The transformative role of data collaboration in sports fan engagement: An interview with Sportradar’s Mike Falconer

Sportradar has been at the epicenter of the sports industry for over two decades. Over the years, the company has broadened its scope to include fan engagement and marketing services, aiming to help rightsholders, media-owners and brands connect with fans more effectively. Their focus is on optimizing how sports organizations interact with their audiences, whether through marketing, content, or ultimately monetization strategies. To help make this possible, the company launched its Sportradar FanID solution — powered by Decentriq’s data clean rooms — in January 2024.

How does Sportradar’s FanID address data silos and enable data collaboration?

Mike Falconer, VP of Strategy, Sportradar: At its core, Sportradar FanID is a first-party marketing activation platform; designed to foster collaboration around the first-party fan data of rightsholders, brands and media owners. In today’s landscape, privacy changes and the decline of third-party cookies have emphasized the need for robust first-party data strategies. Sportradar FanID creates a controlled ecosystem — sort of its own walled garden — allowing rightsholders to improve, orchestrate, and control the engagement of their own fans while conforming with data privacy and compliance.

Through Sportradar FanID, rightsholders and their various commercial and brand partners can co-mingle first-party data in secure environments, identifying audience overlaps and defining precise fan segments. This capability is foundational for creating tailored fan experiences and for sports-interested brands to run much more effective campaigns.

How does Sportradar FanID enhance monetization opportunities for leagues and teams?

Falconer: Rightsholders have always monetized fan audiences through brand partnerships, allowing brands to pay to associate with their sport and engage fans through their owned platforms. Brands also invest heavily outside these agreements, beyond the purview of the rightsholders — and in doing so, can create fragmented and sub-optimal experiences for fans.

Sportradar FanID gives rightsholders influence over this broader investment. By providing an end-to-end solution for controlled fan engagement, rightsholders can better manage how brands interact with their fans within this wider context. This orchestration benefits everyone: brands can build more effective campaigns, fans enjoy a more curated experience, and rightsholders unlock new revenue streams.

Looking ahead, how do you see Sportradar FanID evolving and expanding its network of partners?

Falconer: One key aspect of Sportradar FanID is the data clean room’s multi-tenancy.  Within each sport, this means that there’s virtually no limit to the number of clean room participants. Each league, its constituent teams, brand sponsors, commerce and media partners can all benefit from the data-sharing it allows. A tiered partner ecosystem will likely emerge, where higher-value partners — for example those contributing transactional signals (ticketing, merchandise, betting, etc..) — will play a more foundational role around their deep insight into fan preferences. These signals can then inform broader engagement strategies across the ecosystem.

Additionally, integrating media publishers into Sportradar FanID is a priority. By directly connecting media partners and rightsholders on a first-party fan basis, Sportradar FanID can provide a "walled garden" of sports-focused media (akin to a retail media network), where very personalized fan engagement becomes possible at scale. 

How does Sportradar maintain its competitive edge?

Falconer: It’s true that sports marketing and advertising is a dynamic industry, but Sportradar’s single-minded focus on sports gives us a significant advantage. We’re a multi-billion-dollar business in this vertical, with 20-plus years of experience, allowing us to deeply understand its nuances. Our neutral position in the ecosystem — working with rightsholders, media owners, and sports-interested brands -—without a direct-to-consumer agenda — also strengthens our credibility.

Technologically, Sportradar FanID is unique because it combines a data clean room with programmatic activation capabilities, all designed specifically for sports. We’ve spent years building a sports-specific demand-side platform, making our combined technology unparalleled in its alignment with the industry’s needs. This end-to-end control — from first-party data input to final fan engagement — ensures Sportradar FanID provides an unrivalled proposition around precision and compliance. 

What led Sportradar to partner with Decentriq for Sportradar FanID’s clean room capabilities?

Falconer: Our decision was driven by a combination of factors. Decentriq offered a highly secure and flexible platform tailored to our needs, with strong credentials in regulated industries like finance and pharma. The multi-tenancy feature and simplicity of the platform were key, enabling us to onboard diverse partners efficiently.

The platform’s simplicity also makes it easy for everyone involved to use, from rightsholders and sponsor brands to media partners and teams. These diverse groups need a solution that doesn’t require extensive technical expertise, so onboarding and daily operations are seamless. Decentriq’s intuitive design ensures all stakeholders can connect, collaborate, and get value from it without unnecessary complexity, which was a game-changer for us.

Equally important was the collaborative relationship we’ve built with Decentriq. As Sportradar FanID evolves, we need a partner willing to develop their approach with us. The expertise and energy of the Decentriq team have been instrumental in making this partnership a success.