Sports Digital Advisory
Turning disconnected digital activity into business value.
Most sports organisations have the pieces: audiences, products, content, data, technology and commercial capability. The challenge is making them work together. Red7 finds where value is being lost, what needs to change, and where to focus next.
A career in sport.
Senior roles inside rights holders, a broadcaster, a platform and a scale-up — leading teams across EMEA, working with some of sport's biggest names.
The core problem
CLUBS · LEAGUES · FEDERATIONS · RIGHTS HOLDERS · BRANDS IN SPORTSport doesn't have a digital activity problem. /
It has a connection problem.
Most sports organisations already have the pieces: audience, product, content, data, technology and commercial activity. They usually sit in separate silos — different teams, different systems, different owners. It shows up at every level, from Premier League clubs to community sports, from global federations to domestic leagues. Red7 helps identify where value is being lost, what needs to change, and where to focus next.
The numbers back it up.
Revenue sports could unlock by closing the digital gap
Morgan Stanley, 2025
Rights-holders losing $100k+ a year from fans they can't reach
Dizplai, 2026
Sports orgs using personalisation — vs 92% in retail
Morgan Stanley, 2025
Six places value gets stuck.
Audience
You may have millions of followers, buyers and fans. How much of that relationship do you genuinely own and understand?
Product
Websites, apps and platforms exist. Are they creating the behaviours and value the organisation actually needs?
Content
More content is being produced than ever — much of it through players and talent whose audience and commercial value the organisation doesn't fully capture.
Data
Useful data often sits across multiple systems without translating into better decisions, personalisation or revenue.
Commercial
Partners increasingly expect measurable digital value. Commercial propositions and digital capability don't always connect.
Technology
Many organisations have accumulated platforms over time, rather than designed a coherent ecosystem around the fan and the business.
Each problem can look separate. Usually it isn't.
The Red7 model
One system. /
Five moving parts.
The opportunity is rarely within one box. It's in the connections between them.
The approach
Find / Fix / Grow.
How Red7 helps
Three ways in.
You deal with me directly. No junior analysts, no account managers. I work across the market — from major leagues and federations to smaller clubs and challenger sports — typically with three to four clients at any one time.
Digital Value Review
Understand the opportunity.
A focused independent diagnostic across audience, product, content, data, commercial, technology and operating model — including player and talent value. It tells you where value is being created, lost or left untapped — and what to do about it.
Strategy & Roadmap
Decide what to do.
Turns the diagnostic into a clear strategy and a prioritised roadmap — spanning audience, product, data, content, commercial, technology and organisational design.
Strategic Partner
Make it happen.
Red7 isn't an implementation agency and doesn't sell technology. Where useful, I stay involved through procurement, partner selection and delivery — so the strategy survives contact with reality.
Every engagement starts with a 30-minute conversation. No brief needed.
Typical questions
Questions I help answer.
- Where are we leaving digital value on the table?
- Who are our audiences, and how much of that relationship do we actually own?
- Are we capturing the commercial and audience value our players generate, or is it going to agents and platforms instead?
- Do we have the right technology, or simply too much technology?
- How should data connect ticketing, CRM, content and commercial?
- Where can AI genuinely create revenue or reduce cost?
- How should digital, marketing, content and commercial work together?
- What should we build, buy, partner on or stop doing?
Proof, not theory
What this looks like /
in practice.
This isn't a framework exercise. It's a digital function rebuilt from the inside, with commercial outcomes to show for it.
England & Wales Cricket Board — Digital Transformation
Situation
Digital function was active but commercially invisible. No connection between output and revenue. Structured as a cost centre with no commercial mandate.
What I found
No measurement that meant anything to sponsors. No alignment between digital and commercial teams. A talented team with no commercial direction.
What changed
Rebuilt the function around commercial outcomes. Created measurement sponsors could rely on. Aligned digital and commercial teams. Gave the board a clear way to evaluate digital.
Outcome
Digital revenue grew 180× in three years. Cost centre to commercial asset. Sponsors started asking for digital-first packages. ECB's broadcast rights roughly tripled in the same period — the digital work helped shape the value story behind it.
EMEA ARR growth at Greenfly — in under two years, working alongside a team I helped build from one to six.
Why Red7
Four sides of the table. /
One independent view.
Most people in this space have worked on one side of the table. I've worked on four — and that changes how you see things.
ECB · RFU
I rebuilt digital functions from the inside. I know what holds teams back, why it happens, and what it takes to change it.
Meta EMEA
I led sports partnerships across EMEA — IOC, FIFA, UEFA, Premier League, F1, World Rugby and more. I know what platforms actually want from rights holders.
Greenfly
I ran EMEA for a platform at the centre of athlete and talent content distribution — I've seen first-hand how the relationship between fans, clubs, players and the content they have access to is changing.
Global markets
Eight years inside US companies gave me sustained exposure to how the most commercially advanced sports organisations in the world think about digital value.
That's the vantage point Red7 works from — across rights holders, platforms, technology and commercial.
About Nick
Nick Shaw · Founder
The person /
doing the work.
I've built digital functions from scratch at ECB and RFU, helped activate landmark rights deals at Meta, grown commercial revenue at Sky, and helped scale Greenfly's business in sport. Mostly I've learned what actually moves things forward — and what just looks like it does. I set up Red7 Advisory to do this work on my own terms — which mostly means being straight with people.
What I sell isn't time or deliverables. It's outcomes, insight and judgement. I still work closely with people in the technology space — including Greenfly, where I'm an adviser — but when I'm working with you, my only interest is what's right for your organisation.
The career path
Experience
A selection / not a definitive list.
Rights holders & federations
Clubs & teams
Brands & broadcasters
A selection — not a definitive list — of organisations I've worked with as clients or partners during senior roles at Meta and Greenfly. I've spent the last decade in rooms with some of the biggest names in sport and learned a huge amount from them. What I want to do with Red7 is bring that thinking to organisations at every level — whether you're a global federation or a domestic league doing more with less.
Mentorship
Helping the next generation / find their way.
Honestly, this is the thing I get the most from. I've been an unofficial mentor to people throughout my career — helping them figure out their next move, back themselves, and grow into roles they weren't sure they could do.
I work with rising talent in digital, media and commercial roles across sport. No corporate mentoring programme. Just honest, practical guidance from someone who's been through most of it.
For organisations: If you've got someone talented who'd benefit from an experienced outside perspective, I'm available for structured mentoring engagements.
If you're early in your career and think a conversation would help, drop me a line. I always make time.
Get in touch →Not sure what the problem is yet?
That's usually where I start. A short conversation is normally enough to work out whether Red7 can help.
Start a conversation →nick@red7advisory.co.uk