Meet the Team | Jak Alcock, Partnerships Sales Executive, IMG

What does your role entail at IMG?

As a Commercial Partnerships Sales Executive at IMG working on Sport 24, I connect with brands and provide them with global media solutions across live sport broadcasts.

What is Sport 24?

Sport 24 is a live sport channel available exclusively to airlines and cruise ships, offering passengers real-time access to major global sporting events while in transit. Due to its breadth of live rights, the channel operates around the clock, airing live sporting events to audiences around the globe. We cover major sports leagues from the likes of the Premier League, National Basketball Association, National Football League and UEFA Champions League among others.

What does your research process look like when engaging with brands?

We begin by analyzing the brand’s objectives, target audience, and existing media strategies to understand how Sport 24 can support its goals. We explore the types of sports and events that resonate with their audience, ensuring alignment with our programming schedule. Often brands that would like to advertise across live sports broadcasts are already involved in relevant sponsorship activity, whether with the federations, teams, or the athletes themselves.

After that, we assess the competitive landscape and identify opportunities where the brand can stand out. We also gather insights on the effectiveness of different content formats—whether long-form storytelling or shorter, impactful placements—based on the brand’s needs and desired media mix. The last piece of the puzzle is analyzing the best timing and placement options within live sports broadcasts to maximize visibility and engagement, ensuring the campaign is both relevant and impactful.

Why should brands partner with Sport 24?

Sport 24 offers a unique opportunity for brands. With round-the-clock content, our schedule is unmatched due to the breadth of live sports rights agreements we have. 

There are limited external distractions to passengers in the sky and at sea, meaning we have a truly captive premium audience. With long-haul travel in particular, the channel allows brands to tell their story over an extended period with varying lengths and frequency of assets. The channel also exposes brands across multiple airlines and cruise lines, all under one buy.

Our partners can target specific live sports events, creating precise break placements across a variety of global broadcasts and ensuring prime exposure during highly watched moments.

How do you build and maintain relationships with brands? 

Flexibility and transparency are a big part of building and maintaining relationships with brands. We focus on integrating and adding value across the global media mix, whether TV, digital, OOH, airport or inflight, tailoring each campaign to fit the brand’s needs. We like to think of ourselves as a powerful content marketing platform, enabling brands to tell their story within the context of sports, with varying asset lengths and frequencies over time.

The channel’s technical capabilities also benefit our commercial partners. We can launch content immediately, allowing brands to send us creative material on a Friday and have it live during Premier League matches on Saturday. As an IMG owned and operated channel , we also have the flexibility to run content of any length for our advertisers. As a result, we can create unique and specific break placements for brands at a moment’s notice.

What partnership are you proud to have worked on? 

Luxury watch brand, Christopher Ward trialled advertising on the channel in 2023 and then after several positive discussions, became a channel advertising partner in 2024 to amplify the brand on a global scale. Since then, they’ve become a significant partner of Everton Football Club and we have ensured increased visibility within all live Everton fixtures on Sport 24, seamlessly tying the sponsorship and media partnership together.

Why do you like working in sport? 

From a partnership perspective, a wide variety of global brands use sports to reach targeted audiences, meaning I’m lucky enough to work with some of the world’s biggest brands such as HSBC, Mastercard, Hilton, IHG and Visit Qatar. Secondly, the relationship between sport, media, and technology fosters constant innovation and growth, meaning no project is the same.

Sport’s role in culture and entertainment allows me to be part of something that can significantly influence and inspire people. Sport is at the intersection of these areas, creating some of the world’s most amazing and iconic cultural moments.