A bright spot for a small league: social media performance in a football league without a COVID-19 lockdown

Weimar, Daniel; Holthoff, Lisa Carola; Biscaia, Rui

doi:10.1080/16184742.2021.1903527

Cited by 9 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 69 publications

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“…Sport consumption and engagement has long been understood to occur not in isolation, but rather as part of a larger network of individuals forming a collective (Katz et al, 2019). Note the discontent voiced by fans, athletes and media pundits alike during the COVID-19 pandemic when most of the world's sporting competitions operated without crowds (Weimar et al, 2021).…”

Section: Collective Engagementmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This is particularly relevant in the sport context because the off-season periods and teams' seasonal ups and downs can play a role in how fans interact with the team and other actors in the ecosystem (e.g., Su et al, 2020). In this respect, good team performance tends to influence positive manifestations of non-transactional fan engagement (e.g., BIRGing;Trail et al, 2016), while a reduction in fan interaction with the team on social media is common during periods without on-field competition (Weimar et al, 2021).…”

Section: [Insert Table 3]mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Customer Engagement in Sport: An Updated Review and Research Agenda

McDonald

Biscaia

Yoshida

et al. 2022

Journal of Sport Management

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Customer engagement (CE) is an emerging perspective that provides a holistic view of the ways in which customers’ interactive experiences with organizations create value for both the parties. Central to this, is the need to develop an understanding of why a customer would choose to invest their resources (cognitive, emotional, and behavioral) with an organization, to be able to better facilitate this engagement and properly value the outcomes from it. Sport, with its inherently strong interactions for both participants and fans, would seem an ideal setting to study CE. To date, however, the CE work in sport domains has largely followed established paths. Given CE’s potential to unify many disparate areas of sport research, this paper presents a comprehensive review of the CE work to date and highlights several ways sport can leverage and advance this work through both academic research and management practice.

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Section: Collective Engagementmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: [Insert Table 3]mentioning

confidence: 99%

Customer Engagement in Sport: An Updated Review and Research Agenda

McDonald

Biscaia

Yoshida

et al. 2022

Journal of Sport Management

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…The authors' findings implied that social media enabled fans to perpetuate messages that elevate group distinctiveness, minimize in-group issues, and derogate out-group members. More recently, Weimar et al (2021) guided by social identity theory and using 3 months of social media data before, during, and 3 months after the COVID-19 lockdown, investigated whether fan interest toward smaller leagues suffered from the presence of bigger leagues. The study reported that interest in a league which remained active increased during COVID but went back to almost where it was previously after the revitalization of worldwide professional football leagues.…”

Section: Social Identity Theorymentioning

confidence: 99%

Theory and Social Media in Sport Studies

Abeza

Sanderson

2022

International Journal of Sport Communication

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A key feature of a robust academic discipline is that its homegrown theories and investing in theory contribute to building good research. In the field of sport and social media research, the rigorous utilization of theory is one of the areas where the field is still facing “disciplinary pain.” In fact, the unique features of social media provide researchers in the sport research community with a valuable opportunity for proposing, testing, applying, critiquing, comparing, integrating, and expanding theories. In this commentary, the authors, based on their own experience (as researchers, readers, and reviewers of social media in sport), contend that reference resources are lacking on this topic to help young (or existing) researchers locate appropriate theories for their research. Hence, this work identifies, documents, and discusses the theories used, advanced, and developed in social media research for sport studies. Furthermore, a compilation is brought together of different theories from various disciplines that researchers in this community may consider for their future work.

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“…The NBA suspended play on March 11 after a player (Rudy Gobert) tested positive for COVID-19 several hours before he was due to play. As the pandemic ensued and games were not resumed, leagues and teams were forced to engage with fans using other content, media outlets, and social media outlets in particular (Hayes, 2022; Weimar et al, 2021).…”

Section: Social Media and The Covid-19 Pandemic-related Sport Disrupt...mentioning

confidence: 99%

A Comparative Analysis of Social Media Fan (Community) Engagement in a European and a North American Pro-Sport League and Their Reaction to Industry-Wide Disruptions

Jakar

Carr

2022

American Behavioral Scientist

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Professional and amateur sport throughout the world experienced an industry-wide disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. The initial stage of the pandemic required the postponement of leagues and games, until athletic events were resumed without fans. This disruption required the sport industry to adapt and supply substitute products to engage users without the access to the primary product, live sport. In this study, we compare how a North American league (National Basketball Association) and a European league (English Premier League) adapted to these changes using social media to engage with fans. We examine changes in the volume of Tweets and engagements with official team Twitter posts. Our data contain categorical control variables accounting for different stages of the pandemic. This includes when games were canceled for health and safety reasons, when play was resumed in a bubble format, in-season periods, and offseason periods. Examining social media engagement during these periods is a unique opportunity to compare team (supply) strategies and fan reactions (demand) to a disruption, and to explore the longer-term implications such as expanded engagement after the disruption has ended or when its effects have lessened.

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A bright spot for a small league: social media performance in a football league without a COVID-19 lockdown

Abstract: This document is the author's post-print version, incorporating any revisions agreed during the peer-review process. Some differences between the published version and this version may remain and you are advised to consult the published version if you wish to cite from it.

Cited by 9 publications

References 69 publications

Customer Engagement in Sport: An Updated Review and Research Agenda

Customer Engagement in Sport: An Updated Review and Research Agenda

Theory and Social Media in Sport Studies

A Comparative Analysis of Social Media Fan (Community) Engagement in a European and a North American Pro-Sport League and Their Reaction to Industry-Wide Disruptions

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