The sponsorship of women’s sport and sportswomen is always a hot topic. 2025 is well underway and this is when the work begins for those who are looking to garner some much-needed financial backing from a sponsor.
Someone who knows a fair amount about what it takes to land sponsorships is none other than Jessica Nkomo. She is nothing short of a trailblazer in her industry as she founded the first-ever sports agency for women athletes.
Bokamoso Sports Agency has become an industry leader as Nkomo continues to show just how dedicated she is to seeing women in sport thrive.
As the year kicks off the cogs for acquiring sponsorship have started to turn for the head of marketing and sponsorship. Companies are now getting back to the grinding wheel with the festive season long behind us. Along with her company duties, Nkomo is also a football agent, so she is also busy with player transfer at this time of year.
Back to the business of sponsorship and Nkomo has shared with gsport her valuable insight as to just what sportswomen who are looking to land a sponsor should be doing. Her advice is to ensure you have carefully curated social media pages that will attract possible funders.


“It’s the packaging of the specific individual, that speaks about your brand, in terms of how you present yourself in a social space. Your social media needs to be attractive and appealing to the consumer or to the person whose door you are knocking on. You need to have a social media following and unfortunately, we are in an era where most people base metrics on the large number of followers, it doesn’t essentially carry a lot of weight when it comes to the analytics of it.
“Just because you have 50,000 followers doesn’t mean you are interacting with all 50,000. Somebody can have a following of 5000 and have more engagement than a person with a large following. Unfortunately, that is how it has been set up, so the more followers you get the more attractive the profile.”
Bokamoso Sports Agency Boss, Jessica ‘Aunty Diski’ Nkomo
‘Aunty Diski’- as she is affectionately known – added that having an attractive bio that speaks about yourself and your work is vital. Not forgetting to also ensure there is a way to contact you via your page, to allow possible sponsors direct contact with you.
Highlighting what you are all about is something that every athlete needs to do in Nkomo’s opinion so creating an informative profile will be paramount to your efforts.
“A profile is also very important, this is your CV that you are sending to potential sponsors to say this is me, this is what I have, this is what I do and this is ROI (return on investment) that you can get from sponsoring me. That is the most important thing an athlete can have. Do your research and understand what the company is about and what values you share with that company”, she added.
Women’s sports sponsorship has really become a talking point in recent years with more companies putting their money where their mouth is. Nkomo feels that although there have been a few companies that have put their hands up when it comes to the sponsoring of women’s sport, there has not much been change in the sponsorship sector.
“I think it’s been one or two brands that we can speak about, but as in sponsorship holistically in all aspects, I don’t think there has been an increase. You can identify certain things …”
“Puma coming into the women’s space for netball, as well as the football players, and the increase in the number of how many women it can sponsor. Maybe there are one or two brands that have stood out in terms of sponsoring, however, I don’t get the relevant growth or the necessary growth that we need. I can’t give you a player who I can say is the female version of a Siya Kolisi in terms of sponsorship.”
“What needs to be done and this is not from us who are asking for sponsorship it’s from the people who are giving sponsorships. I feel what needs to be done is breaking boundaries, breaking stereotypes, and onboarding female ambassadors for specific brands. The ratio of male athletes to female athletes is evident and we still have a long way to go. There needs to be a change in the culture and the attitude of growing interest in the spaces of supporting women in sport.”
Nkomo believes women’s sport is highly valuable to sponsors.
“When we speak about the financial conversation in women’s sport it’s non-existent, so we are already battling the money challenge. When sponsorship comes, it changes that conversation, to say we can sponsor with this and this, and that brings a little bit of a relief to the club and relief to the players themselves.
It dignifies the game to see the marketing around it and the financial muscle also brings smiles to the girls. You don’t understand how frustrating it is to be an athlete who still can’t put food on the table. You have to train and put in the work to represent your club and your country. Having that relief as taking the sport as a profession is something that every woman who plays in sport is manifesting for. To wake up and be an athlete and be paid for the job that you do as opposed to several other jobs just for you to make it work.”
She had this advice to women in sports who are looking to commercialise their brands.
“Speak out a little bit more, I feel like the people who are speaking out a little bit more are us, people who are representatives but I feel like our voices don’t reach the right ears.
“If our voices joined with their voices it becomes a little bit better when you start being a little bit more aggressive with their demands. So begin having these open and honest conversations with the people.”
On a personal front, Nkomo is no stranger to winning on the gsport stage, she was again a star performer and won a top prize at the 2024 gsport Awards, taking home the Woman in PR and Sponsorship. She says she has fully benefitted from the #PowerOfRecognition.
“Sometimes the fuel you need as a person or the ignition you need comes from being recognised by others. We work in our little pockets and sometimes the lack of motivation and the lack of people clapping for us, make us feel like we are not doing enough. However, stepping on that stage and being recognised gives you that edge and it gives you the fuel to do more.”
“You don’t stand on that stage just for yourself, but you have inspired others as well to motivate others it opens up a lot of opportunities because now you are hungry to do more.”
“It’s also a platform that created a wide network for us to engage, create, and exchange ideas on how we can carry on with the conversation of what gsport is trying to do. My gsport Awards have boosted my CV and opened a lot of doors. It’s given me recognition in spaces that I didn’t think my name would be called upon.”
She had this message for women in sport for 2025: “We need to unite and not against each other. I think there has been a lot of shying away from certain truths in the industry, and I think sometimes when we want to build something together as women, we can be obstacles in achieving that.”
“This should be a year where we don’t work against each other but we work together,” says Nkomo. “We don’t see each other as competition but rather as people who are cementing themselves in spaces.”
Main Photo Caption: Jessica ‘Aunty Diski’ Nkomo is the trailblazing founder Bokamoso Sports Agency, the first agency for women athletes. She shared some precious advice to those who are looking to sign sponsorship in 2025. All Photos: Supplied
Photo 2 Caption: Nkomo is a multiple-time winner on the gsport Awards stage, and her experience empowers her with great insight into this critical sector.
Photo 3 Caption: To make sustainable progress in sponsorship of women in sport, Nkomo says: “This should be a year where we work together.”