This year’s U.S. Open tennis tournament, kicking off in New York on August 30, will look unlike any other, with significant and diverse opportunities for advertisers to get in on the energy and opportunity. To align with this unique event, B2B and B2C brands alike should be looking beyond the standard 30-second spot to ensure they’re making the most of the event’s varied—and valuable—fan base.

There are several factors converging around this year’s U.S. Open that suggest the opportunity to reach eager, attentive fans will be bigger than ever. The obvious one would be that, like other sporting events in 2021, this year’s tournament represents a reopening to fans, given that 2020’s matches were held without spectators. In addition, at the end of August, the Olympics will have concluded, the NFL’s regular season will have yet to begin, and MLB playoffs will still be out on the horizon. That positions the U.S. Open squarely within a convenient lull in between other flagship sporting events, enabling greater domination of sports headlines and social media buzz.

The roster of players, too, will be more impressive than ever this year, as will the storylines that surround them. Last year, in the heart of the pandemic, several top players withdrew from the competition, and many of them—including Rafael Nadal, Roger Federer, and 2019 women’s winner Bianca Andreescu—will be back in action. The world’s current number one player, Novak Djokovic, is poised to surpass Federer and Nadal for most major titles, and he also could become the first male player to win a calendar Grand Slam since 1969. Meanwhile, Serena Williams could make history if she wins by tying the cord of women’s major wins at 24. Fans will also tune in to follow the storyline surrounding the women’s defending champion from 2020, Naomi Osaka, who controversially withdrew from the French Open.

How advertisers can deepen their U.S. Open strategies

Given the buzz around this year’s U.S. Open, traditional TV inventory around the matches will be a hot ticket. But the opportunities for getting in on the action go far deeper than that. To that end, brands need to be broadening their strategies in a couple of areas.

One area revolves around cross-channel opportunities. There are opportunities with most TV buys to delve deeper into digital and mobile audiences to supplement reach among audiences that aren’t tuning in to linear broadcasts. But in addition, savvy advertisers can reach beyond the event itself by working with partners to use insights from set-top box (STB) viewership data. STB data can enable advertisers and their partners to build added-value schedules by identifying the programming that U.S. Open fans are most likely to tune into before or after the matches, effectively stretching the pool of available and impactful inventory around the event.

Another big opportunity will be sponsorships with news stations providing coverage of the U.S. Open. Through these packages, brands can align with the credibility and relevance of the sports coverage and extend their branding with integrated logos, billboards, and commercials across linear and digital. This might also extend to weather forecasts, daily tennis schedules and scoreboards, lifestyle features, and more.

While the U.S. Open represents an obvious opportunity for brands to reengage sports-hungry fans, the greatest success will be found by the brands that pursue the less-than-obvious routes to forging fan connections. By thinking locally, and in a cross-channel capacity, brands can make the most of this sure-to-stun sporting event during perhaps its most exciting year ever.

About the Author

Max Strang-Wolf is an account executive at New York Interconnect, a joint venture among Altice USA, Charter Communications, and Comcast that connects brands to more than 20 million consumers in the nation’s number one TV market.