Qualitative study of the positive consequences of using sports marketing in Iranian Premier League clubs

The purpose of this study was to qualitatively study the positive consequences of using sports marketing in Iranian Premier League clubs.The research method is exploratory and has a qualitative nature that used the grounded theory technique. The research population included professors of sports management, CEOs and marketers of Iranian Premier League football clubs, members of the marketing committee of the Football Federation. Targeted method and snowball technique were used for sampling. Open-ended interviews were used to collect data. Data were analyzed from 17 interviews. Three interviews were coded as a sample and finally the reliability of 85% was obtained. The results showed that in the open coding process, a total of 120 non-duplicate initial codes were generated. Codes based on thematic similarity were divided into 12 central codes and finally 4 selected codes. These codes were: fundamental consequences including football, legal-legal and behavioral-moral; Structural consequences including club, technological-advertising and human resources; Environmental consequences include social, cultural and fans-customers and finally economic consequences including income-investment, entrepreneurship-employment and economic growth. According to the results of the present study and presenting the positive consequences of using sports marketing, it is necessary that the managers and officials of the federation, league organization take the necessary action to employ and implement sports marketing management to be able to benefit from its positive consequences.