IPL started in 2008 after a successful T20 world cup and reinvented the cricket league. Gentlemen’s sports turns into three-hour dramas that produce the craze including Bollywood stars. IPL created a new marketplace that was completely different from other cricket games. The drama of IPL created unlimited entertainment for the audience, and they started to attend IPL matches.
IPL: An Unmatchable Cricket Tournament
IPL is one of the biggest sources of entertainment for cricket fans. Ten teams are participating in the tournament from different cities in India, and the tournament started with Bollywood music and celebrity performances.
Cricket is not a sport in India as it is a religion in India. Millions of fans are crazy about cricket and fill the stadium every time. IPL is one of the highest-valued tournaments in the world and competes with the top tournaments. The craze of fans made this tournament even more popular and most revenued. IPL generates 60% of cricket revenue worldwide.
The first season of IPL shows the massive craze as 200 million Indians watch on TV, and 10 million overseas people watch IPL. The interesting thing is that 150 million people watched the English Premier League in 2008. Within two seasons, IPL became the top league in the world.
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BCCI and IPL
Board of Control for Cricket in India(BCCI) is a cricket board of India that is responsible for regulating the cricket industry in India. Before the IPL or 2008, they were competing in the red ocean, but now BCCI has become the monopolistic power and the richest cricket body in the world. The reason is innovation and little change in cricket.
Logic Behind the Launch of IPL
T20 was a recent format that started to shorten the cricket game to attract a new audience. In 2007, the first-ever T20 world cup was scheduled, and India won the world cup. It is also the crucial reason the IPL and the BCCI started the IPL in 2008.
IPL attracted many viewers who were interested in cricket or had not seen cricket at all. The first type of viewer was a general cricket fan supporting India in international matches, and they stopped watching it after a famous 2007 world cup defeat. India was knocked out in the group phase, and was heartbreaking for many people. Viewership turned down from an average of 7.5 to 1.6.
The second type of audience is women and children, who don’t follow cricket. They find it long, boring, and difficult to understand. They refused to watch the five-day or one-day-long cricket to see a winner. Even some people don’t have time to watch the cricket match all day, and IPL becomes a therapy season for many people. You are working all day and cheering for your team after it; a wholesome experience.
The third type of audience is overseas and global cricket fans interested in their countries’ matches. For example, Australian cricket fans will not watch Indian cricket matches if matches are not against them. Overseas cricket viewers won’t watch Indian domestic cricket because unknown faces are playing, and the telecasting quality is not up to the mark.
After attracting the audience, the BCCI wanted to create a market strategy so that they will not be in the competition and reach another level. They research the risk involved in this and the reason that many companies struggle with.
How BCCI Made IPL Big?
The first step was to look for another industry or source of entertainment that is engaging people. They underlie the other organizations and keep them in the red oceans.
The test is the traditional cricket format that was played on a physical and mental level instead of drama and thriller. After the introduction of T20 cricket, everything changed, and the drama and thriller began in cricket as well. Football leagues used to be the big industry, and IPL reconstructed the market boundaries of cricket and gave an unlimited amount of entertainment that cricket fans have never seen in the cricket world.
The English Premier League is one of the biggest leagues, and viewers across the world wait at night to watch it. They are not even from England, and the BCCI created the same passionate league. People have never seen drama, fun, and entertainment in cricket history before IPL. Now, the IPL has become immensely successful, and most countries don’t even schedule their bilateral series during the IPL.
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