👋 Welcome back to Sponcon Sports, a twice-weekly newsletter breaking down the best ideas, strategies, and trends shaping digital sports partnerships.

This is a resource for sports organizations to generate more sponsorship revenue and for brands to get more from their sports partnerships by building sponsored content fans actually want to engage with.

In Today’s Edition:

There's a lot of sponsored AI content in sports right now. But I'm not convinced much of it has given fans a compelling reason to actually use the technology.

Too often, the activation seems to revolve around creating something with generative AI simply because it's possible.

That's why I like what FC Barcelona is doing with Google Gemini.

Ahead of matches, Barça publishes a four-frame Instagram Story powered by Gemini (shown above), sharing interesting stats and insights about its upcoming opponent.

The first frame resembles an actual Gemini conversation, with a prompt asking for interesting facts about the matchup. The next three frames deliver the answers, accompanied by player imagery.

It's straightforward, relevant, and useful for fans preparing to watch the match.

More importantly, the sponsorship demonstrates a practical use case for Gemini. Fans aren't just being shown something AI created. They're being shown how they might use the product themselves.

I think that's an important distinction for brands sponsoring this category.

As much as I like the concept, I think Barcelona could make the content more engaging.

Right now, the slides are extremely text-heavy. I understand why: they're intended to resemble the responses you'd receive when prompting Gemini.

But if you're asking fans to consume multiple statistics and historical insights, why not use AI to help turn that information into more compelling data visualizations?

It reminds me of the Orlando Magic's Stat Stories series, presented by SAS.

The Magic have used three-to-five-frame Instagram Story previews covering everything from team leaders and recent results to head-to-head matchups.

What I particularly like is how they package the information. Rather than presenting fans with paragraphs of text, they use team imagery, statistics, and clear visual hierarchies to make the content easy to digest.

Barcelona has the right idea with Gemini. I'd love to see it combine that useful information with a more visually engaging presentation.

And Barcelona isn't the only club producing these Gemini match previews.

Paris Saint-Germain is running a nearly identical series, but with one important difference: PSG publishes its previews as Instagram feed carousels rather than Stories.

Across the three examples I've reviewed, the posts averaged 30.8K engagements.

That's not a failure by any means, but for a club with more than 60M followers, it doesn't suggest the content is particularly compelling either.

Of course, engagements alone don't tell us how many people saw the posts or whether they're delivering against Google's sponsorship objectives.

Still, I think the text-heavy format faces a challenge in the feed, where it's competing with goals, highlights, player content, and countless other posts for attention.

Data-focused content can absolutely perform on Instagram. I've highlighted successful examples from clubs like Bayern Munich before. But it needs a visual hook that gives fans a reason to stop scrolling.

And there's another reason I particularly like Barcelona's approach.

You've probably heard someone in marketing say that follower count is a vanity metric. And there's some truth to it.

Having millions of followers doesn't mean your Instagram Reels or carousels will reach millions of people. Distribution increasingly depends on how audiences respond to individual posts, including people who don't follow the account.

But I think we've become too quick to dismiss follower count entirely.

Because Instagram Stories work differently.

Stories are primarily a way to reach people who already follow your account, rather than a discovery engine designed to reach new audiences.

That makes an established follower base much more relevant.

During my time working with sports teams, I've seen accounts with anywhere from 500K to more than a million followers generate Story reach equivalent to roughly 1–4% of their followers.

That's not a universal benchmark, and results vary significantly by team, audience, and content.

But consider what that means for a club like Barcelona, which has 149M+ Instagram followers.

Even reaching a small percentage of that audience could translate into hundreds of thousands, potentially millions, of views per Story frame.

And with four sponsored frames ahead of every match, that exposure can add up considerably throughout the season.

There's also the question of consistency.

Feed distribution can vary dramatically from post to post. While Story reach isn't guaranteed, an established audience can provide a more predictable baseline for recurring sponsorship inventory.

That's valuable when you're trying to build, price, and deliver a partnership.

Of course, Stories have their limitations.

The content disappears after 24 hours, and traditional engagement is much more limited than in the feed.

That said, I've had considerable success incorporating interactive stickers into sponsored Stories. Polls, quizzes, and other interactive elements give fans a reason to participate rather than passively watch.

Before we blindly dismiss follower count as a vanity metric, it's worth remembering that building an established audience has real commercial value, particularly when it comes to Stories.

And while clubs like Barcelona have an obvious advantage with their enormous followings, Stories can be valuable sponsorship inventory for smaller teams, too.

The key is finding ways to give partners more real estate, whether that's through multiple branded frames or creative approaches like this NFL strategy.

There are trade-offs compared with the feed, but Stories deserve more attention when teams are evaluating and pricing their digital sponsorship inventory.

I've covered several other creative ways to use Instagram Stories for sponsorships, including:

Barcelona's match previews are part of Google's broader European football strategy.

In August, Google announced long-term Gemini and Pixel partnerships with five major clubs:

I've been following their activations, and these are five Gemini integrations I've particularly enjoyed.

When Liverpool signed Bradley Barcola, the club used Gemini to help supporters learn about their newest player.

It's a natural fit. When a new signing arrives, fans want to know everything about them, from their career history to their biggest accomplishments.

I particularly like how the carousel resembles an actual Gemini conversation, from the opening prompt to the bolded keywords in the responses.

And Liverpool integrated Google across the broader announcement, using Pixel for Barcola's first selfie and day-in-the-life video.

Rather than creating AI content for the sake of it, Liverpool demonstrated how fans could use Gemini during one of the most exciting moments of the season.

Liverpool has also been using Gemini to quiz supporters on their knowledge of the club.

One carousel tests fans on the current season with multiple-choice questions about matches, players, and results. As you swipe, the correct answers are revealed through highlighted choices and accompanying match photography.

Another challenges fans to identify missing players from Liverpool's historic starting lineups against Manchester City, using the match date and key moments as clues.

Both give fans a reason to keep swiping, but I actually prefer this type of activation in Instagram Stories, where quiz stickers let supporters submit answers and get immediate feedback.

Liverpool's approach works, though, and it's another way to turn Gemini-powered information into content fans can participate in.

Whether it's a busy month of fixtures or an international break, Gemini can help fans stay informed about what's coming up.

Barcelona used it to preview its October schedule, sharing interesting facts about upcoming opponents, from historical results to memorable matchups. The carousel generated more than 482K likes.

Meanwhile, PSG and FC Bayern Frauen have used Gemini to highlight upcoming international fixtures involving their players, including dates, opponents, and kickoff times.

I particularly like the practicality of these activations. Fans can quickly find out when their favorite players are competing or learn something interesting about upcoming matches. It's another natural way to demonstrate how Gemini can make following a club easier.

Ahead of its match against Brentford, Liverpool used Gemini to revisit one of the club's best performances against the Bees.

The prompt asked Gemini to walk through Liverpool's standout performance and find video clips of the goals, demonstrating its integration with YouTube.

What I particularly like is how the carousel alternates between descriptions of the goals and actual match highlights, allowing fans to relive the 4–1 victory from February 2024.

Bayern Munich has taken a similar approach, using Gemini to uncover interesting facts about past matchups, including its 6–0 win over Schalke.

Both give fans a reason to revisit memorable moments while demonstrating how Gemini can help them explore their club's history. But Liverpool takes it a step further by incorporating video rather than relying solely on text and imagery.

Barcelona has also incorporated Gemini into its YouTube membership Q&As.

At the end of each session, the featured player asks Gemini a question, creating a natural opportunity to demonstrate the product.

I particularly like this because Barcelona doesn't need to create an entirely new series for its sponsor. Instead, Gemini becomes part of an existing experience, putting the product in front of some of the club's most dedicated fans: those willing to pay for a YouTube membership.

It's a smart way to reach a highly engaged audience while adding value to content fans already enjoy.

There's an important distinction between using AI to make content and creating content that shows fans why they'd want to use AI.

That's where I see the greatest opportunity for Google Gemini.

And there's room to take these experiences beyond social media.

Imagine a more comprehensive Gemini-powered match preview on a club's website or app, or a personalized email digest delivered before kickoff.

But what I particularly like about Barcelona's approach is that it doesn't need to be complicated.

Give fans information they actually want, demonstrate how the sponsor's product can deliver it, and distribute it through a channel with an established audience.

That's a pretty compelling foundation for a recurring sponsorship activation.