Social Media Marketing Plan
Marketing Goals
The message that is being communicated to the audience includes the relocation of the football team to a new home stadium on the opposite side of the city. The main goal is to inform the fans that the team will be moving to a new stadium so that they can be able to keep on cheering the team. Secondly, the marketing plan aims to promote an increase in the number of fans attending home football matches as a result of considerable awareness among the fans and the people within the city (McCarthy et al., 2014). Thirdly, the promotional material intends to attract more fans, especially in the new relocation area to support the team through coming to spectate during home games. This communication is anticipated to create awareness among the football team’s fans. The outcome would be the presence of fans during its games in the new stadium.
Target Audience
The target audience for the communication includes the football team’s fans. These are fans who love watching home games, sing during the games, are diehards and delusional. Furthermore, these are fans who show commitment, loyalty, dedication, and consistency to the team and are often (i) behaviorally, showing his or her commitment via tangible actions including merchandise or ticket purchasing, (ii) attitudinal, as they believe strongly in the sport and the team and, and (iii) cognitive, as they build up knowledge about the team and the sport.
Message
The campaign aims to inform the club fans and potential fans about where the new stadium is located and the opening date. The message will also indicate the name of the new stadium and the first match that will be held in it. The fans will be informed about the capacity of the new stadium as compared to the old stadium. They are also supposed to know that the new relocation has adequate parking space for the fans will come with their vehicles. More importantly, the announcement is intended to inform the passengers about the increase in the size and number of restaurants around the stadium where fans can be able to enjoy themselves before the game begin and during the halftime break. This information would be presented using infographics because its format is designed or tailored to make the information straightforwardly understandable at a glance. Infographic also more attention-drawing, enhance SEO, more attractive or eye-catching, and is extremely shareable.
Social Media Platforms
The social media platforms that I will use to disseminate the information about the team’s rebranding in order to reach the greatest segments of the team’s target audience include Facebook, Instagram, and twitter (Jordan, Upright & Forsythe, 2017). The three social media platforms have been chosen due to a large number of followers. The team, for example, has 12 million followers on Twitter and 10 million followers on Instagram. Most of the fans also use Facebook to get information; therefore, using the three social media platforms would enable the information to reach the target audience more efficiently and effectively.
Audience Influencers
The primary audience influencers for the campaign include key players, the coach, celebrities who support the organization, social media influencers, and the team sponsor. The above individuals have a significant number of followers, especially in social media platforms, including twitter. Key players and the coach are able to influence or convince the fans very fast and easily when they post the infographic on their various pages. More importantly, these people are able to make the message much understandable and believable to the target audience. On the other hand, celebrities and social media influencers who support the club are also crucial in this initiative because they have large followings whom they can pass the message.
Timeline
The campaign is expected to run for six months before the start of the subsequent season. This would enable the fans to get informed early enough so that they can make arrangement of starting to watch the team’s games from the new stadium. The campaign will be seasonal.
Competitive Advantage
The campaign will enable the brand to grow and gain dominance in the football arena. It will enable the team to have a higher fan base, thus increasing its revenue, especially through the ticket purchase (Aichner, 2019). Through this social media campaign, young fans will be targeted to ensure that the number of club fans increases as compared to the previous years. Moreover, both the old and young fans will be enticed to come and watch the team play during the home matches. As a result, the club revenues will increase, and the club position, from a financial perspective, will improve. Besides, the team will also have the morale to play with passion since they will have the complete support of a very large crowd of fans who will be in the stadium. This will help the club improve its position in the league when they win matches.
Evaluation Metrics
The social media campaign success will be determined by looking at the rate in which the number of social media followers of the club grows, and the likes and shares that the club postings on social media receive. On the other hand, the evaluation will consider the rate in which the number of fans is buying match tickets and the amount of revenue that is generated from ticket purchase and club merchandise.
Specific Content
Crisis Communication Plan
The management of social media interactions is essential. As such, given responses would be provided for both negative and positive comments which are likely to come from the fans and other followers. I will constitute a ‘Spokesperson Response’ which would apologize for any inconvenience the team’s decision to relocate may have on anybody, especially the fans (Manoli, 2016). I would tactfully use social media to preemptively navigate negative situations before they spin out of control and becomes detrimental to the team through being empathetic, acknowledging the issue, and avoiding canned response. I would listen to the fans’ feedback and show that I care about their feelings. I would clarify to the target audience that the new stadium would be used in the subsequent season; therefore, they need not to worry about the current tickets.
I would also tell the fans that the duration provided for the relocation is enough for those who want to relocate to the stadium to do so. I would, however, apologize for those who are not able to relocate to the new venue due to family ties or work to use the cheap public means to come and watch the games. To the current residents of the new relocation area, I would assure them that our fans are always organized and there would no form of noise pollution from the spectators or vehicle as we have mounted silencers all over the stadium. In terms of congestion, I would inform the public that the stadium has enough space and traffic would be well-coordinated by the police officers to ensure there is no snarl-up.
Reference
Aichner, T. (2019). Football clubs’ social media use and user engagement. Marketing Intelligence & Planning.
Jordan, T., Upright, P., & Forsythe, S. A. (2017). Social Media and Relationship Marketing in Community Sport. KAHPERD Journal, 55(1).
Manoli, A. E. (2016). Crisis-communications management in football clubs. International Journal of Sport Communication, 9(3), 340-363.
McCarthy, J., Rowley, J., Ashworth, C. J., & Pioch, E. (2014). Managing brand presence through social media: the case of UK football clubs. Internet Research.