Is it just me, or does the day feel a bit emptier without the thrill of the Euros from 2pm to 10pm? Not even Wimbledon or the British Grand Prix (where Lewis Hamilton took his ninth Silverstone victory, no less) could grip the nation quite like the football and Gareth Southgate’s squad.

The European Championships were held in 10 cities across Germany, contested by 24 teams and captured over 5 billion viewers with a month of high-quality football and VAR controversies. Let's dive into the unforgettable highlights, game-changing moments and standout performances that defined this year's historic European tournament.

Euro 24 Overview

This year’s format took some getting used to, with winners, runners-up and the four best third-placed teams advancing. Fans were left frantically predicting routes to the final right up to the last group game. For the first time, all four teams in Group E finished on the same points – unlucky for Ukraine despite finishing on the same points as England and Romania who topped their groups.

Fast forward to England's semi-final win against the Netherlands, where audiences across England - peaking at 21.6 million (ITV) - heard these spine-tingling words from Peter Drury: ‘For the first time ever, England will play a major tournament final on foreign soil. European championship finalists twice in a row’… Giving every single England fan the hope that football may finally be coming home.

With the potential for a UK Bank Holiday looming if England won, millions of fans gathered in homes, bars, fan zones, with an estimated 24% of sports fans watching Euro 2024 in the pub.

In total, over 24 million people tuned in to watch Southgate’s Three Lions in the final, only to be left devastated by Spain’s last-minute winner and a 2-1 score line. Spain won all 7 of their Euro 2024 matches, celebrating a record-breaking fourth Euros title, while England became the first team in history to lose consecutive finals.

Advertiser Opportunities: Turning Goals into Gold

Euro 2024 brought great opportunities for brands to reach consumers.

Among the audiences who were intending to follow the action, Kantar Media’s GB TGI data found that brand sponsors could enjoy fantastic visibility, sentiment uplift and potential purchase intent:

  • 40 per cent are more likely to notice brands who sponsor big football events like Euro 2024
  • 34 per cent agree that sponsoring big events like the Euros improve their perception of a brand.
  • 26 per cent are more likely to buy from brands who sponsor Euro 2024

According to internal estimates from IPG Mediabrands’ MAGNA, television ad spends increased roughly 20% in June compared to the same period last year, with advertisers clamouring for the incredible reach and association being linked to the Euros brings. Much of that will be attributed to ITV, the commercial broadcaster that shared coverage rights to the Euros with the BBC.

Off the pitch, national team social media accounts saw surges in popularity: Winners Spain saw a 14.8% rise with 748k new followers, Portugal with a rise of 5.5%, gaining 956k followers and most notably Turkey achieving an impressive 57.2% follower growth adding 1.3million new followers.

Social graph

The ever-growing impact and influence of digital and social media means brands can move with the tournament, adapting their tone and creative in real time, and allowing businesses to be dynamic and often opening new opportunities for commercial success.

Social presents opportunities for advertisers with more modest budgets – leaving TV to the tournament sponsors and those advertisers with large ATL media spends – but not all focus needs to be placed on social.

Digital OOH also enabled flexible messaging and creative in line with the Euros: Chase Bank focused on out-of-home, programmatic OOH and retail media activations, featuring Declan Rice and Bukayo Saka in an eye-catching Oxford Circus takeover!

Since the previous Euros in 2020, audio advertising on sites like Spotify and via Podcasts have advanced quite some way, providing another route to reach football fans. Skybet for example ran audio spots on Spotify in the lead up to the finals while also sponsoring podcasts such as ‘Stick to Football’

This year’s Euros allowed for even more diversity of choice and wider channel activation, driving campaigns which are commercially focused, as well as those campaigns which are there only to build and amplify brand awareness.

The Changing Face of Search During the Euros

With so much happening on and off the pitch, search was subject to constant changes throughout the tournament. None more so than a player’s performance effecting user searches.

Selecting a handful of players, we saw significant spikes in search interest around gamedays. Picking out Nico Williams (Spain), Lamine Yamal (Spain), Cole Palmer (England) and Pepe (Portugal), we can clearly see the correlation between on-pitch performance and search interest.

Some of the key reasons these plays saw such large spikes in consumer interest were:

Pepe extended the record as the oldest player to appear at the Euros at 41 years and 130 days. (UEFA)

Lamine Yamal, named young player of the tournament, became the youngest EUROS scorer at 16 years 362 days. (UEFA)

Turkey’s Arda Guler became the youngest player to score on his EURO debut – and what a goal it was! (BBC YouTube – 2mins 04 seconds in – enjoy! AND another spectacular goal at 0.58 seconds in!)

Diogo Costa (Portugal) became the first keeper to save 3 spot kicks in a penalty shoot-out, putting Diogo Costa on the search map, if only momentarily.

#Euro2024 has been tagged in more than 1.7 million Instagram posts and two million TikToks. The official social accounts of the tournament have attracted more than 16.7 million TikTok followers, 18.7 million Instagram followers and 4.1 million X (formerly Twitter) followers.

Reacting to Search Changes

Understanding the impact on search interests, preparing for a sporting moment like the Euros requires an intricate mix of meticulous planning, fluidity and reactivity to react to shifting consumer behaviour and on-pitch action.

Walkers is a great example of this in motion. ‘In the Bag’ was created in a reactive manner to celebrate Olly Watkin’s semi-final winning goal:

Crisp advert

Instagram and influencers were used to good effect by brands during this tournament. One of my highlights has to be the LADbible and Asda collaboration with Tom Cox of Unlikely Dad promoting their matchday pizza offer.

Euros Stimulates Retail and Leisure Sectors

While the Euros saw lots of consumer transactions when it came to merch purchases, it wouldn’t be a Euro’s blog without shining a spotlight on football shirts.

Like many other fans, I spent a good chunk of my time searching ‘vintage football shirt’, in the hope there were still some available. Nothing like the England 1990 World Cup Finals shirt! Even lifestyle blogger Gavin Toner teamed up with Junction 32 (very close to our KINESSO Leeds HQ), to visit the new Sports Direct shop and get an England Shirt!

With that in mind, it is interesting to see the comparison for ‘vintage football shirt’ with ‘men’s football shirt’ and ‘women’s football shirt’, notably ‘men’s football shirt’ being outperformed by the other two search terms with similar trending peaks throughout Euro24.

And while thousands of dedicated British fans travelled to Germany over the course of the tournament, the full impact on the UK economy is yet to be fully recognised but retailers were anticipating a substantial uplift during the Euros 2024, with projections suggesting a potential £2.1 billion increase in sales.

This surge is primarily being driven by increased spending on food and drink purchases with people hosting viewing parties at home, electricals with fans updating their home entertainment set ups for the crispest sound and images possible, and all the official merchandise i.e. football shirts (Economy Impact).

Calling Full Time

Euro 2024 captivated audiences with historic moments and high stakes, culminating in Spain's record-breaking fourth title and England's heartbreaking final loss.

With a viewership of over 5 billion and significant social media surges, the tournament underscored football’s continued and growing global appeal. Advertisers benefited immensely, with 40% of viewers more likely to notice brands and TV ad spend rising by 20%. Player performances drove search trends, highlighting the need for brands to remain adaptive.

All in all, a real moment for sport and marketers. See you in 2028, where England, Northern Ireland, the Republic of Ireland, Scotland and Wales will co-host the tournament.