From time to time I talk about sports and Internet marketing here at Marketing Pilgrim. I do it mainly because I am a fan but even more so as a marketer because sports sells. Now being in the US, soccer (or football to the rest of the world) is not as dominant in terms of shear numbers and impact as a spectator sport. It does, however, count millions of youngsters as players of the game and many others catching on during the start of the World Cup in South Africa today.

It looks like the US and the rest of the world are taking notice. Beet.tv reports

Akamai, the world’s largest operator of a network of computers, today is showing on its Web site that it is the busiest day for bandwidth demand for news sites. With some 11 million visitor requests per minute to its network, up 233 percent from the normal demand at this time.

The previous record for most video requests was the Inauguration of Barack Obama.

Below is a screenshot of the Akamai “live” counter showing the impact on several continents with increased traffic.

All very interesting indeed especially if you have products and services to market to the World Cup soccer fan. Considering that this is essentially soccer’s “Super Bowl”, it will be interesting to see just how the Internet, social media and the whole Internet ecosystem effects the impact of the event and the growth of the sport in places like the US moving forward.

Of course, what would help is that teams win and progress through the tournament. Sports fans can be a fickle lot especially with so many ‘fair weather’ fans jumping on board for this big event.

Here’s to success for your team. In fact, tell us who you will be pulling for so we can see just where some of readers’ allegiances are.