Which is the most popular IPL team?

Ask the observers to identify the most well-known cricket league in the world, and nearly all of them even critics will choose that it is the Indian Premier League. You can ask about the most loved team of the IPL and you're bound to receive a range of responses.

Which team has, actually, been the most popular throughout the league's 12 years of existence?

Let's look at the major factors that influence the team's popularity. These include the team's performance, size of the market in which it operates as well as its advertising and marketing power. The question arises which IPL team has most fans. These factors are not enough by themselves and neither does the absence of anyone means that a team is likely to be viewed as unpopular.

"Surprisingly that winning doesn't always have a bearing on the popularity of a team," Jasal Shah, the head of Velocity MR, which released an analysis of consumer perceptions about the IPL last year, told Cricket Monthly. "If you check out certain teams, particularly Royal Challengers Bangalore, they frequently lose, yet they're at to the very top of the chart for popularity. Some teams have also won the IPL but are not as popular."

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The place of a franchise is a factor in the size of the market it serves, giving teams in metropolitan areas a huge advantage. "Punjab as well as Rajasthan will remain smaller advertiser markets and will struggle to secure sponsorship deals when compared to the larger-four teams of Mumbai, Chennai, Kolkata and Bangalore and are capital cities of major states," Indranil Das Blah the founder Kwan Entertainment, the founder of Kwan Entertainment, said in an article in the 2018 IPL report through Duff & Phelps, a multinational consulting firm.

Duff & Phelps estimate that franchises invest between 5 to 15 percent of revenue on promotion and marketing. Naturally, certain teams are more adept in this area than others. "CSK has put money into every aspect of branding" Harish Bijoor, a specialist in brand strategy who spoke to The Cricket Monthly. "They have a great name, and they are represented by MS Dhoni who is a symbol of the brand for them. Their ' whistle podu campaign was a hit and took the brand deep into the hinterlands of Tamil Nadu. It was a bottom-up building of a brand and it's not an easy task."

There are a few popular factors that are particular to India. "What is significant to India that is distinctive is a famous angle," N Santosh, the partner of Duff & Phelps India, said to Cricket Monthly. "Celebrity involvement in the team makes it attractive to its fans and aids in keeping the fans, no matter if it's Shah Rukh Khan, Preity Zinta, or Shilpa Shetty." Evidently, the larger the star, the greater influence they have, however, celebrity power has an unintended consequence: if the popularity of the star decreases, so does the team's popularity.

Another reason to consider could be the existence of an Indian superstar player like Sachin Tendulkar or Dhoni. An Chris Gayle or an AB de Villiers might be popular however, they are thought of as international players. This is not the case with other major leagues. Frenchman Eric Cantona was the star of Manchester United in the early times of the English Premier League, while Egyptian Mo Salah is Liverpool's most-loved player. "If Virat [ Kohli has moved into Rajasthan Royals, there would be a change in loyalties," says Shah.

To answer the question, we'll take a look at the number of viewers watching television (and in the future, streaming numbers) as well as brand estimations and social media followers as well as anecdotal sponsoring and advertising data. To answer our question all 12 seasons in the IPL naturally permit study in two four-year blocks each which are followed by two two-year blocks every two years (Super Royals and Super Royals were both suspended for both the 2016 and 2017 seasons).

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