sports tend to be greater when men’s and women’s events are staged together often for example: track and field, tennis, triathlon, mixed martial arts and extreme/action sports.

Of the general population across the eight markets surveyed, 45% would consider attending a live women’s sporting event, and 46% said they would watch more if women’s sports were accessible on free TV.

Of those who said they had no interest in women’s sports, 38% said they hadn’t watched, but “could be interested,” revealing the potential market for rights holders and other stakeholders to engage those who aren’t currently following women’s sports.

Attributes associated with women’s sports demonstrate several of the values that brands should seek to associate with, further revealing potential for commercial growth in women’s sports. Specifically, respondents see women’s sports as more progressive and inspiring, less money-driven, more family-oriented and cleaner than men’s sports. Women also see women’s sports as even more inspiring than men do.

For brands interested in associating with women’s sports, it’s worth noting that three quarters of those interested in women’s sports can name at least one brand involved in women’s sports, and 63% of people say they believe brands should invest in both women’s and men’s sports.