Advertisers are already looking ahead to next year's World Cup

"With teams still competing to qualify and an entire domestic season still to play out, the tournament's cast of characters remains up in the air. But marketers aren't waiting around to receive a cross. They're in the middle of planning activity and paid media commitments to ensure they get their share of the enormous audiences ( 1.42 billion worldwide watched the 2022 final) expected to broadcast, stream, follow and listen in to the second-largest sporting event on the planet."

""We see it as a cultural platform," said Eric Willis, CMO at Nestlé Purina North America. Willis said that how Purina activates against the five year partnership, whether via TV buys or other channels, is currently being decided. "We're down the path now on figuring out what that looks like in terms of activation across the portfolio, what it looks like at retail, what it looks like with the players," he said."

""We've already started having [World Cup] conversations with clients," said Mediaassociates vp of media activation Alicia Weaver. "They start planning these things well in advance," she said, adding that one of the agency's clients had bought a sponsorship-linked out-of-home package as far back as last year (she didn't name the brand). IPG's Magna unit projects that global ad sales will rise 6.3% in 2026, spurred in part by the World Cup; U.S. ad spend alone is expected to reach $429 billion."

Nine months before the FIFA World Cup, brands and agencies are already planning sponsorships, media buys and activation strategies to capture enormous global audiences. Purina agreed a five-year partnership as U.S. Soccer's official pet food partner and frames the deal as a cultural platform, with activation details across portfolio, retail and player collaborations still being decided. Agencies report early campaign planning and some clients purchased sponsorship-linked out-of-home packages as early as last year. Market forecasts from IPG's Magna project a 6.3% rise in global ad sales in 2026, with U.S. ad spend expected to reach $429 billion, much of it directed to television.

Read at Digiday