The online social network Twitter has grown exponentially since 2008. The current study examined Twitter use among professional athletes who use Twitter to communicate with fans and other players. The study used content analysis to place 1,962 tweets by professional athletes into one of six categories: interactivity, diversion, information sharing, content, promotional, and fanship. Many of the tweets fell into the interactivity category (34%). Athletes used Twitter to converse directly with their followers. Those with the most followers had more interactivity tweets. A large percentage of tweets (28%) fell into the diversion category, because many of the tweets involved non-sports-related topics, and relatively few of the tweets (15%) involved players discussing their own teams or sports. In addition, only 5% of the tweets were promotional in nature, indicating that professional athletes may not be taking advantage of the promotional opportunities Twitter may provide.
The current study aims to understand if sport organizations can utilize environmental sustainability (ES) efforts to increase revenue in addition to saving money. To do this, fans of the Philadelphia Eagles were surveyed. Findings indicate fans were willing to pay an average of US$6.50 in the form of a sustainability fee to help the organization implement an environmental initiative. Furthermore, this study found that nearly none of the prevailing thoughts on predictors of fan behavior significantly positively predicted fans’ willingness to pay an environmental sustainability fee. The findings of the current study challenge the conventional theoretical thinking with respect to fan behavior. Furthermore, respondents in the current study were equally likely to financially support the sustainability efforts of their favorite team no matter their income, loyalty to the team, personal values, or conative loyalty associated with environmental sustainability. Theoretically, the current study advanced the triple bottom line theory, the Contingent Valuation Model, and the Model of Sport Fan Sustainability Behavior.
This study surveys professional niche sports sponsors in an effort to empirically understand what selection criteria these companies deem important when evaluating professional niche sports sponsorship proposals. Findings suggest that professional niche sports properties may possess unique attributes on which sponsors place very high levels of importance, such as cost effectiveness, flexibility in assisting sponsors achieve their objectives, a more targeted fan-base and decreased sponsorship clutter. Pragmatically, findings provide professional niche sports managers with tools that may be useful when competing for sponsorship funding against more established mainstream sports properties. Theoretically, the current study begins to fill a gap in the sports sponsorship literature which has primarily focused on mainstream professional sports, major intercollegiate sports and elite amateur sports such as the Olympic Games.
The sport marketplace is overcrowded, and contemporary sport fans have more choices than ever. This makes it difficult for new teams, leagues, and sports to enter the marketplace. In addition, a cultural oligarchy of mainstream sport leagues currently dominates media coverage. As a result, marketers and managers of emerging sports need to understand the attributes for which sport fans connect with entities. Little is known, however, about the differences between fans of niche (emerging or nonmainstream) sports and their mainstream-sport counterparts. Guided by social-identity theory, this study explored the dispositional and behavioral differences between niche- and mainstream-sport fans as a means of psychometric and behavioral segmentation. In particular, an individual’s need for uniqueness and communication behaviors were compared. The results suggest that dispositional differences between the segments were minimal. However, potentially important behavioral differences were uncovered related to how sport fans assimilate with others and advertise their sport affiliations.
In order to provide an experience that meets or exceeds a spectator's expectations, it is important to understand customers' expectations. Given sport consumers may have experience with similar service providers or similar products, it is important for sport managers to understand which sporting events spectators may be comparing when constructing their expectations. Results from this study suggest spectators may base their expectations on sports they are most familiar with and other sports competing at a similar level. Further, results suggest spectators' attendance intentions are more likely to be based on predictive expectations when spectators have direct experience with a sport, but based on ideal expectations when experience is limited.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
hi@scite.ai
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.