Sponsoring & product placement

Advertisers invest a lot in communication through sports and product placement. For a brand involved in sports, visibility at sporting events and stadiums, and consequently on TV, is key. However, as in any other communication context, clutter is a critical issue. Eye tracking offers unique new opportunities to measure the effects of investments in sports marketing.

Gaze plot visualization showing the gaze path of an individual TV viewer.

What do I get out of eye tracking?

Efficiency measures used in sports marketing have traditionally often been assimilated from a mix of visibility and audience. However, visibility does not mean that a brand is seen, and the likelihood of whether a TV viewer engaged in a game actually looks at the brands has remained unknown. Eye tracking can help answer questions such as: To what extent is a brand seen? Which locations are the most viewed? Which camera angles are the most viewed?

Heat map visualization showing the average brand glance duration of 30 people on a close up short frame.

What do people in front of their TV see during a sporting event?

This heat map visualization gives an aggregated view of how 30 people looked at a short frame from a rugby game. In this case most of their attention was directed towards the ball and the brand located on it.

Eye tracking can determine the amount of time that is spent looking at brands and locations such as billboards, jerseys, balls, on-field signage, sideline signage, and so on. Viewing time can be compared to visibility and researchers can further investigate the relation between “seen” and memorized using traditional post surveys.
 
By getting the answers to these questions, advertisers and rights owners are able to optimize communication strategies, pricing strategies and more.