Marketing in Cricket

Cricket, known as the "Gentleman's game" has its origin from England. A game that was once played by the "Elites", is now a game of the "Mass". In India almost 95% of the men in age group of 5-40 would have played the game in their childhood and still following it. In Pakistan and Sri Lanka, it is the most watched and played game.
The first county club was started in Sussex in 1839 The first official League for Cricket was the "County Championship" formed in 1890 in England. During the initial years the most common played format of the Cricket was of five days and called as the "Test Cricket" and became the standard format by late 19th century. Playing for a county was prestigious, than economical. The player received a decent compensation but the main value out of the county Cricket was the prestige associated with the county Cricket. This also catered well to the elite class of England.

New Market Strategy:
As the English empire expanded since 16th century until 19th century, the game spread to other countries and now being played and followed by lot more people in other countries like India, Australia and Pakistan than in England.

Product Awareness:
The first marketing move was made in early 20th century, to use the nationalism of the countries to increase the popularity of game by playing against different countries. During this phase the awareness of the game as a product was increased.

New Segment - Product Width Extension Strategy:
As the British Empire spread to the Indian subcontinent, the profile of the audience for Cricket changed drastically. After the fall of the British Empire, the previous colonies adopted the game and was played by common men. With the five day format, Cricket was still not popular among the mass who had little time of pleasures. With the absence of the elitism in these countries, there was a need for a new format so that both the elites of England and the mass of the developing nations could be satisfied. In 1963, a second marketing move was made, by creating a new format called "Limited Overs Cricket" to decrease the total time of the game. It soon gained popularity and became "One-day Cricket" that we have now. In One-day Cricket, each team would play only 50 overs unlike test matches where the teams would play for five days and two innings without a limit on the number of overs.
Even though it was not a orchestrated marketing move by an institution. It came out of a need, to satisfy a new market segment. With the advent of the One day cricket, the game became more popular with the mass.In India, cricket overtook Hockey, the national game of India as the most popular game by 1970s. With the increase in popularity, the players became stars and everybody associated with cricket, the cricket board, the television channels and the game sponsors started making more money.

Business Problem in the beginning of 21st century:
The One-day Cricket format became the most successful format in Cricket and many countries started playing the game. As many countries started playing the game between themselves, the viewership and the audience were limited due to the time difference between the countries. Only ardent followers watched the game when the matches were at night due to the time difference. Apart from that there was also a huge segment of the audience who watched the game only when their country played. They just wanted to watch their national heroes. Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) realised this problem and given the population of more than a Billion and high following of Cricket, recognised the missing viewership and the potential revenue. BCCI also realised that its revenue comes mainly from the viewership of people in India and not from the viewership of people in other countries and most of the Indian population is interested in matches when India played.

Break-Through Solution: Branding and Franchising
In 2008, BCCI under Lalit Modi, the marketing director, formed a new league called the "Indian Premier League"(IPL) to play the Twenty20 format which was already gaining traction in the Indian Cricket League(ICL), which was formed by former Cricket players. Before IPL, ICL had the entire market for Twenty20 Cricket. In Twenty20 Cricket, each team would play only twenty overs. The IPL was based on the business model of Soccer League in Europe. In IPL, different team franchises were formed and auctioned to the highest bidder. The players were also signed on the basis of the auction. To increase competitiveness, players from other countries were allowed to be part of the team. In order to satisfy the local crowd, a minimum of 4 Indian players in each team was made mandatory.
With the formation of a brand "IPL" and franchising made it a huge hit. The private investors in the franchise to increase profit made the game more glamorous by bring cheerleaders from America to perform before the matches. The decreased time limit of the game also made it easier for the working population to view the matches. As the game lasted only a few hours, instead of just sported that was watched mostly by men, it was now being watched as an event by the whole family. With the decrease in time limit and increased number of matches, the league was able to offer cheaper tickets. All these factors increased the demand for the IPL matches.

E-commerce:
To attract the tech-savvy and non-resident Indian, in 2010, IPL decided to air its matches through "Youtube", the video hosting site of Google, apart from the traditional television broadcasting. The revenue would be based on ad revenues.

After the launch of IPL, BCCI's income has increased manifold in 2008 and crossed Rs. 1000.4 Crores as compared to Rs 651.8 Crores in 2007. According to Lalit Modi, the marketing director of BCCI, IPL would be the single largest revenue source for BCCI in few years.

After the success of IPL, other leagues that are based on Twenty20 format has been launched in other countries. The International Council of Cricket also started Twenty20 matches between countries and formed a World Cup Championship in Twenty20 format.