For any sport events, main important part
is fan engagement. Every loyal fan can help boost brand of any team, player,
league.
In simple language; Fan Engagement is
connection, communication and experience sharing among fans and team or league
or player. All teams or leagues or players in sports world always want to
engage themselves with their fans. In other way, fans are also excited by
connecting with their favorite team or league or player. This engagement is voluntary.
There are debates about important aspect
of any sports. Some people say sport itself is most important. Some say players
are important. Some say league or teams are important and some say sponsors are
important. These all aspects for any sports business are dependent on one
common thing and that is Fanbase.
Loyal fanbase will create great sports brand
in long run. They affect decisions on sponsorship and players. For any successful
leagues in the world, there is always most loyal fan engagement.
For creating fan engagement, communication
and connection should be positive. Negative sentiments among fans will have
adverse effect and it is not good for brand health. So, content creation is essential
key to engage fans positively.
Fan engagement is helpful for creating
strong base for different leagues. For example, Indian Premier League (IPL) is
most successful cricket league in India. However, other leagues like Pro
Kabaddi League (PKL) and India Super League (ISL) for Football have made their
mark thanks to fan base. League like PKL focused on various attributes of
Kabaddi sport, player profiles, critical moments in game to get attention of
new fans for the sport. Loyal fan base can give boost to leagues in different
sports which are less known and make these sports world events.
In line with IPL, PKL, ISL; there are
other leagues started in India for Tennis, Badminton, Volleyball. These new
sport leagues will do great work to engage fans and generate more fans to
popularize sport culture in India.
On Field and Off Field fan engagement
Fan engagement can be on field and off
field. On field fan engagement example is event happened inside stadium during
live match. It is by cheering for favourite team, enjoying live game in a
league, capturing special fan moments. It is all about living every moment of
game in a league.
Off Field fan engagement is mainly
happened on social media, internet, hoardings, advertisements out side stadiums.
During time of pandemic when matches are played in absence of fans in stadiums,
social media becomes top priority for all leagues for engaging with their fans.
Content creation targeting moods and choices of fans is in great demand.
Stadium place is limited so every fan
cannot come and watch live match. This is limited to 60,000 to 70,000 fans at
maximum who can enjoy league live at stadium. Lot of fan base is actually off
the field so it is very important to engage fans in other ways off the field.
On social media, it is possible to connect
24/7 and 365 days a year. One can access social media at any time and see
happenings in league.
Transactional and Non-Transactional fan
engagement
Fan engagement can be viewed as
transactional and non-transactional basis also. If a fan is buying ticket or
t-shirts or caps or paid content voluntarily to enjoy every bit of his/her favourite
sport, it is transactional engagement which involves money.
Non-transactional engagements are not
including monetary aspects but mainly emotional connects on social media
platforms, participation in survey, work as volunteer for any event.
Social Media content and fan engagement
All leagues are on various social media
platforms like facebook, twitter, Instagram. They engage their fans by various
innovative ideas like Coaches speech, Informative data & analysis, news, match
schedule & timings, small clips from games, match highlights in
photographs, match interesting moments, season points table, behind the scenes
like warm up, practice, team meeting, fan voting etc.
There is minor difference in each social
media platform engagement. Instagram and Facebook can be used for Reels and
photographs. Twitter can be suited for fan voting apart from photographs and
short videos.
Many leagues or teams create positive stories
around players. After watching such content, fans can be attracted emotionally
with league or team or player. More positive stories around various players or
team or league, more will be fan engagement.
Posts shared on social media by league or
team or player create long lasting memory for small milestones. Fans share and
enjoy such memories among each other. Hashtags are used on social media to
share such memories with big mass. Looking at fan engagement, these hashtags
can be named as ‘Fantags’. Hashtags given by fans are ‘Fantags’.
Effective digital strategy is the one which
can effectively engage fans with team or league or player. Social media
insights on fans and their behavior will help companies to market their
products effectively and thus it is helpful for business as a large.
Social media content writers, digital
marketer, video makers, photograph editors are in great demand from sports
league due to effect of social media on fan engagement. No league or team or
player want to miss such a great engagement opportunity.
Emergence of fantasy sports business in
India is pure example of fan engagement effect. Sport lover always want to
provide his/her input on starting team, combination of players, auction of
player and want to have experience in real life. This became inputs for all
fantasy sports companies and they created various formats for fantasy team, selection
of players which can be played along with match.
Fans want to learn lot about various business
aspects of leagues and thus it creates platform for all relevant field experts
to share their thoughts with league fans. So, fan engagement is helpful for
full league eco system be it business or player or auction strategy or sponsors
or broadcaster or team or supporting business avenues or field experts or
sports commentators.
No comments:
Post a Comment