The consumption of sports content in South Africa has reached a tipping point, with social media and streaming platforms overtaking traditional linear television to become the dominant channels for the country’s sports fans.
That was one of the key findings from Nielsen Sports South Africa’s latest ‘Nielsen Fan Insights’ report, which was published recently and is now available for purchase.
Nielsen Fan Insights
Nielsen Fan Insights is Nielsen Sports’ specialist tracking service that enables monitoring of sport and sponsorship trends and developments, including measurement of fan avidity toward sporting disciplines, sporting events, lifestyle activities and events.
The latest report measured data gathered between May and July 2022 and compared its findings with those published in the previous NFI report in May 2020.
Social & Streaming
According to the latest report, social media and streaming platforms owned by broadcasters (DStv Now/Showmax) enjoyed increased levels of usage during the two-year period, whilst pay-TV saw a drop of four percent as the platform used to watch sport on, whilst free-to-air TV saw a drop in usage levels of five percent.
“This is a trend we’ve been seeing for some time now, but there’s no doubt that it was accelerated by the change in consumption patterns brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic,” says Jean Willers, Managing Director of Nielsen Sports South Africa. “South African sports fans are still heavily invested and interested in sport, but they are clearly finding other ways to consume it, and social media and digital streaming platforms offer a more cost-effective alternative to those who cannot afford pay-TV. This trend shouldn’t be a surprise, if one considers the financial pressure South African consumer finds themselves under, with an increase in cost of living etc.”
Nielsen Sports is a source of sports measurement and analytics around the world, with solutions spanning cross-platform media valuation, fan insights, digital and social media analysis, and in South Africa it works across the entire local sports industry, including with rights-holders, brands, agencies and broadcasters.
That provides Nielsen Sports SA with an acute understanding of the local sports market and puts it in a unique position to accurately interpret data, such as that gathered by Nielsen Fan Insights.
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Women’s Sport
For example, the fact that women’s cricket has seen huge growth in following – up from 3% to 10% – since May 2020, which ties in with the global trend of increased interest and commercial investment in women’s sport across the board.
Significantly, this research was conducted prior to the 2023 ICC Women’s World Cup and it stands to reason that this number could now be even higher, due to the increased interest driven by the national women’s team’s run to the World Cup final.
Similarly, the latest NFI report found that the national women’s football team, Banyana Banyana, also saw increased levels of interest amongst respondents.
“This is another global trend just reinforced by our Nielsen Fan Insights report findings and it’s a trend worth tracking, particularly for those brands looking to possibly invest in women’s sport, or a broadcaster or content platform reviewing what product they’d like to serve their audience,” says Willers. “There’s no doubt that women’s sport is on the up and is finally being taken more seriously in South Africa.”
Football
Interestingly, the report found that Kaizer Chiefs remained the favourite local football team for most of the NFI respondents, with their levels of favouritism increasing from 38% to 47%. Orlando Pirates also saw an increase in ‘favourite team’ status, but they still lag behind Chiefs at 25%.
It seems that “Khosi for life” is not just a catchy tag line. Amakhosi fans are, indeed, “for life”!
That may be the case, but Chiefs and Pirates would do well not to rest on their laurels. That’s because Sundowns – the most successful local team of the past decade, with eight Premier League titles in 10 years – have also increased their currency as the most ‘other team supported’ – up from 25% to 53%.
No surprise that football remains the dominant sport of interest for South African fans, but an interesting finding of the NFI report was that interest in international football had increased by 12% from May 2020 to July 2022, whilst interest in local football had remained static at 56%.
Esports & Online Gaming
Unsurprisingly, another finding found that both esports and online gaming had enjoyed notably higher levels of interest in 2022, up from 32% to 37% and 41% to 49%, respectively. These represented increases of 16% and 20%, respectively.
Encouragingly for all role players in the South African sports industry, the NFI report found that comparatively, sport in general, watching sport on TV/streaming services, and participating in sport and fitness activities all enjoyed notably higher levels of interest in 2022, compared with that of 2020. Sport in general was up from 61% to 67%, watching sport on TV/streaming services was up from 60% to 67%, and participating in sport and fitness activities was up from 58% to 64%.
If you would like to receive the full Nielsen Fan Insights report or would like to know more about it, please contact Nwabisa Bhayi or Van Zyl Jacobs.
