Meet the Team | Mollie Kemsley, Partnerships Manager, Esports

What does your role at IMG entail?

As a partnerships manager, I work to secure new partnerships and renew deals for our esports rightsholders. This involves prospecting partners, building pitches, presenting opportunities or reports, and negotiating rights packages. Our specialized esports team is based in London, but we work with colleagues globally to connect brands with the best.

For those that don’t know, what is esports and gaming?

Gaming is a term that encompasses the casual playing of mobile, PC and console games, from CandyCrush to The Sims to Grand Theft Auto and everything in between. Esports is classed as competitive gaming where the pros play for big money. Esports events showcase the best players in the world, attracting the most passionate and engaged fans. Some of the most popular esports titles include League of Legends, Counter-Strike, and Dota2.

You’ve previously worked at England Rugby, how does esports sponsorship differ?

Esports is a relatively nascent industry and is still finding its feet in the sponsorship landscape. Compared with IPs like England Rugby, who have built long-term legacy partnerships over time, esports rightsholders still need to prove their value to brands. It’s a relatively untapped marketing tool, often misunderstood by a lot of brands. Gen Z and Gen Alpha are spending more time gaming than on social media, so brands are realizing they need to meet their audiences in the gaming space. Esports is part of that, offering brands a channel into the most engaged sector of gaming fans.

What are some of the key opportunities for brands within esports?

Key opportunities come under both physical and digital umbrellas. On the one hand, esports creates a huge spectacle for in-person fans, creating the perfect stage for physical activations. For the millions watching online, brands can tap into a host of digital assets – the interactive chat, pop-ups, logo rotations, clickable banners, broadcast segments, and caster callouts.

Esports events are produced by local media partners in different languages, meaning a brand has the power to adapt its messaging by region. They could also associate with the regional qualifier so that fans in their target market are exposed to their campaign in the lead-up to the main event. Beyond this, brands can partner with publishers to create a branded in-game challenge wherein players can win custom skins and accessories that can be traded, thereby becoming a valuable and exciting part of the gameplay.

When looking to secure meaningful partnerships, what is your process? 

We are very data-led in our process. Working alongside Endeavor Analytics, we carry out a property audit. This helps us identify the deliverables, any key teams or personalities, and markets to leverage. This is coupled with audience insights and rights valuation to understand which categories are strongly aligned.

The process of structuring partnership packages is collaborative with the rightsholder, building out a pipeline of prospects based on market research. Throughout the process our priority in prospecting meaningful partnerships is audience alignment and meeting the brand’s key objectives.

Can you give us an example of a partnership that you’re proud to have worked on?

I helped broker the partnership deal between Chinese electric vehicle brand, Lynk & Co, and our client, BLAST, for their 2023 World Final. We worked closely with our sales colleagues in China to ensure the process ran smoothly right through to the delivery of the event in Abu Dhabi. The core objective of this partnership was to build brand awareness among 18-35-year-olds in the Middle East. Through a suite of digital and in-arena activations, the partnership generated over 5 billion impressions for the brand, and awareness increased by 87%. It was a proud moment to see the cars driving players around Abu Dhabi, wrapped in the BLAST event creative. Reading positive fan responses to the social posts online was the cherry on top, as we could see that this partnership had resonated well with the target audience.

What are some trends you’re excited about?
I’m excited to see more non-endemic brands entering the esports sponsorship space. Recently we’ve witnessed the likes of Revolut, Magnum and Ballantyne’s experiencing return with this audience. It’s also interesting that luxury fashion and cosmetics brands are diving into user-generated content (UGC) platforms like Roblox and Fortnite, and I’m interested to see whether those brands can tie in esports activity. If a brand can integrate in-game, and sponsor an event, it would create a well-rounded partnership that supports various elements that are important to fans.

I’d also love to see more growth around female esports. There are more female gamers in the world, yet very few esports’ athletes are women. There are lots of reasons for that, but I’d love to see the right brands come in and help change this. There are some great initiatives out there trying to create equity, but we need brand sponsors to add fuel like we’ve seen in traditional sports.

You have a degree in Zoology from the University of Exeter, what advice would you give someone looking to move into sport?

I studied Zoology because I was interested in it – and in my experience, when you’re interested in something, you’re more likely to succeed. I started my career in sport for the same reason. My advice to anyone starting out is to be open to seemingly left-field opportunities- maintaining an attitude of ‘this could be interesting’, has led to some of my best experiences. ‘Partnerships’ in general is such a broad field of work, and I love meeting people from so many different industries that I get to learn from. Having sport at the core of my work is a bonus, I don’t think many industries have the same passion and emotion driving them.