How Ally Financial is helping back women in the gaming and esports spaces

As part of Ally Financial's efforts to reach younger people, the team has been taking part in various gaming endeavors and also looking to amplify women's voices.

Ozzie Mejia

December 7, 2023 1:00 PM

The streaming space and the esports world have gradually opened up more and more to women. However, there are plenty of young women out there looking to get into streaming or professional gaming who need guidance. The team at Ally Financial, its gaming division specifically, is looking to help. To learn more, we spoke with Ally Senior Director for Brand and Partnerships Beth Woodruff.

"As a brand, we have a commitment, we call it the 50/50 Commitment," Woodruff told Shacknews. "We want to, by 2027, spend equal amounts on men's and women's advertising in sports and that's really intrinsic to our brand, this idea that we really want to focus on equity for women and men in sports and we consider esports a huge part of that, as well. So it was a natural evolution, as we built Ally Arena, we started a partnership with Rocket League as part of that. We felt like this commitment really needed to extend to esports and so much of what we've been doing is trying to create pathways for females in the esports and gaming space, but also create ways that we can amplify their gameplay, as well as understand their needs better to be a better brand partner to them."

Woodruff also talks about the intersection between Ally as a financial institution with gaming as a hobby, as well as some of Ally's ventures in the gaming space. This includes the formation of events like the Ally Women's Open in Rocket League and backing up-and-coming women in the streaming space. For more interviews like this, head over to Shacknews and Shacknews Interviews on YouTube.

Ozzie Mejia

Senior Editor

Ozzie has been playing video games since picking up his first NES controller at age 5. He has been into games ever since, only briefly stepping away during his college years. But he was pulled back in after spending years in QA circles for both THQ and Activision, mostly spending time helping to push forward the Guitar Hero series at its peak. Ozzie has become a big fan of platformers, puzzle games, shooters, and RPGs, just to name a few genres, but he’s also a huge sucker for anything with a good, compelling narrative behind it. Because what are video games if you can't enjoy a good story with a fresh Cherry Coke?

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