How Premier League clubs kicked off the season on Instagram
Including the weekend's most popular posts, a post-match interview format you're going to want to steal, and a sprinkling of social media updates.
This past weekend saw the Premier League kick off, following on from the Championship, League One, and League Two earlier in August.
Games were played across the 15th, 16th, 17th, and 18th, with all 20 teams featuring across the opening weekend. To try and keep the below figures more comparable, I've only included their posts from the days where their games took place unless I mention otherwise.
NB: All content referred to is what appeared in clubs' main feeds. Stories from accounts that aren't your own can't currently be tracked using Meta's API.
Overall activity
Firstly, there's a huge variation in the amount of activity that clubs shared on their respective fixture dates.
Liverpool were the leagues by this metric, sharing 52 posts on the 15th. This includes match updates such as line-ups and goals, but also a new signing announcement on the same day. They were followed by Spurs (47), Manchester City (40), Sunderland (39), and Nottingham Forest (28).
The average number of posts clubs shared on their game days was 21, with Bournemouth posting the least (7).
In total, clubs posted 428 times. Of these, 181 were single-image posts, 130 were Reels, and 117 were carousels. Single-image posts do tend to be the most popular across a normal month but the gap isn't usually that big. Clubs seem to prioritise these when content needs to be a bit more timely.
Post engagement
Across these 428 posts, clubs picked up 31.8m likes in total. That's an average of 1.6m per account.
In terms of teams that attracted the most likes, Liverpool win this one again with 12.7m. That's an average of 244k likes for every post across. the day. Manchester City's 5m is only enough to get them second place, followed by Manchester United (3.8m), Arsenal (2.8m), and Spurs (2.4m).
Despite only posting seven times across the day of their game against Liverpool, Bournemouth came eighth for likes per posts. They received an average of 37k likes for each post they shared.
There's a slight difference if we look at the number of comments, with Manchester United winning this particular race (79k). Liverpool have to settle for second place this time (58k). In total, clubs received 279,618 comments on their posts.
Sunderland grew their following by 1.9%, with another newly promoted side, Leeds, in second place with 0.17%. Across the four-day opening weekend in total, Sunderland grew their following by 6.7%. Bournemouth were their closest competitors on 0.67%.
Bournemouth did, however, have the highest post interaction rate on their opening day (average interactions on posts per follower per post) at 3.9%.
Most popular content
Perhaps unsurprisingly, given they attracted the most likes and there was only one game on the opening day, Liverpool come top of the most-liked posts for the 15th August with the following getting 738k likes on the day it was posted.
Liverpool had eight of the 10 most liked posts this day, with their clean sweep ruined by this post from Manchester City in second and this from Manchester United in third.
When looking at post interaction rate, however, Bournemouth's post supporting Semenyo was the winner with 16%.
On the Saturday, where there were five games, Liverpool also managed to get three of the top five slots for most-liked posts. The below Reel of Chiesa's goal was top, but it was also the most liked post in total over the four days with 1.1m likes.
When looking at post interaction rate, Sunderland and Bournemouth each had posts that achieved 17%.
For Sunderland, it was them announcing the result of their game against West Ham. Bournemouth's was a Reel of Semenyo's goal the previous evening.
On the Sunday, it was Spurs' turn to top the most-liked post charts. Their Reel of Richarlison's goal picked up 543k likes. In terms of post interaction rate, however, Sunderland's announcement of the signing of Nordi Mukiele was top with 22%.
Finally, on Monday, Manchester United came out on top with the most likes with this Reel of a piece of skill from their game against Arsenal on Sunday getting 368k likes. When looking at post interaction rate, Burnley's 5.9% for this picture of owner JJ Watt attending their game was the winner.
Interestingly, despite Leeds and Everton playing on this day, only Leeds had any posts in the top 25 for likes and interaction rate. Leeds posted 24 times and eight making it into the list, while none of Everton's 17 posts appear.
Club development program
I'm delighted to announce that I've started working as head of FBIN Education. One of our ongoing projects is the club development program, developed in partnership with the Slovak Football League.
This is a hybrid training course involving two in-person sessions in Bratislava as well as online learning over a period of nine months. The purpose is to help you understand the different areas of working in football, covering commercialisation, fan engagement, financial management, brand development, and communication and marketing.
All sessions are pre-recorded and delivered by experienced industry practitioners, and the next cohort starts in October. If you're interested in finding out more, you can register your interest below or reply to this email and I can give you more information.
(And I promise I won't be promoting this kind of thing in every newsletter unless it's relevent)
Watford's post-match interviews are a breath of fresh air
Watford have a new way of conducting post-match interviews and I think they might be the best I've seen in a long time. Yet also the simplest.
In short, they speak to players conversationally as they're still on the pitch applauding the fans. The result is something that feels authentic - it's unpolished, it's timely, and it makes you feel like. you're getting insights from the "real" player.
This type of content is a lot more likely to be remembered and, therefore, watched. It's natural storytelling at its very best.
The best bit? You could do this too. And it's easier than having to get a full media set-up. You need a camera (or phone) and a microphone - then you're off!
You get good results like these if you focus on the content first rather than the format. If something is good, it doesn't matter how polished or edited it is.
Social media updates
Some generic updates from social media platforms that might be useful.
- Threads has reached 400m users, meaning it's getting even closer to matching X's 600m.
- TikTok is starting to restrict some users to a maximum of five hashtags on posts in a bid to boost the user experience.
- Reddit have published a sports playbook which shares a bit more about the culture of fandom on the platform.
