Helmets Off: How the NFL is Using Social Media to Grow Its Fan Base in the UK and Europe

Helmets off: How the NFL is using social media to grow its hardcore and casual fan base in the UK and Europe By Heather McLean

Tuesday, October 15, 2024 - 09:46

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Caleb Williams of the Chicago Bears being interviewed at the Spurs' stadium on Sunday 13 October 2024 [source NFL]

In sports broadcasting, social media is a key aspect of building a fan base and breaking into new demographics, and the NFL is well versed in creating and utilising this type of content. This month the NFL is holding three games in London - two at the Tottenham Hotspur stadium and one to go at Wembley bringing the explosive fun and excitement of American football to Brits in a now annual event that seems to get larger every year. We caught up with the NFL's senior vice president, influence marketing, Ian Trombetta, to discuss its social media strategy, how it is growing, and how the league makes it work.

Let's start with your social media strategy for overseas showcase games, such as the three being played in London now. What's the plan? How does that fit into your overall broadcast strategy?

From just a global perspective, just to give you a sense of how we approach social media, we take what we call the helmets off' approach. What that means essentially is just getting to know the more personal details and the ins and outs of what the player interests are. We've really made a concerted effort to do that. I think for NFL football, it's really, really important because as you know, we only have 17 regular season games, unlike some other sports, like Major League Baseball, and they've got 162 regular season games.

Then you factor in the fact that our guys are wearing helmets, and it really helps us drive interest, especially with more casual fans, that the more that we're able to really showcase who the players are, obviously on the field, which of course is expected, but also off the field. So that helmets off' strategy now is extending into many different areas, especially as we think about our content creators and the way that we're working with influencers, as well as some of the wives and girlfriends associated with the NFL; obviously Taylor Swift being at the very top of that list, but [there are] so many others that we're working with, including Simone Biles, Kristen Juszcyk, I can go through a whole laundry list of Alix Earle, etc that we're working with, again, to broaden the game and to broaden the appeal of the game.

So when we think about what we're doing here in London, and for all the games internationally, we're really trying to drive a global appeal with both the avid fans around the world, as well as more casual fans.

I think Brazil is a really good example of us integrating Anitta [Brazilian pop superstar] for the halftime show and really elevating the halftime show there, and then having local creators from Brazil, including Olympians and others who are part of the programming, and [doing] something similar here in London. It's really showcasing all the dimensions of the game here locally, and then extending that out to a more global audience. In doing so, we see great interest, not only while we're here, but even from fans State-side or around the world, just very interested in terms of how we're operating and some of the storylines of the players, especially being in London, sometimes for the first time. It's really great. We're super excited about all the games here.

The NFL captures all its social media content with the help of live content correspondents (LCCs)

What from the actual games themselves or behind the scenes in the stadiums over here in the UK do you put on social media? Because I guess for the US fans, they're like, what's a British stadium look like? .

Yes, everything from the pubs and the watch parties that we have at the pubs with each of the teams, to players interacting with some of the local fans here. We had a creator by the name of Jimmy [Darts], who's got well over 10 million followers, but he's based in the US. We brought him to London and he did a series of things with different fans and kids here, so that was great.

And the nice thing too, just going back to your original question of how do we integrate [social media] into the broader ecosystem, including our TV and broadcast partners, increasingly there is a sharing of content that's happening through what we consider social-first content, but we're supplying that over to the networks and they can pick that content off and integrate that into the broadcast and also to their social channels. So whether it's CBS or it's NBC Peacock or Amazon or Netflix in the future, they're all utilising that content that we're supplying. We have a variety of ways in which we're not only shooting it, but also looking at ways in which we can get more and more access to showcase the fashion, to showcase a lot of the behind the scenes to really showcase the players and the teams in the best way possible.

Do you have a media hub where that goes to so that your rights holders can take it off?

We do. One of the biggest things we've worked on over the last several years is the connectivity actually in the stadium, [so we can ensure all social media content is delivered] real time. We've got a database that our partners can pull from, and then we'll also send directly clips that we know are going to perform well or be interesting to the broadcast and the broader audience, so we'll do that in the inside the game' environment. And then through the week we're constantly supplying content through the broadcast partners and really through a variety of different partners, including Verizon, Procter & Gamble, Nike, etc. We really want to continue that, especially aroun

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