Welcome to the 15th Irish social media report, brought to you first on Sport for Business this morning by Sportego, specialists in social media and sport.
The Paralympics dominated Irish Sport in September producing far and away the greatest increase in social media reach.
The return of the PRO12, the All-Ireland Finals and the start of the European leg of the World Cup qualifiers also ensure that fans had plenty of top level Irish sport to keep them entertained.
On social media fans were engaged with 15 of the Governing Bodies of Irish Sport experiencing growth. This month for the first time Sportego includes Swim Ireland in its list of 16 monitored sports. The governing body of Irish swimming debuts in the charts at 11th, with an impressive 27k social reach.
Given the success of the Irish Paralympic team in Rio it is no surprise to see they saw huge month to month growth from August to September. Their total reach grew by an impressive 30%. To put this in context the next biggest growth experienced by a sporting body across all the social channels monitored (Facebook, Twitter and Instagram) was 2.56% by Triathlon Ireland.
Jason Smyth delivered gold on the track and his success proved a winner on social for the Paralympic body with his T13 100m win leading to a very high 18% engagement rate on Instagram. The post just pipping its Facebook equivalent.
Hashtag Insight
#BeActive was the pan European hashtag in use to promote the European Week of Sport in Ireland. In all nine of the 16 sporting bodies monitored used the tag though engagement on it was low suggesting a perceived less relevance to the primary content of the sites.
Six of the bodies used the #Paralympics hashtag and generated an engagement rate of just under 1% while the #BeActive tag hit less than 1 in 200 in terms of engagement.
Twitter falling short on lasting impact
When compared to its peers, Twitter doesn’t deliver the same engagement levels as Facebook and Instagram. The instant nature of the platform meaning that posts can be missed unless virality is achieved.
However 24.7k engagements for Paralympic Ireland, an increase of 746% on the previous month deserves special mention. So too does the FAI, who despite a drop of 45% remained the most engaged body in Irish sport on that platform.
Staying with Twitter, a key metric we like to look at is mention and potential reach. In this regard the FAI led the way with a social reach of 31 million, four times that of its nearest rival, Cricket Ireland.
The Paralympic Ireland story reached 920k people with Basketball Ireland and the Special Olympics moving into the top 8.
Looking for Reach from Partnerships
When looking at digital partnerships, brands getting involved with sports clubs and leagues should look at their potential reach.
Subtle brand placement such as the Irish team drinking probably the best beer in the world in the changing room could have a much wider reach than tagging an advertisement and having stars using a brand in a picture offers more again.
National versus Global
In addition to adding Swim Ireland to our reporting, this month we also delved into the location breakdown of followers on Facebook for the big four of the GAA, FAI, Irish Rugby and Cricket Ireland. Special thanks to Result Sport for their research into this.
If you are looking at a strong Irish reach, then the GAA fits the bill best, as might be expected. 74% of their Facebook likes are Irish based.
In international terms though Cricket ireland leads the way. It’s domestic audience of 11,000 makes up only 2% of the total reach.
Cricket strongholds India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka account for 57% of their reach with the UK and Australia also featuring strongly. The worldwide appeal of Irish Cricket is a very positive message for the sport and shows the wide appeal of the content they are sharing. This is something which might be of use in the ongoing move towards achieving full test status.
The other main social sports in Ireland also have a majority of fans outside the island of Ireland.
Irish based followers account for just 44.78% of the FAI Facebook page. The United Kingdom, as you might expect makes up almost 20% of the likes with the USA and Germany also featuring highly.
The IRFU boast an Irish based following of 227k or 43% of their total following with the UK making up 24%. France, Italy and Australia, Argentina and New Zealand account for 11% of their likes.
The IRFU remain the biggest Facebook page in Irish sport administration, despite a slight drop in the off season for international competition from August to September.
Want to know more about your audience and how you stand up to your peers? Get in touch with Trev@sportego.ie
