How Haley Rosen leads the women’s sports movement with hype

Haley Rosen, the founder and CEO of Just Women’s Sports, “leads with hype, not guilt.” “As a brand we’ve always pushed that we’re not going to guilt people into making this a big business,” said Rosen, a former soccer pro. “We have to show them just how freaking dope it is, and it is—it’s exciting and it’s the pinnacle of athleticism.” These days the door to the world of women’s sports has been kicked wide open with the rise of stars such as the athletes in the 2024 WNBA rookie class, including Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese. Women’s soccer, with the upcoming 2024 Paris Olympics and the popularity of the NWSL in the U.S., is on the rise. Rosen predicts that women’s volleyball will be another area for growth and attention. The interest in women athletes is reflected in the growth of Just Women’s Sports, Rosen's social media-first sports media brand that reaches 80 million fans a month across TikTok, Instagram, YouTube and other platforms. In 2023, Just Women’s Sports’ audience grew 148%, and revenue increased 48%, according to the media company. During March Madness this year, Just Women’s Sports generated almost 200 million impressions across its digital properties, Rosen said. And the majority of the media brand’s audience, about 75%, is under the age of 34, she said. “We need to take this window of opportunity and turn it into something really special,” Rosen said. Just Women’s Sports has brought brands to the games, too, including work with Ally, Nike, Grubhub, State Farm and Delta. For Rosen, this is just the beginning of the creation of a media ecosystem around women’s sports. “Our guiding light for this year is we think we’ve done a good job of raising the visibility for women’s sports,” Rosen said, “and we think the next step for us as an industry is to make women’s sports 365 days a year 24/7.” Read about Ad Age’s 2024 Leading Women here What advice would you give to your younger self? Don’t overthink, and just go for it. It sounds so simple, but as a young adult, your instinct can be to wait for permission, or the perfect plan. But the reality is you just have to make the leap, especially when it comes to starting a company. There’s no manual, and other people’s advice will only get you so far. You have to be willing to put yourself out there and learn as you go. What’s the biggest risk you’ve ever taken? Leaving a comfortable job in tech to start Just Women’s Sports. I knew the potential for this space was there, but it was still “early” when I decided to make the leap four years ago. People thought I was crazy when I told them I knew women’s sports could be big time, but here we are today. If you weren’t doing your current job, what would you be doing and why? Playing professional soccer. It’s still the dream that got away, thanks to a series of injuries. But in an ideal world, I would be out on the field rather than covering the games. What should the industry do to encourage more women and people of color into its ranks? I think the biggest thing is that we need to diversify every step of the pipeline. That starts with understanding how specific positions are filled and working backward to make sure the talent pools we are selecting from are appropriately diverse. Being more transparent about the pipeline—and which positions are more likely to be filled from within the industry versus without—would help us better understand the gaps in the process and where our efforts should be focused. On top of that, I think we need to work on eliminating bias in the hiring process and provide more flexible working environments. How will AI impact your job in the future? I think AI is only going to make strategic decision-making an even more critical skill. It may help in executing certain tasks, whether that’s drafting emails, brainstorming ideas or even serving as a thought partner on important decisions. But the more powerful these tools become, the more important the judgment will be of the person wielding them. And especially in our industry, where strategic partnerships and interpersonal relationships are so key to making everything work, I don’t expect AI to crowd out those uniquely human skills of decision-making and teamwork. Rather, it’s just going to make them even more important than they are. Read about Ad Age’s 2024 Leading Women here

How Haley Rosen leads the women’s sports movement with hype

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