Platform Consolidation, Federal Legislation, and Personalized Highlights
Name, Image, Likeness Insider uses proprietary data and expert insights to explain the latest NIL developments.
INFLCR EXECUTES AN IMPORTANT CONSOLIDATION
Student-Athlete Insights NIL Research Poll - 2022
NIL business management app INFLCR recently executed simultaneous deals with marketplaces MarketPryce, NOCAP Sports, MOGL and Embassy . Each platform will use INFLCR’s Global Exchange to offer student-athletes deals directly in the INFLCR app. Student-Athletes with accounts on any of these marketplaces will now have access to a greater number of brands and potentially far more NIL opportunities.
Why It Matters: The consolidation of marketplaces is an important step in the evolution of of NIL. The fact that it’s occurring just a little more than a year into NIL’s existence is telling about both sides of the NIL market - student-athletes and brands. Bringing multiple platforms under INFLCR’s umbrella begins to address (if not yet completely solve) two challenges.
Student-Athlete Insights has completed multiple studies indicating that student-athletes are spending more time than they expected managing their NIL activities; this consolidation is a first step in alleviating the NIL platform fatigue that many are suffering from trying to utilize multiple tools to improve their chances for NIL success.
It’s a consolidation of sorts for the brand side of the NIL market too; while the marketplaces will continue to operate independently, a centralized location to engage student-athletes will appeal to brands.
FEDERAL LEGISLATION CONNECTING NIL TO TITLE IX
Over the last few years, eight Federal bills related to college athletics have been introduced, but none have progressed. Recently, five U.S. senators (Democrats Cory Booker, Richard Blumenthal, Brian Schatz, Ron Wyden, Alex Padilla) reintroduced legislation called the “College Athletes Bill of Rights.” The bill would alter student-athletes’ compensation, but possibly more significant is the legislation’s requirement of annual reporting by institutions with regard to Title IX. (Republican Tommy Tuberville and Democrat Joe Manchin have discussed legislation to standardize NIL, but their bill does not address Title IX.)
Why It Matters: The view by many is that Title IX does not apply to NIL because institutions are not directly providing NIL deals to their student-athletes. Putting the role of institutions aside for a moment, whether NIL is good for women student-athletes is worth debating. Women student-athletes are getting over 40% of NIL deals and women’s sports make up 5 of the top 10 NIL income earning sports. But Student-Athlete Insights data on compensation by gender indicates a substantial gender wage gap with women making about 26% of what male are earning for similar NIL activities (a 74% gap.) By comparison, the pay gap for U.S. workers ages 18-23 is about 2%.
PAC-12 STUDENT-ATHLETES TO EARN INCOME WITH THEIR GAME HIGHLIGHTS
The Pac-12 has developed a first of its kind partnership with tech startup Tempus Ex Machina. The partnership will provide student athletes access to their personalized game highlights. They can then share their highlights via their Twitter handles.
Why It Matters: The Pac-12 is providing student-athletes something of real value. According to our most recent studies, social media accounts for about 80% of all NIL activity. It’s likely that student-athletes that post their video content will increase engagement rates and follower count and will thus be able to further monetize their NIL. I think this is just a start - or at least I hope so. The program will begin with football and men’s and women’s basketball student-athletes, so it’s a bit of “the rich getting richer”; I think the greatest impact might happen when the non-revenue sport athletes (who are often truly micro-influencers with less than 10,000 followers) get their hands on this. In addition, the program appears to focus on Twitter. Again, I have no problem with Twitter, but our studies indicate that it ranks far behind TikTok and Instagram in terms of student-athlete use and therefore is not as powerful as those other social media when it comes to peer-to-peer impact.
I consult with brands, agencies, and sports organizations on Name, Image, and Likeness - and provide on-demand courses for parents, athletes, coaches & administrators. I teach NIL in College Sports at the University of Vermont’s Grossman School of Business. My NIL services include consulting, training workshops, custom newsletter-style monthly updates, content development, on-demand courses, and more. I’m a SportsBusiness Journal Forty Under 40 Award winner and former co-founder of the marketing agency Fuse, which I operated for 20 years before selling in 2019.