2025 brought us Drake and Kendrick’s feud on America’s biggest stage, a nearly seven-hour-long World Series game, and Katy Perry blasting off to space and landing in the headlines with Justin Trudeau. We didn’t see that coming.
We can’t predict everything, but our team of sports fanatics, music enthusiasts, and tech aficionados tries their best! We rang in the new year by asking Tradable Bits’ industry experts what they think the 2026 Fan-Based Marketing landscape will have in store for us.
First, let’s recap 2025:
Here are some of our predictions from last year:
- Stadiums will roll out exclusive VR experiences to allow at-home fans to feel like they’re right in the stadium
- 👍 In a step up from the virtual, pandemic-era concerts hosted on Fortnite and Roblox, we saw a rise in VR concerts that gave fans a front-row seat to sold-out shows. Apple premiered its immersive concert experience with Metallica while Meta continued its series with artists like Shawn Mendes, Coldplay, and BLACKPINK.
- Women’s sports will be the answer to the Youth/Gen-Z connection crisis
- 👍 Women’s sports, like last year, are on the up and are only poised to grow even more. More women’s sports athletes, teams, and leagues have taken to social media and are beginning to win over the elusive Gen Z audience.
- AI will break into the mainstream of the music industry
- 🤔 Though AI hasn’t fully been integrated into the music industry, multiple AI-generated artists debuted on the Billboard charts, igniting debates across the internet. And with big names like Universal Music Group and Warner Music Group announcing partnerships with AI music generation platforms, music companies seem ready to embrace “responsible AI” use (their words, not ours) any second now.
- AR and VR could evolve to provide fans with holographic replays or even the ability to view games from a player’s perspective
- 🤔 ESPN tried to bring VR replays to life through their broadcasts, though the less-than-perfect visuals and awkward execution were met with mixed reactions.
- Sports organizations will increasingly use AI to analyze fan behaviour and preferences to deliver highly personalized content and experiences
- 👍 We saw the introduction of personalized, on-demand, AI-driven highlights and recaps from the likes of Prime Video and their NBA Broadcast, though it hasn’t quite become mainstream yet.
- 👍 We saw the introduction of personalized, on-demand, AI-driven highlights and recaps from the likes of Prime Video and their NBA Broadcast, though it hasn’t quite become mainstream yet.
Now, our predictions for the 2026 fan-based marketing landscape:
Let’s dive right in! We sorted our team’s thoughts into 5 different pillars:
- The volatile world of AI
- Optimizing in-venue experiences
- Disruptions in developing leagues
- Proving sponsorship value beyond the numbers
- The shifting landscape of influencers
1. The volatile world of AI
AI was the most pervasive and controversial topic dominating the conversation in 2025. As the mass hype and widespread dread start to die down, we can expect this year to bring new questions: How can companies use AI in a beneficial way? And what regulations will be put in place as AI continues to be adopted into every aspect of our lives?
"
With AI artists already generating streams and royalties and leaving (real-life) artists concerned, the battle over AI artists has officially started. 2026 will be the year artists start demanding defined laws and standards.
Amy Hodgson (Customer Success Manager, Music & Entertainment)
2025 marked the first time that AI-generated music debuted on Billboard’s charts. “A Million Colors” by Vinih Pray became a TikTok earworm, and AI artist Xania Monet made headlines when she signed a $3 million deal following a heated bidding war.
But AI-powered music sits in a weird liminal space, as no established regulations exist when it comes to monetization or copyright. As tensions rise, we predict the start of clear boundaries being drawn in this grey area.
"
2026 will see a rise in authenticity wars. Fans will demand verified “human-made” or “artist-approved” badges or other certs for some kinds of content. Platforms that can prove genuine athlete/artist involvement will have a leg up.
Selena Neumark (Director of Product)
We think 2026 will have audiences asking for more (and finding more value in) content made by real people; platforms that can prove genuine human involvement will have a leg up.
At the same time, though, companies that don’t use AI for some level of segmented personalization may start falling behind. A bit of a double-edged sword scenario.
2. Optimizing in-venue experiences
With rising ticket prices, overpriced concessions, and hefty parking fees, watching a game or attending a concert has never been more costly. Ensuring the experience is truly worth it will be key to getting fans in your venue and coming back for more.
"
The evolution of immersive, personalized experiences inside venues will accelerate significantly by 2026. The competitive race will be to adopt more flexible, less capital-intensive technologies to deliver immersive experiences without rebuilding the physical infrastructure.
Geoff Robins (VP of Product and Marketing)
While the Sphere and Intuit Dome are good examples of how the next generation of venues are using tech to redefine the fan experience, most of us can’t throw millions (billions?) of dollars into venue upgrades.
We predict that venues that can layer personalization on top of their existing footprint will be best positioned to remain competitive in attracting fans, events, and partners going into 2026. Leveraging technology like mobile, data, connectivity, and software-driven personalization is a low-cost, high-reward way to improve the fan experience.
3. Disruptions in developing leagues
With shifting priorities across established organizations and new leagues popping up every year, the hierarchy of the sports industry is no longer as clear-cut as it once was.
"
College athletics will complete their transformation into professional sports organizations, and fan relationship infrastructure will become as critical as recruiting budgets.
Lenny Goh (VP of Business Development)
College sports have always been big business. But new dynamics around NIL and revenue sharing are accelerating a shift with how programs operate. High-level teams are being forced to think more like professional organizations, with revenue growth and audience monetization becoming critical to long-term sustainability.
Athletes are now starting to evaluate programs based on brand strength and visibility as much as on-field opportunity. Programs that can demonstrate a strong fanbase can offer athletes a clearer path to NIL success, turning fan relationships into a competitive asset.
In this developing playing field, fan data is becoming foundational. First-party fan relationships power smarter ticketing, more valuable sponsorships, personalized engagement, and defensible revenue growth. As college athletics continues its shift towards a professional operating model, investment in fan relationship infrastructure will start to become a top priority.
"
Athlete-influencers will continue to reshape the power dynamics in women’s sports.
Khevyn Gormley (Business Development Manager, Sports)
Professional athletes have always had influence, but these days, an athlete doesn’t have to be the best in the world to rack up millions of followers on social media. Especially within women’s sports, we’re seeing individual athletes lean into social media and gain far more attention than the accounts of the leagues they play in.
Take rugby player Ilona Maher, who went viral at the 2020 Olympics and returned to the next Games four years later with more followers than any other rugby player in the world. With her rise to fame came an unprecedented rise in (women’s) rugby viewership, evident by record-breaking Olympic attendance in Paris and her brief stint on a British team that had to move to a larger stadium for her debut.
Embracing the athlete-influencer as a partner, not just a product, will be key to riding this new wave. We think this year’s Winter Olympics in February will kickstart this shift of athlete-influencers not just as ambassadors for the game, but as power brokers and drivers of visibility and commercial growth.
4. Proving sponsorship value beyond the numbers
Bigger isn’t always better. Understanding the value of your fans beyond who’s spending the big bucks will be critical to proving your value to sponsors in 2026.
"
Sponsorship teams will be asked to provide more hard metrics beyond attendance/impressions. A move from 'reach' to 'value per known fan.
Jordan Pink (Strategic Development Manager)
There’s a big difference between the number of passive viewers in your venue and the number of actual, active fans in your database. Being able to prove the precise and measurable impact of your audience will be integral to retaining and gaining new sponsorships this year.
Figuring out what “value” means for your organization is the first step in making this distinction. The fan dropping the most money on tickets once a year isn’t necessarily your most valuable fan; factors like who’s coming back consistently, investing in merch, engaging with your content online, etc., are important to consider when quantifying the “value per known fan”.
5. The shifting landscape of influencers
Love ‘em or hate ‘em, influencers have certainly escaped their social media containment. These days, they’re earning Grammy nominations, interviewing celebrities on red carpets, and headlining Netflix-powered boxing matches.
But as the pool of content creators gets more crowded, how sustainable will the influencer space really be in 2026?
"
Athlete-generated & owned media will rival traditional sports coverage. Athletes will become the most important marketers for their brands and teams.
Austin Kretzschmar (Director of Technical Operations)
With every actor, comedian, and friend-group-in-their-basement deciding to take up the microphone, 2025 was undoubtedly the year of the podcast boom. NFL brothers Jason and Travis Kelce are among the more notable athlete-turned-podcasters, and the women’s sports world saw athletes like Ilona Maher, the PWHL’s Zoe Boyd, and at least 5 different current and former WNBA stars all debuting their own shows last year.
This influx of athletes taking up content and media creation will only grow in 2026. We may even start to see a shift in the role that media companies play in the industry. As we said earlier, expect things to kick off with a(nother) wave of athlete-generated content at the Winter Olympics this February.
"
Creator and influencer programs will prove challenging when it comes time to track the success of each creator.
Jordan Pink (Strategic Development Manager)
The days of paying big-name influencers for one-off, sponsored posts are fading. Instead, we’re seeing a rise of UGC (User Generated Content) creators–less glitzy than the traditional influencer and more of a down-to-earth everyman. But when anyone can become a revenue-driving creator, individual attribution tracking becomes much more difficult.
And with that, our predictions for the year come to an end!
We can’t wait to see what 2026 has in store. Here’s to another year of innovation and highly engaged fans!