Manchester City launch Facebook Messenger bot

Following on from experimenting with messaging apps by launching on WhatsApp, Manchester City have today announced that they have become the first team in England to offer a bot on Facebook Messenger.

They promise that the bot will give supporters a “City perspective on the latest news and topics surrounding the team”. As of right now there are three topics to subscribe to – Pep Talk, Transfer News, and Social Buzz – and they’re promising Match Highlights and Matchday Content will follow in time for the new season kicking off.

To opt-in to messages from the club you can visit their Facebook page and open the message tab. Alternatively you can use an embedded subscribe button on the official announcement page on the club’s website. Opting out is as simple as sending the word ‘stop’. You will need to be running the latest version of the app on your phone.

As well as the latest news from the club there will also be club-related wallpapers, exclusive photos, behind-the-scenes videos, and “more”.

Diego Gigliani, Senior Vice President of Media and Innovation at City Football Marketing, said:

We are delighted to announce another digital first for Manchester City. Messaging platforms have huge global audiences and our fans all over the world are spending more and more time on them.

Messaging apps are on the path to becoming one of the most important ways of delivering content directly into fans’ hands, as seen already in China with WeChat, and we wanted City fans to be the first to benefit from this experience on Facebook Messenger.

We are committed to experimenting with new ways of engaging with our increasingly global, digital and mobile fan base and Facebook Messenger is yet another example of this.

City are following in the footsteps of the NBA, which launched a similar bot at the beginning of June. It’s anticipated that City’s will work very similarly, offering in-app clips when the new season arrives.

Bots on Facebook Messenger are expected to shape the way fans interact with teams. Platforms such as Messenger and WhatsApp (also owned by Facebook) are changing the way that people expect to be able to communicate with businesses. As the first team to make the move to the platform expect there to be a lot of clubs paying close attention to how they perform.