Sports Media and Culture Coming Together
Social media is a new constant in any business or sports organization. Businesses and organizations can use these new platforms or trends to their benefit, but it is quite frankly a challenge some teams are still trying to figure out. With new platforms gaining popularity, Tiktok for example, teams have been jumping on the application to try and figure out how this can expand their fan experience and boost their products.
One of the teams who is using Tiktok to its full potential is the Premier League’s Leeds United Football Club. Leeds is the first football club in the world to partner with TikTok as an e-commerce partner. The deal consists of the club having a shopping tab directly on their homepage, and the products they may feature in their videos, being directly linked to that page as well. The deal is not only great traction for their products, but it is also a new step-up in fan experience. Being involved on an app like TikTok, not only shows that the club is a part of trends and the next big thing, but it also shows that the team is willing to be on a platform that will boost their reach to the younger generation, and hopefully draw in that crowd to games. Another team that has been getting involved on Tiktok, is the Detroit Lions of the National Football League. The team is constantly responding back to fans, through comments, videos of their players, and even “changing” their logo because someone said their current one needed an upgrade. These small things that each team is doing, are ultimately drawing in the younger generation, and creating a fan experience outside of the game.
This social media wave is a new way for organizations to be more involved with their brand’s image and elevate it to the next level. There are other organizations who are following almost the same idea, but with a different outcome. The music industry is one of the biggest industries worldwide. In 2020, music globally made over 23.1 billion dollars in revenue, according to Rolling Stone, which is up seven percent from 2019. So, why wouldn’t organizations like the Wolverhampton Wanderers, a Premier League football club, create their own record label company? Wolves Records is the first record label to be created by a football club. The partnership will benefit both sides by bringing their respective fan bases together. The idea is already swarming with success as it has already added a “lifelong” fan club for the artists. Wolves Records also signed their first big artist, S-X, to the label who has already collaborated with artists like Nicki Minaj, Chance the Rapper, and many more.
Being able to think outside the box and create new innovative ways to boost your brand, club, or organization is important for the fan experience. Having the ability to follow through on that fan experience outside of the actual game or arena, is also extremely important. In the attention economy, teams are fighting to capture the focus and passion of the younger generation and can do so by interacting with them on popular social platforms like TikTok and showing an affiliation with cultural trends. Being able to not only speak to them through social media and music, but understand their trends, is important to their own personal fan experience with sports. There is nothing more powerful than understanding the fan behaviors that matter most to your supporters.