Sports Marketing

What is Sports Marketing?

Sports Marketing is one of the fastest growing business fields. It is a broad title that refers to all marketing activities that involve sport. Sports Marketing includes marketing sports and all activities related to the development and execution of strategies designed to bring sports products and experiences to consumers. Sports Marketing also includes marketing through sports, which refers to firms’ activities who use sports to reach their key customers in order to sell non-sports products, such as automobiles, beer, or snack foods. Thus, career opportunities include positions with teams and sports organizations as well as major corporations. An internship with a professional team or a sports company during their college years is a good start.

Fast Facts About Sports Marketing

  • Sports Marketing is unique in that it is highly visible and part of the social fabric of most societies.
  • Sports accounts for more than $200 billion dollars of revenues each year.
  • The consumers of sports are highly involved with the products and experiences they consume, making them interesting subjects for study.
  • Over 70% of Americans identify themselves as sports fans.

More on Sports Marketing

Gaining Industry knowledge

  • Learn the structure of the sports industry
  • Understand the relationship between culture and sport
  • Apply your learning to real world sports strategies
  • Learn how companies use sports to reach their most desired target markets

Understanding sports fans

  • Learn to understand sports consumers
  • Find out how to reach and motivate fans, what makes them tick, and how to get them even more involved

Developing Sports Marketing strategies

  • Learn how to plan and execute strategies in the volatile world of sport

Starting a career in Sports Marketing

  • Learn how to start a career in sports
  • Learn how to start a job search
  • Meet guest speakers who work in the sports industry

Careers in Sports Marketing

Sports Marketing offers a variety of rewarding careers. A sampling of these is provided below.

  • Marketing or community relations with professional teams, both major and minor league
  • Collegiate sports marketing
  • Event management
  • Group or event sales and marketing
  • Sponsorship management and sales
  • Sports organization marketing and management (e.g., PGA, USTA, NCAA)
  • Sports Marketing specialist for advertising agencies
  • Sports Marketing specialist for corporations
  • Product and brand management for sports equipment companies
  • Sports equipment sales and marketing
  • Sports services marketing (e.g. gyms or clubs)

Undergraduate: Required Courses

Undergraduate: Suggested Electives(Two Needed)

Graduate Students

To fulfill the requirements for your marketing concentration, you may utilize up to two 400 level marketing courses or any 500 level marketing courses. The 500 level marketing courses offered vary by semester. Recent offerings include: Non-Profit Marketing, Strategic Marketing Intelligence, Product and Brand Management, and Business Marketing and Customer Relationship Management. Please check for current 500 level marketing courses.

Marketing faculty contact:

Professor Howard Forman
hforman@fullerton.edu