How to turn the world's biggest sporting event into brand momentum
Every four years, the World Cup delivers something almost nothing else in advertising can: billions of people, fully engaged, all watching the same thing at the same time.
For brands, that's both the opportunity and the challenge. The audience is willing. The investment is real. But a month-long tournament spanning dozens of matches across every major market is also a lot of noise to cut through. The brands that win aren't just the ones that show up. They're the ones that show up with a tentpole strategy and a plan to prove what it delivered.
Here's what that looks like in practice.
Who's actually watching
The World Cup audience is bigger and more diverse than most marketers expect. DISQO's Sports Advertising and Brand Experience report found that nearly 155 million Americans watch live sports regularly. Women make up 40% of frequent sports viewers. Millennials and Gen Xers are the most engaged, but Gen Z's enthusiasm for sports streaming is accelerating fast. And 60% of the regular sports audience earns under $75K, making this one of the most efficient channels for reaching consumers at scale.
The bottom line: this is a broad, cross-generational audience that is genuinely invested in what they are watching. They expect brands to match that energy.
The multi-screen reality of sports viewing
The World Cup doesn't happen on one screen. It happens on many, often simultaneously.
DISQO research found that 88% of sports viewers multitask while watching. Social media tops the list at 44%, followed by socializing in person (26%) and shopping online (24%). Connected TV leads all devices at 70% of viewers, nearly three times that of non-connected TV. Mobile accounts for another 40% and rises among the most frequent fans.
Every match, sponsorship, or content partnership you activate on linear TV has a second life on social, a third life in search, and a fourth life in the conversations consumers carry with them after the final whistle.
Why the World Cup works for brands
Presence is a brand signal
DISQO data shows 41% of consumers report a more positive perception of brands they see participating in major tentpole events. Only 7% feel negatively. The act of being there signals scale and legitimacy before a single creative element lands.
Fan receptivity is genuine
Nearly half of sports viewers (44%) say they place more value on brands that advertise during programming they enjoy. That climbs above 50% among frequent viewers and Gen Z. More than half also say the ads they see during sports feel relevant, and nearly half actively want those ads to connect to the sport itself. The creative brief writes itself: make the game part of the story.
The full funnel is in play
Sports advertising isn't just about awareness. DISQO data shows 48% of sports viewers are more likely to consider purchasing from brands that advertise during programming they like. Nearly half (46%) say they'll engage with interactive formats like QR codes, shoppable units, or real-time polls, and another 23% could be persuaded. The gap between a brand impression and a behavioral outcome has never been smaller.
The World Cup campaign arc
The biggest mistake brands make is treating the World Cup as a single moment. It's a compounding arc with three distinct windows.
Before the tournament begins, seed memory early. Teasers, sponsorship announcements, and pre-release content establish your presence before the noise of group stage matches takes over. DISQO's Big Game research found 47% of viewers seek out ad content before the event even starts. The pre-tournament window is a real media opportunity.
During the tournament, this is when attention and reach peak together. With over 60 matches across more than four weeks, the World Cup gives brands something a single-game tentpole can't: repeated opportunities to build frequency, test creative variations, and compound the impression across a global audience that keeps showing up.
After the final whistle, the campaign keeps working. DISQO research shows that post-event, 32% of viewers talk about ads with others, 18% rewatch them, and 14% search for more information about the brand. The downstream tail of a well-executed tentpole campaign is real, and brands that measure it capture the full return on their investment.
Five best practices that separate good from great
1. Target peak moments with precision
Kickoffs, halftime, goals — these are predictable spikes in attention and emotion. They are also programmatic opportunities. Geo-fenced buys near stadiums and fan zones during match windows reach audiences at peak receptivity, and real-time contextual triggers let brands capitalize on the moments that matter most rather than buying broadly and hoping for overlap.
2. Build distinctive assets that last
The brands that win tentpole moments over time are almost always the ones with the sharpest distinctive assets. Mascots, jingles, color systems, and recurring characters compress brand meaning into instantly recognizable signals. In a tournament where viewers are exposed to dozens of brand messages per match, what makes an impression retrievable days and weeks later is consistency, not just spend.
3. Lead with emotional storytelling
Fans don't just tolerate great advertising during the World Cup. They reward it. The tournament's natural narrative arc, group stages, knockouts, and a single final, give brands a ready-made emotional framework. Campaigns that tie their story to the drama of advancement, elimination, and the euphoria of a goal build affinity that outlasts the event and shows up in brand tracking long after the trophy is lifted.
4. Amplify fan-generated content
The social layer of the World Cup is enormous and largely organic. Fans are already generating, sharing, and building on content at scale across every match window. Brands in beverages, media, travel, and adjacent categories that design campaigns to invite participation, and then amplify what fans create, extend reach far beyond what paid media alone can deliver. Meeting the community where it already is beats redirecting it every time.
5. Use interactive formats to drive action
The distance between awareness and action is shrinking, and interactive ad formats are why. QR codes, shoppable overlays, and real-time polls give engaged viewers a reason to act now rather than storing an impression for later. With 46% of sports viewers willing to engage and another 23% persuadable, these formats are no longer experimental. They are a reliable bridge from attention to outcomes.
Why measurement is the differentiator
Knowing your campaign ran isn't the same as knowing what it delivered. The challenge every World Cup advertiser faces is proving direct impact across a media plan that combines linear TV, CTV, social, and digital, often across multiple markets simultaneously.
DISQO's person-level measurement connects media exposure to how consumers actually feel and what they actually do after seeing an ad, across every channel and without gaps. Brand Lift shows shifts in awareness, favorability, consideration, and intent. Outcomes Lift reveals the downstream actions those shifts produce: search activity, site visits, and e-commerce behavior.
For brands investing in the World Cup, that kind of complete, cross-channel view isn't a nice-to-have. It's the difference between knowing your investment worked and being able to prove it.
The bottom line
The World Cup is the largest stage in advertising. The audience is diverse, motivated, and genuinely receptive. The opportunity to build brand equity and drive real outcomes in a single tournament window is unlike anything else on the media calendar.
The brands that leave with measurable results aren't necessarily the ones that spent the most. They're the ones that planned across the full arc, activated across every screen, and measured every dollar with the same rigor they brought to the creative.
The World Cup gives your brand a rare window of global, willing attention. The question is whether you have a clear, holistic view of what it actually delivers when it is over.
To learn how DISQO helps brands measure the full impact of tentpole advertising across Brand Lift and Outcomes Lift, let's connect.
Data Sources: DISQO Sports Advertising and Brand Experience Report (2024), surveying 2,810 US sports viewers (18+), June 11–18, 2024.