National Sports Forum 2025: Sports leaders must reinvent fan engagement, media, and monetization—right now

One thing was crystal clear at the National Sports Forum 2025: Sports executives must rethink how they activate, engage, and monetize their audiences in an increasingly digital world. The traditional business model—built on cable TV deals, in-stadium sales, and one-size-fits-all marketing—is failing to meet the demands of today’s fans. With 70–90% of fans never attending games in person, the real opportunity lies in creating direct-to-fan digital experiences that drive sustained engagement—and revenue.

As sports consumption shifts, AI-driven media strategies, data-backed fan engagement, and new revenue models are redefining the industry. Meanwhile, women’s sports are the most significant untapped commercial opportunity, and media fragmentation is forcing enterprises to move beyond traditional distribution models. The future belongs to those who act now—integrating AI, fan-first content strategies, and next-generation monetization models to stay ahead of the curve.

The accelerating decline of cable TV is forcing teams and leagues to rethink content distribution

Sports fans are no longer tied to a single platform or network; they consume content across streaming services, social media, and digital-first platforms. The days of relying on lucrative broadcasting deals as the primary revenue driver are over. Victory+ proved free streaming can massively expand audience reach, growing its viewership 5x while slashing its average viewer age in half. Meanwhile, the NBA’s Dallas Mavericks’ MavsTV is now in 3.1 million homes across the Dallas-Fort Worth market for free via antenna while also launching a gradual rollout across Endeavor Streaming, proving that accessibility, not exclusivity, is key to audience growth.

For enterprises, this means a shift from monetizing content to monetizing audiences. Sports leaders must distribute content across multiple platforms—over the air (OTA), over the top (OTT) streaming services, and social media—to capture and retain fan engagement. The WNBA’s rising media rights valuation underscores how undervalued properties are being reassessed, demonstrating that audience growth, not legacy distribution models, will drive the next wave of revenue. The takeaway? Sports organizations must stop acting like media rights holders and start thinking like digital content platforms, reaching fans across every available channel.

Women’s sports are no longer an afterthought—they are the most under-monetized asset in the industry

Investors and sponsors recognize the vast commercial upside of women’s professional basketball as audience engagement surges. The WNBA, perpetually overlooked in media deals, is poised for a significant revenue jump, and Canadian women’s soccer saw 16 million fans follow the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup. More than 150 Canadian women are playing professionally worldwide, proving that the talent pipeline and fan demand are growing rapidly.

Fans of women’s sports leagues are twice as engaged online as their male counterparts’ leagues. This means brands that invest early will secure premium partnerships at a lower cost before valuations skyrocket. Women’s leagues provide a clean slate for next-gen sports engagement, offering a unique opportunity to deploy AI-driven strategies, digital-first content models, and new revenue streams. The question isn’t whether women’s sports will be a significant revenue driver—it’s how long enterprises will wait before realizing they’re missing out on one of the biggest growth opportunities in sports.

Despite the industry’s focus on fan engagement, most sports organizations are failing to capitalize on the massive amounts of data they collect

A staggering 97% of fan data remains unused, leaving teams blind to how to activate, engage, and monetize their audiences. With most fans never attending a game in person, the real business of sports isn’t inside the stadium—it’s in the digital ecosystem. AI-driven platforms are transforming how teams interact with fans by integrating ticketing, sponsorship, and social media data to create personalized engagement strategies.

The key to success is owning and controlling audience data. If teams and leagues don’t take ownership of fan insights, they don’t own their audience—and they risk losing them to platforms that do. New opportunities for collecting and transforming data into engagement are emerging in the fast-evolving digital world. The future of fan engagement depends on turning passive viewership into active, monetizable relationships through AI, automation, and real-time insights.

AI is revolutionizing how sports content is produced, distributed, and consumed

Sports media is shifting from centralized broadcasting models to AI-driven, multi-platform content ecosystems that cater to individual fan preferences. Automated AI tools generate real-time game reports, multilingual commentary, and personalized content experiences at scale, ensuring sports organizations can meet fans wherever they are, in whatever format they prefer.

Two AI-powered platforms showcased at the National Sports Forum highlight the need for AI to reinvent outdated business operations:

FanHero—Content Distribution Platform:

• Uses AI for automated research, smart content curation, and real-time news generation.
• Publishes AI-powered reports within a minute of a game ending, providing instant fan engagement.
• Leverages GenAI-driven multilingual, multicultural, and multi-persona strategies to hyper-personalize content based on fans’ consumption habits, cultural preferences, and engagement history.

Tradable Bits—Fan Engagement Platform

• Empowers teams to capture, unify, and activate fan data to drive personalized marketing efforts.
• Analyzes social media interactions, ticketing history, and streaming habits to create highly targeted engagement campaigns.
• Uses AI-powered research methodologies to identify fans’ favorite teams, players, and content types, enabling hyper-personalized content, promotions, and ticketing incentives.

The Bottom Line: Sports organizations that fail to evolve will be left behind as traditional revenue streams erode.

The National Sports Forum 2025 set an urgency for sports decision-makers to adapt quickly to new trends and move away from outdated revenue models and engagement strategies. Teams and organizations must shift from content monetization to audience monetization, distributing content across multiple platforms to drive continuous engagement. Women’s sports present a massive, undervalued investment opportunity, and brands that move in now will secure long-term advantages. Owning and leveraging fan data is critical, and AI-driven insights will be the key to long-term revenue growth. The future of sports belongs to executives who put fans at the center, leveraging AI, next-gen media, and innovative engagement strategies to turn the fan experience into a business outcome. Those who don’t will be left chasing a fanbase that has already
moved on.