Major League Baseball and Twitter Usage: The Economics of Social Media Use

Watanabe, Nicholas M.; Yan, Grace; Soebbing, Brian P.

doi:10.1123/jsm.2014-0229

Cited by 46 publications

(69 citation statements)

References 21 publications

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“…For attendance, this is consistent with Pérez (2013), even if the comparison is not fully reliable as his dependent variable is the twice weekly change in the number of Twitter followers, his exact explanatory variable is the number of season ticket holders and his focus is only on Spanish football teams. By contrast, our result for population is contrary to Watanabe et al (2015) who find a significant positive impact of a dummy for teams designated as being in a smaller market. However, their dependent variable is the percentage change from the previous day in the number of Twitter followers, while their focus is only on MLB teams.…”

Section: Resultscontrasting

confidence: 99%

“…His results show that the most successful and those with the most season ticket holders benefit from the highest rates of recruitment of new Twitter followers. Watanabe et al (2015) explain the percent change from the previous day in the number of Twitter followers for teams in MLB. The results reveal specific determinants that have a significant positive relationship with Twitter following: the number of tweets; participating in the playoffs or the World Series; a winning streak of four or more games (or negative impact of a losing streak of four or more games); 31 July trading deadline; the first day of free agency; all days compared to Sunday; February, March, and April compared to January (negative impact of November and December); teams participating in nationally televised games; and teams designated as being in a smaller market.…”

Section: Facebook And/or Twitter and Professional Sports Clubsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In the literature, several articles deal with the relationship between Facebook and/or Twitter and professional sports teams, focusing mainly on three aspects: the reasons for Facebook and Twitter use by professional sports teams (García 2011;Hopkins 2013;Wang and Zhou 2015;Waters et al 2011;Watkins and Lewis 2014); fans' expectations when using Facebook and Twitter (Gibbs et al 2014;Stavros et al 2014); and the drivers of changes in the number of Facebook fans and Twitter followers (Hopkins 2013;Pérez 2013;Watanabe et al 2015) 1 . These articles show that Facebook and Twitter are important for fans and thus demonstrate their importance for the relationship marketing strategy adopted by professional sports teams.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Jensen et al (2014) explore the factors affecting popularity on Twitter measured as the number of followers but for Football Bowl Subdivision head coaches rather than professional sports clubs. Pérez (2013) and Watanabe et al (2015) explain respectively the change twice a week (every Tuesday and Friday) and the percent change from the previous day in the number of Twitter followers for professional sports clubs over specific lengths of time. However, they are not interested in the total number of Twitter followers, their explanatory variables focusing only on short-term on-field success and including limited market variables, specifically the number of season ticket holders for Pérez (2013) and a dummy for teams designated as being in a smaller market for Watanabe et al (2015).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Pérez (2013) and Watanabe et al (2015) explain respectively the change twice a week (every Tuesday and Friday) and the percent change from the previous day in the number of Twitter followers for professional sports clubs over specific lengths of time. However, they are not interested in the total number of Twitter followers, their explanatory variables focusing only on short-term on-field success and including limited market variables, specifically the number of season ticket holders for Pérez (2013) and a dummy for teams designated as being in a smaller market for Watanabe et al (2015). Our hypothesis is that the number of social media fans for a club (its popularity) is to a large degree the result of its local market characteristics (population, number of clubs in the local area .…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 4 more Smart Citations

Explaining the Number of Social Media Fans for North American and European Professional Sports Clubs with Determinants of Their Financial Value

Scelles

Helleu

Durand

et al. 2017

IJFS

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Abstract:The aim of this article is to investigate the explanatory variables of the number of Facebook fans and Twitter followers for professional sports clubs based on the financial value literature. Such explanatory variables are related to local market conditions and on-field and off-field performance. Based upon a sample of North American major league clubs and the most valuable European soccer clubs as evaluated by Forbes over the 2011-2013 period (423 observations), our results indicate a range of variables with a significant positive impact on the number of social media fans: population, no competing team in the market, current sports performance, historical sports performance, facility age, attendance, operating income, expenses/league mean, and being an English football club. An improved understanding of the effectiveness of clubs' social media presence is important for contemporary sport managers in terms of enhancing supporter communication, involvement, and accountability, as well as maximizing clubs' revenue generation possibilities. Our findings could help sport managers to realize their clubs' social media potential in pursuit of these objectives, specifically to understand which variables are under-exploited and why some clubs over-perform, which will allow managers to prioritize decisions to increase their number of social media fans and financial value.

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Section: Resultscontrasting

confidence: 99%

Section: Facebook And/or Twitter and Professional Sports Clubsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 3 more Smart Citations

Explaining the Number of Social Media Fans for North American and European Professional Sports Clubs with Determinants of Their Financial Value

Scelles

Helleu

Durand

et al. 2017

IJFS

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

Stakeholder Communication in 140 Characters or Less: A Study of Community Sport Foundations

et al. 2016

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Community sport foundations (CSFs), like other non-profit organizations (NPOs), are increasingly employing social media such as Twitter to communicate their mission and activities to their diverse stakeholder groups. However, the way these CSFs utilize social media for communicating such practices remains unclear. Through a mixed-method approach of content analysis of Tweets from 22 CSFs established by English professional football clubs and interviews with key individuals within these CSFs (n = 7), this study examines the extent to which CSFs' core activities are being communicated through Twitter and identifies the strategies employed for doing so. Reflecting the target audiences CSFs are seeking to reach through Twitter and the challenges associated with communication about projects involving marginalized groups, tweets largely concern programs related to sports participation and education. The most frequently employed communication strategy is to inform, rather than interact or engage with stakeholders. However, CSFs with higher organizational capacity attempt to go beyond mere informing toward engaging with stakeholder groups that relate to their social agenda, highlighting the importance of trained and dedicated social media personnel in optimizing CSFs' use of Twitter for communication.

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