Social Network Sites and Football: Key issues for football club marketers (original) (raw)
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Social Network Sites and Relationship Marketing Communications: Challenges for UK Football Clubs
The remarkable rise of social network sites (SNS) and associated developments in consumer behavior presents research opportunities as well as challenges for marketing practitioners engaged in push-based traditional and digital marketing communications. This paper seeks to contribute to SNS literature by investigating its impact on organizational digital relationship marketing communications and how such organizations may respond strategically in the age of social media. A multiple case study approach was used to examine the challenges and concerns of English football clubs in relation to SNS. Within-case analysis preceded across-case analysis in order to identify emergent themes and key issues. The results provide empirical insights into current levels of integration of relationship marketing initiatives. Concerns of SNS include inertia, control and monetisation. The willingness and ability of cases to harness online community value is also tempered by concerns related to brand control. This paper is perhaps one of the first studies to focus on the organizational perspective of the SNS phenomena. Findings identify factors organizations should consider when devising a strategic response to the challenges and opportunities faced by SNS, with a view to influencing consumer behavior to mutual benefit. Such factors are tempered by the short-term commercial focus of cases concerned. Further research may include other countries, wider elements of social media and research from the consumer perspective.
Impact of social media on the way marketing is done in football clubs
Annals of Tropical Medicine and Public Health, 2020
Background:Sports fans always have a unique relationship with the club that they support or follow.Even if it is on a digital platform or in an offline manner. But there aren’t many studies or papers regarding how fans change the numbers of a club and affect their business model as well. This paper is an attempt to understand how social media is used as a platform for clubs to market themselves and also create an engagement between fans and players. Methods: A survey was conducted online in the form of a Questionnaire. Statistical methods were used to deduce the information which was collected on a primary basis. To determine the reliability of the data, Various statistical methods were also used. SPSS was also used to analyze the data which was collected.Conclusion:This study will make a significant contribution towards that side of the market which was untapped from this perspective. This research concluded that social media engagement has merged behaviours in social media.
2015
The growth and penetration of social media provide professional sport clubs with a powerful tool to communicate their brand to a worldwide fan base. This study aimed to provide an understanding of how Liverpool FC uses Facebook and Twitter in terms of communication tools and brand attributes and how its fan base engages to this usage in terms of key responding features of Facebook and Twitter. In addition, it aimed to analyze and compare UK and Greek fan clubs in terms of engagement, perceived brand benefits and effects in their consumption behavior. A mixed method case study design has been applied using content analysis, online questionnaires as well as focus group and one to one interviews. The research confirms the literature models of sports brand image in terms of identified product and non-product related brand attributes and brand benefits and enhances the literature on customer-based brand equity of sport clubs by taking a combined view of the usage of Facebook and Twitter ...
Managing brand presence through social media: the case of UK football clubs
Internet Research, 2014
Purpose - This research contributes to knowledge on the issues and benefits associated with managing brand presence and relationships through social media. UK football clubs are big businesses, with committed communities of fans, so are an ideal context from which to develop an understanding of the issues and challenges facing organisations as they seek to protect and promote their brand online. Design/methodology/approach - Owing to the emergent nature of social media, and the criticality of the relationships between clubs and their fans, an exploratory study using a multiple case study approach was used to gather rich insights into the phenomenon, from the club perspective. Findings - Clubs agreed that further development of social media strategies had potential to deliver interaction and engagement, community growth and belonging, traffic flow to official websites, and commercial gain. However, in developing their social media strategies they had two key concerns. The first concerned the control of the brand presence and image in social media, and how to respond to the opportunities that social media present to fans to impact on the brand. The second concern was how to strike an appropriate balance between strategies that deliver short term revenue, and those that build longer term brand loyalty. Originality/value - This research is the first to offer insights into the issues facing organisations when developing their social media strategy.
Social Media Strategy in Professional Football: The case of Liverpool FC
The purpose of this study is to examine the role of social media as marketing tools in professional team sport organizations. Focusing on the English Premier League football club Liverpool FC, an exploratory case study design using one-to-one interviews with the club's senior social media managers was adopted. The findings highlight the need for integration of all media channels of the club in order to allow for a more targeted and engaging approach towards its fans, and suggests that further development of social media strategies has potential to deliver increased commercial gains both in the short and in the long term. However, given the peculiar nature of sports fandom, a major issue for social media managers is to find the appropriate balance between content that increases fan interaction and engagement and content that deals with purely commercial purposes .
Communication & Sport, 2021
The emergence of social media and digital channels have expanded communication practices and also created new, virtual spaces where sports fans can interact and communicate directly with each other and with clubs. This article examines the potential for social media brand communities to develop a sense of both community and place amongst sports fans. It explores their influence in placemaking initiatives through the bonding and bridging social capital of a football club’s supporters. A netnographic study of a football club’s supporter networks (five channels) and their interactions with social media brand communities was performed. Data gathered from online sources was underpinned by interviews with 25 members of the community. Findings were analysed via NVivo using bridging and bonding social capital as a theoretical lens. The paper makes two primary contributions to knowledge. It enhances our understanding of the impact of SMBCs and their use in a sporting context—an area that has...
THE IMPACT OF LFC SOCIAL MEDIA ON LIVERPOOL FC SUPPORTERS' PERCEPTION AND THEIR PURCHASE INTENTION
2019
Nowadays, many sports organisations including football clubs have started a new trend to survive in competitive market conditions on the internet; online football marketing. Online football marketing has become a significant topic to consider for all major football clubs, in another saying, for all football companies in the world. Since the internet has a crucial part in people’s lives, football related companies have found a quite useful way to gain supporters, who turn into customers by making digital marketing involve in individuals' lives. Liverpool Football Club is one of those professional football clubs with a worldwide fan base and seeks new markets to enhance its digital marketing touchpoints as well as maximise profits. Therefore, the aim of this study is to prepare a research project that observes in what manner LFC Social Media affects LFC supporters’ perception and their purchase intention by reviewing the previous researches and testing particular hypotheses. In the first chapter, the researcher provides an introduction about the motivations and research objectives behind the subject. In the second chapter, the researcher reviews the literature for the concept of football fans’ customer behaviour and the theory behind this subject. Further, the third section of the text puts words together about the research methods and the philosophy of this study. In the fourth chapter, several analyses are carried out and each hypothesis is tested. In the final chapter, the researcher provides a conclusion and the findings that were made.