Knowledge Snippets on Sales & Marketing

Cricket in Indian subcontinent is something people will die for - literally such is passion for this sport in this subcontinent that when cricket matches are going on you will see empty streets, people glued to TV sets, crowds in front of electronics shops watching TV, people walking on road holding radio sets by their ears and discussions which are equally passionate at offices, at pan shops (small shops at square that sells Tobacco)

With time this passion in the public has grown and today’s corporations have made successful attempts to take out the money from the pockets of the crowds. Cricket in Indian subcontinent sells more than any other sports. Look at these figures: Today the BCCI annual revenue may be close to 3650 Million rupees. The current auction of IPL for 8 teams generated 720 Million USD. BCCI is said to have made over 1 Billion on TV rights itself. Remember 10 years back the BCCI accounts were in red. BCCI is expecting to generate 1 Billion USD (including annual contracts) by the launch of IPL. Apart from BCCI top Indian cricket players are sitting on the goldmine. The prize money from ICL and IPL 20:20 matches is slated to around 7  Million USD. They not only earn by match fees but by endorsements signing deals for consecutive many years running in million dollars. Many of them have smartly branched out in business as well running restaurants, boutiques etc.

To understand this entire let us understand how the Business of cricket is organized The ICC is running and guiding organization for cricket across the globe based in Dubai, recently shifted from London. Each country has its own cricketing governance body in India it is BCCI. BCCI is private club and is not governed by government but has selected representatives from different states in India or counties as in UK. Each state or county is its own cricketing governance body. The stadiums and infrastructure is maintained by state bodies and state bodies organize state level matches. The international matches are organized by BCCI and there is revenue sharing for advertisement at stands ticket sales etc. BCCI also markets the telecast rights for international matches Recently, after facing competition from ICL (India Cricket League) promoted by Subhash Chandra of Zee Telenetwork, BCCI also promoted (Indian Premier League: IPL) which plays similar format of 20:20 over over a day. The teams are owned by wealthy individuals like Mukesh Ambani, Vijay Mallaya etc. The players were auctioned at huge sums.

Today there is lots of money in these sports; youngsters aspire to be Sachin Tendulkar and Saurov Ganguly. The competition in sport has made the board more active, brought in lots of diplomacy, more money in the game will also translate to better infrastructure in terms of better stadiums, better training facilities. The youngsters will not face looming question of survival as at the lower level he may make respectful money to meet his basic needs. The competition in the game will make it more professional and only best will survive on the top.

However, there are darker aspects of lots of money in this game, which is becoming evident for last few years. Players are hogging limelight for the match fixing scandals, ball tampering etc rather than for their performance. Big money has also brought lots of politics in the game. India today  contributes arround 50 % of revenue but host 7th of of its home game. There are issues of the conflicts in endrosements as players endorse competing products as sponsored by ICC. Then some borads like BCCI feel that they will better off promoting their own tournaments rather than opt for "champions trophy" a property owned by ICC, so ICC makes more money hosting champions trophy. Also the boards of cricket mature markets like India, England and Australia want more pound of the flesh

Other games has totally been sidelined and public may lose interest on these totally. The senior players tend to be in team without enough performance and logic as they are more interested in their market value rather than in game, they prefer not to play at state level.

There is also question about the depth of the market and paying potential of the masses consistently for coming many years. As if there is too much of cricket masses may choose to avoid it and look for other modes of entertainment.  There is lots of money invested by corporations if the teams don't succeed it leads to huge losses as it happened in 2007 world cup when India and Pakistan lost out early. As the advertisement money may not translate into business of hard cash. There is massive betting racket to the tune 25 Billion $ on this game sometime pointing figures to sad events like death of Bob Woolmer.

There is a lot to think about this game, if we compare cricket to some other sport in world, much more can be done. As against selling the telecast rights boards can decide to produce and sell only footage. They can decide to restrict photographers and press to sell the images or news. 

But nothing in this world has remained forever. Cricket is also changing from the game of gentlemen to push button game; from 5 days test match to one day international to 20:20 Format. Change is good for all, more money is better however if it happens with balance it is good for all players, governors and spectators.