Are there gender differences?

http://opendorse.com/blog/top-10-athlete-endorsement-earners-by-gender/ This webpage shows exactly how much the top male and female celebrity endorsements are valued at. There is a significant difference wit men almost tripling their women counterparts in earnings. This suggests that women generally endorse less products for brands than men.

In sports the main difference between men and women is the inequality of prize money. Many sports such as football, cricket, golf, darts continue to pay unequal amounts of prize money to different genders. Sponsors say that the audiences are not big enough for many events, therefor there is not enough cash generated. If there is not a wide enough audience this could impact a sponsors decision on endorsements with certain players/athletes.


'Tennis players rule the list with seven individuals. Tennis is the one sport that generates significant revenue on both the men’s and women’s side. The result is near equal prize money in tennis and widespread TV coverage, which attracts sponsors who want athletes getting exposure. Tennis’ demographics are also strong with tennis fans wielding high disposable incomes to spend on equipment, apparel, watches and cars.'
http://www.forbes.com/sites/kurtbadenhausen/2015/08/12/the-worlds-highest-paid-female-athletes-2015/#7e25c00c7b11

This may encourage brands to also think about the sport, rather than just the celebrity athlete.

Maria Sharapova was the highest paid female athlete for 11 years running, until she failed a drug test and lost a lot of her endorsements.

Here is a link for a video of Maria Sharapova admitting to drug use whilst competing professionally.
http://money.cnn.com/video/news/2016/03/07/maria-sharapova-failed-drug-test.cnnmoney/

 

Tiger Woods is another example of being one of the highest earning sportspeople to lose their endorsements.  http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp dyn/content/article/2010/02/19/AR2010021902442.html )


With regards to sports, there are few sports where women earn as much in endorsements as men do so I would say that there are gender imbalances. However, there are certain cases where this would not be applicable.