- 2 de agosto, 2023

Young Women Emerge as Fastest-Growing Sports Audience

Implications for Advertisers and Women's Sports

From June 2022 to June 2023, there was a 22% increase in the number of females aged 18-24 who visited a sports website or app, more than any other age and gender breakout1. This is happening as women's sports are becoming more mainstream, with new leagues, more investment, and increased screen time. It's also a major trend to watch during the 2023 Women's FIFA World Cup.

Growth in Women’s Sports Media

There has been a more significant focus on women's sports coverage on TV, streaming, and digital in the past few years, and an increase in representation could contribute to this growth in interest. Just one example is how profiles focused on women's sports have seen considerable increases in social media actions year-over-year, including Just Women's Sports (+138%), On Her Turf (+174%), and espnW (+219%)2.


Growth in Soccer Viewership in the U.S.

Concurrently, there has been an overall increase in interest in soccer in the U.S., a trend we saw with TV viewership during the Men’s World Cup last year where the final game saw a 33% higher live rating than the previous tournament.

Young Women Emerge as Fastest-Growing Sports Audience

Young Women Over-Index with Soccer Media

These ratings are even higher when we look at households that contain the women 18-24 demographic. For example, while the overall live household rating for the 2022 final game was 8.9, it rose to 9.7 for households with young women3.The growing interest in soccer is not just a trend seen on linear TV. For example, take Major League Soccer's online properties where females 18-24 are 18% more likely to visit than the general population4. For comparison, males 18-24 are 37% less likely to visit MLS sites than the general population, and females 55-64 are 89% less likely to visit.

Implications for the FIFA Women’s World Cup

With a combination of female athletes and soccer, will the Women's World Cup boost these trends even more? The chances look promising. The U.S. Women's National Team and several key players are seeing huge spikes in engagement on social media as the tournament kicks off. Knowing that young women tend to over-index on platforms like TikTok (48% more likely to use than the total population) and Instagram (40% more likely to use than the total population)5, they are no doubt a part of this wave of social action.

Young Women Emerge as Fastest-Growing Sports Audience

Key Takeaway: Don’t Count Young Women Out

Mobilizing this segment of young women could be huge for advertisers, opening new partnership opportunities within the sports space. Target markets and advanced audiences provide the opportunity to go beyond just age and gender for targeting. When advertisers can break out beyond the traditional expectations of who will be watching or attending programming and who cares about sports in general, there’s a chance for new, fun, and creative campaigns that both entertain audiences and drive results.

If you’d like more sports insights, visit our sports page here.

If you’re wondering how audiences are trending for your brand or industry, get in touch with our experts for a free report.

Metric Definitions:

Live Household Rating: A Household Rating is the percentage of TV households in the market that viewed the entity (telecast, series, or station.)
Actions: a measure of total engagement. They include reactions, likes, shares, comments, and retweets.

Sources:

1. Comscore MMX, Sports, females aged 18-24, June 2022-June 2023, U.S. Compared with male and female segments aged 18-24, 25-34, 35-54, 55-64, and 65+.
2. Comscore Social, Metrics & Trends, Actions across Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, TikTok, June 2022-June 2023
3. Comscore TV, US, December 2022, Households with females aged 18-24
4. Comscore MMX, MLS Digital Properties, June 2023, U.S.
5. Comscore MMX, Instagram.com and TikTok.com, females aged 18-24, June 2023, U.S.