March 2026, Mumbai: JioStar today released The Winning Edge, a first-of-its-kind advertising playbook designed to help brands and media buyers unlock the full potential of live cricket as a marketing platform. Drawing from billions of impression-level data points across marquee cricket properties and validated through Brand Lift Studies conducted by Kantar, the playbook moves beyond conventional wisdom to deliver data-backed, outcome-driven guidance for advertisers.
The playbook establishes cricket on JioStar as an unmatched environment for brand growth. For new brands entering the market, advertising on live cricket on JioStar delivered up to 6.9x higher brand awareness and 10.8x higher purchase intent compared to Kantar norms. Established brands fared equally strongly, recording up to 4x higher brand awareness and up to 4.9x higher purchase intent — underscoring cricket’s power as both a launchpad and a long-term growth engine.
Anup Govindan, Head of Sales, Sports, JioStar said: “The Winning Edge, developed in partnership with Kantar, is built on rigorous, data-backed analysis of how real brands have performed on our platform across categories, objectives, budgets, formats, and tournament phases. The study reaffirms that when it comes to driving real outcomes such as awareness, consideration, and purchase intent, nothing matches the intensity, scale, and impact of live cricket. The depth of attention and emotional engagement during live moments creates a multiplier effect that non-live environments simply cannot replicate.”
Soumya Mohanty, MD, and Chief Client & Solutions Officer at Kantar South Asia said: “Numerous Kantar Brand Lift Studies have demonstrated the incremental impact of Live Cricket Advertising, with results consistently ranking at the top end of Kantar’s Brand Lift database. This playbook distils those insights into actionable media planning and creative recommendations to help advertisers drive stronger outcomes in Live Cricket environments.” –
One of the playbook’s most significant findings relates to platform strategy. Brands that activated across Linear TV (LTV), Connected TV (CTV), and Mobile simultaneously recorded up to 7x higher purchase intent than those present on a single platform — with less than 10% audience overlap across screens, signaling strong incremental reach. Combining video and display formats further
amplified impact, with brands running both seeing up to 7.4x higher brand awareness compared to video-only campaigns.
The data makes a compelling case for sponsorship over standalone inventory purchases. Brands with formal sponsorships recorded up to 9x higher purchase intent and up to 8x higher ad awareness compared to those buying inventory alone. Additionally, brands that added PPL (Pre- Post-Live) studio programming to their live media mix saw an incremental up to 2.1x in aided awareness — demonstrating the value of extended brand presence around the live match.
The playbook identifies four key in-match moments that deliver disproportionate brand salience
— Super 4s, Super 6s, DRS (Decision Review System), and Fall of Wickets (FOW). Brands that incorporated these moments into their asset mix recorded uplifts ranging from 4x to 9x in salience, 4x to 10x in awareness, and 4x to 7x in brand recall — making contextual, moment-led advertising a critical lever for maximising impact.
With live cricket commanding the largest, most engaged audiences in Indian media, the opportunity for brands has never been greater. The Winning Edge sets a new standard for how advertisers approach sports marketing in India: not with assumptions, but with evidence; not with presence alone, but with intent.
Download ‘The Winning Edge’ Playbook HERE
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