Gen-X, Millennial Parents Opps: Dick's Sporting Goods sponsors Notre Dame Athletics (Score 69)

Sales lead: This sponsorship signals the company is targeting college sports fans. 

• Dick's Sporting Goods is now the Official Sporting Goods Retailer of Notre Dame Athletics (NDA)
• The company will receive exposure and engagement across NDA's digital/social platforms and national radio network. 
• Notre Dame fans will receive exclusive giveaways, promotions, sweepstakes, and hospitality experiences. 
• Plus, Notre Dame coaches, student-athletes, and cheerleaders will participate in events at the South Bend Dick's location. 

Target demographic: Gen-X/millennial parents & college sports fans

The company will likely:

• Continue increasing ad spend
• Seek additional sponsorship opportunities
• Make agency changes (recent CMO hire)

Broadcast insights (TV ad creative spend, effectiveness, impressions, and performance)

• YTD spend: Dick's spent approximately $89.2m on national TV ads YTD, up 36% from $65.6m spent in this channel during the same time period of 2022. 
• 2021-2022 spend: Full-year spend jumped 55% from $46.5m in 2021 to $72m in 2022. 
• Ad programming: It placed ads during programming such as College Basketball, NFL Football, College football, Today 1, and Good Morning America. 

Digital and social insights (digital ad spend, effectiveness, impressions, and performance)

• YTD spend: Dick's spent around $76.6m on digital display ads YTD, a 29% increase from $59.6m spent in this channel during the same time period of 2022. 
• YTD data: 11b impressions via Facebook (43%), Instagram (32%), YouTube (16%), desktop display (5%), desktop video (2%), mobile display (1%), and Twitter (1%). 
• 2021-2022 spend: Full-year spend dropped by 4% from $65m in 2021 to $62.7m in 2022. 
• Ad location: It placed 99% of these ads directly onto sites such as facebook.com, instagram.com, youtube.com, twitch.tv, and twitter.com. It placed 1% of these ads indirectly through Criteo and Google AdX+AdSense onto sites such as football.fantasysports.yahoo.com, yahoo.com, espn.com, finance.yahoo.com, and eenadu.net. 

Additional channel insights  

• Dick's also invests in OOH, print, radio, and local broadcast. 
• Top podcasts sponsored: Fore Play and Inside Mental Health. 

Agency analysis:

• Opportunity: Dick's hired Emily Silver as CMO earlier this year, so keep reaching out to see if she plans on making any changes to the roster. 
• Current roster:
  • Haworth Marketing & Media: media AOR
  • Arts & Letters: creative AOR
  • Fuse: social
  • INVNT Group: experiential