Title: 57% of brands can't prove ROI on sports fan engagement despite rising investment

URL: https://www.infobip.com/news/infobip-sports-fan-engagement-rising-investment

Vodnjan, Croatia, 08 Sept 2026 – Research commissioned by Infobip, the global AI-first cloud communications platform celebrating 20 years, shows brands are significantly increasing investment in sports fan engagement even as many struggle to prove business impact.

The global study of 500 marketing and digital leaders across industries, including retail, financial services, telecoms, travel, and food & beverage in 11 markets found that brands currently allocate an average of 13% of annual marketing budgets to sports-related activations, and nearly 73% expect investment to increase over the next 12 months. Yet while live sports moments generate the highest levels of fan engagement, nearly half (47%) of organizations admit they struggle to deliver real-time engagement during live events, and more than half (57%) say it is difficult to prove the ROI of their sports marketing investments.

At the same time, the report shows a strong appetite for AI-powered engagement. 87% of respondents say AI is critical to the future of sports fan engagement, and AI-driven content and journey automation were among the top improvements brands said would have the greatest impact. As brands increase investment in sports engagement, orchestration, connected data, and real-time interactions are becoming essential to delivering personalized fan experiences at scale.

To support this shift, Infobip recently launched PitchMate, an AI-powered fan engagement solution for global football audiences built on its AgentOS platform, turning real-time fan interactions into trackable touchpoints across the fan journey. In Latin America, Claro Sports launched an AI assistant using Infobip’s platform and Google’s RCS technology, giving Mexican sports fans real-time scores, athlete alerts, and interactive experiences across messaging channels.

Over the past two decades, customer communications have evolved from one-way messaging to intelligent, conversational engagement at scale. As fan expectations rise, brands that combine data, automation, and conversational channels will be best positioned to deliver measurable business results.

Read the survey here: https://www.infobip.com/downloads/the-sports-fan-engagement-report-for-brands.

## About Infobip

Infobip is a global cloud communications platform that enables businesses to build connected experiences across all stages of the customer journey, with AI as the driving force of innovation. Through a single, natively built platform, Infobip delivers omnichannel engagement, identity, user authentication and contact centre solutions that help businesses and partners overcome the complexity of consumer communications while driving growth and increasing customer loyalty. Infobip is focused on enabling and accelerating AI adoption as it continues its transformation into an AI-first company. Infobip’s technology has the capacity to reach over seven billion mobile devices in 6 continents connected to 10k+ connections of which 800+ are direct operator connections. The company was established in 2006 and is led by its co-founders, CEO Silvio Kutić and CTO Izabel Jelenić.

## Recent recognitions include:

- Infobip ranked #16 in Fortune’s Europe’s Most Innovative Companies 2026 (June 2026), up from its inaugural #68 ranking in 2025.
- Infobip named a Leader in the Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Communications Platform as a Service (CPaaS) for the fourth consecutive year. Positioned furthest for Completeness of Vision for the second time (May 2026)
- Infobip named the number one Established Leader in the Juniper Research RCS for Business 2026 Leaderboard (Feb 2026)
- Infobip recognized as a growth and innovation leader in Frost Radar™: Communications Platform as a Service (CPaaS) by Frost & Sullivan (Oct 2025)
- Infobip ranked as the number one Established Leader in the Juniper Research Mobile Messaging Fraud Prevention Market report (Sept 2025)
- Infobip ranked as a Leader in the Omdia CPaaS Universe Report for the third time (April 2025)
- Infobip ranked an Established Leader in the Juniper Research Conversational AI Leaderboard (Feb 2025)
- Infobip named a CPaaS Leader for the third time in the IDC MarketScape (Feb 2025)
- Infobip named one of the top CPaaS providers in Metrigy’s CPaaS MetriRank Report (Dec 2024)
- Infobip recognized as the number one provider in the AIT Fraud Prevention market by Juniper Research (Oct 2024)