Who’s Winning The #WorldCup Battle Of The Brands On Twitter? #stats

With only 2 days until the opening ceremony in Rio of the 2014 FIFA World Cup, we thought we’d take a look at who is being talked about on Twitter. This last month has seen all the main sponsors (and the traditional ambush brands) pushing their multi-million pound ad campaigns.

All those brands will be looking at how many times they’ve getting mentioned on Twitter – as well as a deep dive into who it is who is doing the talking (influencers), what they’re talking about (good or bad) and if it’s actually affected their bottom line.

There are some easy direct comparisons to make as there tends to be a big sponsor and then an equally large brand who are looking for a piece of the World Cup action. Below we’ve taken a look at adidas v Nike, Coca Cola v Pepsi and Hyundai v Vauxhall.

adidas v Nike

This is the one which has already filled out many column inches in both the trade press and traditional business ones too. The last World Cup was dominated by Nike with their “Write The Future” campaign headed by Cristiano Ronaldo. This time adidas haven’t been as complacent with a number of new digital initiatives, whilst Nike have once again gone for the BIG player dominated ad (and cartoon).

So lets take a look at the mentions of @adidasfootball v @nikefootball

Screen Shot 2014-06-10 at 11.19.40

It may come as a bit of a surprise to see that @adidasfootball has so far dominated the conversation over the last month. The main spike from @nikefootball coming in the last few days with the release of the final part of their film trilogy “The Last Game“. adidas saw their peak come with the launch of “The Dream” ad featuring their star man, Leo Messi.

What we are missing is the peaks in April when the big ads started to hit our screens. It’s going to be close this year for sure in the battle of the two dominant sports brands during the Finals itself. And then we’ll find out the financial results later on in the year when we hear who made their sales targets.

Coca Cola v Pepsi

This is as keenly fought as the battle of the sports brands. Coca Cola are a long-time supporter of FIFA and have recently renewed their sponsorship up until 2022. Pepsi have taken the Nike approach to major events and spent their money on marketing campaigns and players rather than event sponsorships.

This is more clear cut with Coca Cola enjoying much of the conversation. What it doesn’t show though is a break down of those mentions that include the World Cup or football. Some of the peaks are around non-sports events and gives an indication more of their overall performance as a brand.

Coca Cola v Pepsi

 

Hyundai v Vauxhall

This is a slightly left field one but worth looking at after the recent involvement of both brands at last month’s Digital Sport London event. Hyundai (in co-sponsorship with Kia) are a FIFA partner whilst Vauxhall are involved in the event through their sponsorship of the England team.

Hyundai have been running competitions to brand the team buses (which didn’t go entirely to plan) and in the UK have partnered with Copa90 to provide a different platform to talk about the event. Vauxhall meanwhile have loaded their campaign up front with Facebook Q&A’s and behind-the-scenes content from friendlies and training days as the players started to prepare for their trip to Brazil.

It’s clear though that Hyundai have a long way to when it comes to maximising their presence on social media for their football sponsorship. They have no dedicated football account, which they do on Facebook but has not been updated since Euro 2012. Vauxhall meanwhile have @vauxhallengland which has been highly active and looking to engage with football fans.

hyundai v vauxhall

 

The Outsider

One that people didn’t expect to come to the fore as it did was Beats By Dre. They launched their fantastic “Game Before The Game” video with Neymar, Fabregas, Sturridge and many more World Cup stars featuring in it. It certainly made an impact but has seen mentions taper off in recent days and the hashtag #GameBeforeTheGame has not really caught on with the public.

Beats By Dre

 

And Finally…

With the event almost upon us after month’s, if not years, of anticipation you can see that people are talking about it much more now that it is within site. Teams have finished their preparations, their have been the anticipated protests and upscaling of the articles about Qatar in 2022. This has all led to a significant increase in mentions of #WorldCup, #WorldCup2014 and #FIFA (far more mentions of FIFA by hashtag than account is maybe something they should look at).

FIFA World Cup twitter

 

Enjoy the World Cup everyone. We’ll be keeping an eye on Twitter (and other platforms) activity over the next month and report back all the interesting findings it throws up.

 

About author

Daniel McLaren
Daniel McLaren 820 posts

Dan is the Founder & CEO of Digital Sport. Can be found at sports industry events and heard every week on the Digital Sport Insider podcast. @DanielMcLaren

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