Agents and Business Managers of Artists, Performers, and Athletes

In our Arab countries, you might see a young man crying tears of joy at the sight of Messi holding the World Cup, and see another shedding tears of sadness over Cristiano Ronaldo's team being knocked out of the tournament. This huge outpouring of feeling toward soccer players, or celebrities in general — athletes, artists, and others — might seem a bit strange, especially since we know very well that such celebrities live a life we, as ordinary people, couldn't dream of even a small part of. A player like Cristiano Ronaldo can earn, in a single minute, more than $880,000 for just one sponsored post on his Instagram account, all because he has more than half a billion followers. In 2022, Forbes magazine estimated that Ronaldo's earnings by the end of that year had reached $100 million, while Lionel Messi earned $110 million. You might be surprised that the bulk of both players' earnings came from endorsements, not from the salaries they receive from the football clubs they play for. Football players, professionals in various sports, and celebrities from actors and singers to others can earn enormous profits if they choose their offers wisely and succeed in negotiating the highest possible pay, whether from advertising deals, football clubs, or production companies in the case of artists. But can you imagine a footballer, actor, or singer negotiating on their own with the companies or clubs that want to sign them? Certainly not — they simply don't have the time for that, and most of these celebrities don't have the ability to market themselves well enough to land the best offers, or the negotiating skill to secure the best possible pay. And we're talking here about people working in fields where profits are measured in the hundreds of millions of dollars, so opportunities and offers need to be handled in the best possible way, and there need to be people capable of doing all this on their behalf. That's where the people known as artist managers or player agents come in — people who have the expertise and qualifications to handle all these matters, and we could say they do everything on behalf of their clients. There isn't an athlete or artist in the world who doesn't have their own business manager handling all their interests, and in the lines ahead you'll learn in detail about the various tasks handled by celebrity business managers.

Meet the Writer: Waleed Abo Omiraa