Sports Portals & Social Networking

Being in India these past few days, I am reminded how much of the content that is marketed in India (and the world) is related to Sports. The newspapers devote a lot of front page real estate to Sourav Ganguly’s ups and downs, as India plays South Africa. The IFA Shield soccer tournament is on, and not only my father, but many relatives dropping in, are glued to the television. Of course, our family happens to be really into sports, like many (most?) Indian families.

So are any of you thinking about the immense entrepreneurial opportunity around sports related content, social networking, and advertising?

I have watched closely how certain sports got marketed over the last two decades because of family involvement. My father has been a mastermind behind Indian Table Tennis, and one of my uncles happens to be Jagu Dalmiya, the mastermind behind the blockbuster marketing of Indian cricket, or rather, world cricket, at this point. One thing to note – both men are entrepreneurs, with business success in other disciplines. They have applied their business and leadership skills to the games they have championed, as have many international entrepreneurs. Cricket has now become a blockbuster game, with big money flowing all around, in the same league as Tennis, Baseball, Soccer, American Football, Basketball, except, that the number of countries that play cricket is smaller than those who play soccer.

Yesterday, I asked my father, how many Table Tennis players does India have? The answer is a meagre 100,000. These are registered players, of course. “People who play” and “Players” are not necessarily synonymous here. Do you know how many “Players” China has? 3 Million. I would extrapolate that the “People who play” number is closer to 30 Million. Even the smaller European countries like Sweden and France have 300,000+ players. India, probably, has at least a Million “People who play”, if not more like 3 Million.

Why do I quote these numbers? Because they are big. And someone should pay attention to what they’re telling us.

What they’re telling ME is that these are big, sticky segments, perfect for the kind of Content Portal + Social Networking platforms that tend to become successful around a niche theme that a large group of people are passionate about. And the potential for marketing the under-marketed Sports is tremendous from an internet content opportunity point-of-view. With the discontinuity in television, and with internet and mobile TV becoming mainstream, I would start thinking about how to leverage them.

In parallel, of course, for India, an important exercise is to continue to raise the standard of the games and the players. For a country with a Billion+ population, it is quite pathetic that the only game in which the country has world class performance, is Cricket. However, it is a bit of a chicken and egg, and once a game is marketed properly, prize money – especially big money – starts to flow in abundantly, and the media builds “star” players, it automatically draws more players into the game. Training infrastructure becomes more readily available, and the players start climbing the rungs of international rankings.

It is a virtuous cycle that is awaiting the magic touch of some high calibre entrepreneurs, rather than corrupt politicians and power hungry administrators who rule today’s maidan culture. I hope, some of you will clinch this.