How the evolution of technology has influenced darts
Many sports have had to adapt to the changes that technology has ushered in over the last 30 years. While early technological changes from the 1990s were much slower to take hold, as soon as the internet started to permeate every level of our lives, there was a huge, immediate need for sports to adapt to this technology accordingly.
To better understand the changes that technology has brought into the darts world, we need to break them down into two areas. First, the impact on the sport includes how the game is watched and refereed and how tickets are sold.
Second, there’s the broader impact, or what some people might refer to as the indirect impact, which encompasses other markets, such as darts betting websites, the proliferation of websites that sell merchandise and how social media now plays a pivotal role in putting the sport in the shop window.
Sports betting markets
Technology has defined the current era of sports betting. It’s gone from the smoky, jostling floors of land-based bookies in the UK to digital, global sports entertainment titans. Without the internet, this simply wouldn’t be the case.
The sports betting markets in the UK have been able to adjust to technology, partially due to the UK Gambling Act of 2005 being so revolutionary in providing a solid framework that companies could operate within. It’s also the home of darts, so it was a perfect recipe allowing darts sports betting markets to adapt to the new technology. Companies that executed their plans and business models correctly found a whole new world of potential lying in wait.
The best betting sites UK customers have access to encompass a wide range of sports. While darts betting might be on the outskirts of the wider betting world, sports betting platforms have become very wide ranging. Darts have continued to grow in popularity, so the fusion of these two factors has led to a burgeoning and thriving betting market that buzzes under the bonnet of the explosivity and tenacity of the world’s top darts competitions.
Cultivating communities
Darts has always been a great game for friends down at the pub. While the top tournaments always attract a substantial audience, it wasn’t until media technology was enhanced, ushering in social media sites such as YouTube, that the darts world started to grow into new markets.
For much of the 1980s and 1990s, darts was a UK-centric sport. However, even browsing the upcoming Professional Darts Corporation (PDC) calendar, you can see tournaments and events in destinations as far-reaching as Brisbane in Australia and the New Zealand capital of Wellington.
The internet has allowed communities of darts fans, both domestically and overseas, to come together, allowing marketers and promotions to test the waters with overseas events and to gain an accurate idea of how much of an appetite there was for the sport overseas.
The impact of social media
In a digital age where marketers are increasingly reliant on video clips that can be compressed into a digestible TikTok-sized video, darts is a sport that fits the bill perfectly. The quickfire games, the intense, short bursts of players chasing doubles and trebles, and even landmark moments in tournaments, such as when Willie Borland hit a 9-darter in 2021, took a grand total of 41 seconds.
Social media marketers and managers have been able to harness the quickfire nature of social media and darts to create marketing strategies that help to reach as many viewers as possible.
Ultimately, the evolution of technology has helped it reach a much bigger international audience. While this is the case for many UK-based sports, few could boast they were as UK-centric as darts in the days before the internet. The market is taking hold in the US, mainland Europe, and parts of Australia and New Zealand. Primarily, this results from technological evolution and its influence on the overall sport.
Watching darts in the digital age
Dart's popularity stemmed from its appearance on mainstream TV in the UK in the 1990s. As satellite television took over and big-money operators moved in, which made it more expensive to watch the sport, digital media started to swing the pendulum in the opposite direction.
The evolution of technology ensured that darts fans could use the internet to keep up to date with the latest news, scores and highlights without paying more for expensive subscriptions.
Similar to social media, technology has opened up the market and expanded the community. Its influence is widespread, and although it might not have had a profound impact on how the game is played, especially at a professional level, there’s no denying that technology has made it much easier to watch the sport domestically and internationally.
Final thoughts
Many of the changes that technology has brought into the world of darts are changes we’ve also seen across the world of professional sports. Darts isn’t particularly unique in this sense. It has been able to leverage technology and adapt in the same way, with social media managers quickly recognizing the incredible potential technology has in introducing the sport into fresh markets.
While the rise of social media played a pivotal role in the growth of darts' popularity, the underlying technology also played an important role. Without the mass adoption of smartphones, cheaper internet access and a society that shifted and embraced this technology, perhaps these changes wouldn’t have been as widespread.
As the world continues gravitating toward technological changes, the darts industry will tirelessly search for ways to implement any new changes that allow the sport to continue growing.