Hi everyone and welcome to my first Blog, I will be talking about the impact that social media as had on Somerset County Cricket Club. Somerset’s social media presence tends to be on Twitter with 94.5k followers and Instagram with 45.1k followers.
Social Media has had a huge impact on sport in the last ten years, Filo et al. (2015) stats that “The emergence of social media has profoundly impacted the delivery and consumption of sport.” As social media use has increased in recent years, sport businesses and brands have come up with different ways to communicate with consumers, and generate revenue through social media. Somerset have found a way to keep fans up to date with whats going on with the club during the off season and during the season, Somerset uses Instagram to post training sessions, player signings, ways of buying tickets for games and many more things, these types of post also go onto twitter to help reach a wide range of consumers.
Mitchell (2015) cited in Pedersen et al (2016) says “Millions of fans and consumers have now transitioned from purely using traditional media to receive their sport content to a integrated approach where they engage through a variety of platforms.” With the ever increasing number of people that are transitioning from traditional media to new media many sports club have had to do the same and having to use new media to provide results for there team where as they used to have results put into newspapers or on teletext, they now have to put it on there own social media accounts.
By engaging fans via social media, Somerset can open new communication channels with their consumers that can be measured and valued as a new commercial opportunity with sponsors. Sports clubs that get involved through sponsorships and social media promotions tend to benefit from increased brand affinity and loyalty.
Yet sports clubs are only beginning to appreciate the potential that this offers. An example of a team doing this well is FC Barcelona they have become the world’s largest sports club on social media with followers expected to approach 150 million this year. Last year, it worked with sports marketing agency IMG to examine what value social media adds to its shirt sponsorship rights. Over one weekend, there were 61 million web impressions of the Qatar Foundation’s sponsorship of the club’s shirts.
Ioakimidis (2010) says that “Online sports marketing has become the best foundation for building communications for professional sports leagues and teams”. Somerset have begun to use Instagram takeovers by players to get the fans engaging with players, during these takeovers a player will go round filming on Somerset’s Instagram stories showing fans what goes on at training and they also provide to opportunity to let the fans ask them questions. This chance to engage the fans in some of the days of training at the club really makes the fans feel like a part the club.
Mobile phones and tablets have allowed social media to flourish and now cricket stadiums such as Lancashire’s Old Trafford and Taunton, home of Somerset CCC, offer fans Wi-Fi, enabling not only more interactions at live events but more commercial activity, too. Spectators now have the ability to make additional purchases or seat upgrades, for example, from the venue.
During live games Somerset provide fans at the game to take selfies of them at the games and use a hashtag on Twitter or Instagram to give them a chance of being shown on the big screen at the ground. This is another example of Somerset using social media to get fans engaged but at live events which gets them excited to feature on the big screen.
With this changing media landscape, where sports organisations can tell their stories directly to their fans through their own social or digital channels, is making it more difficult for traditional news journalists to get access to athletes or coaches. The organisation’s media department often holds the power to decide which player appears, where and when, and it’s becoming more common that their own channels win. Somerset have their own blog on their website which shares news from the club and writes reports on games that have been played and they often hold interviews with players and tend to only let the main news outlets to interview players such as Sky Sports or BBC, this could possibly make it harder for older fans of the club to find match reports or interviews
The voice as well as the face of sport is changing in response to social and digital media. In this context, with all of the relationships between fans, sports stars and clubs and journalism shifting, what shape will the future take?
References
Filo, K., Lock, D., King, A. (2015) Sport and social media research: A review, Sport Management Review, Vol. 18 Issue: 2, PP.166-181
Pedersen, P.M., Laucella, P.C., Kian, E., and Guurin, A.N. (2016) Strategic Sport Communication. 2nd ed. Leeds: Human Kinetics.
Ioakimidis, M. (2010) Online marketing of professional sports clubs: engaging fans on a new playing field, International Journal of Sports Marketing and Sponsorship, Vol. 11 Issue: 4, pp.2-13
socialmediain.sport.blog 