Has Social media put Formula 1 into the fast lane?
In 2018 social media has an enormous impact on our everyday life, for us it allows us to socialise with friends and family within a few clicks of a button, but Formula 1 uses social media in a completely different way. Formula 1 uses social media as a platform to promote its brand and attract new fans across the world to the sport, this also means that the net worth of the sporting brand also goes up.
Throughout 2017, Formula 1 decided to make a change to its social media marketing strategy to attract new fans to the sport, and to get the sport more mainstream attention. This campaign was a massive must for the organisation as Formula 1 is often considered by multiple news outlets as being an “elite fan group”. Formula 1 has always struggled with attracting casual fans to the sport, this is due to many reasons ranging from the basic rules of the sport and the steep learning curve to understanding how the sport works. This had to change otherwise there might not be a bright future for Formula 1.
By the end of 2017, Formula 1 had become the fastest growing sport brand on all of social media beating the likes of the NBA and Premier league football. This was a humongous gain for the sport where years before this, they had very little social media presence compared to other sports. With 2017 finished, they would have increased their social media following by 56% compared to that of the end of 2016.
Formula 1 Executive chairman, Chase Carey
The sport’s following in the United Kingdom has always been one of its biggest in terms of popularity. The UK also hosted the very first British Grand Prix and has hosted it a whopping 73 times, this is more than any other country in the world. Formula 1 is also featured a lot on television on channels such as Sky sports F1 which is the home of Formula 1 in the UK and is also featured on channel 4 where they show less races compared to SKY due to licensing.
(Left to right) SKY sports pundit Martin Brundle, McLaren Formula 1 driver Fernando Alonso and Former 2016 World champion Nico Rosberg
Formula 1’s marketing director, Ellie Norman, has said that Formula 1 will be tracking viewer engagement, video views and much more stats to get a better understanding of their situation for their campaign. Norman has also stated that “Formula 1 has always had a logo, but never an identity”.
In 2018, Formula 1 are still pursuing their social media marketing and are attracting much more fans to the sport through their social media changes, these changes consist of constant uploads of Formula 1 news, fan polls for viewer interaction, consistent uploads to their social media platforms of videos and advertisement for tickets to F1 fan festivals and Grand Prix’s. This change in marketing has shown an improvement in ticket sales and viewership and Formula 1 is gaining multiple TV deals across the globe.2018 has been a huge sucess for Formula 1 as a sport and if the numbers shared have significance, then 2019 will be one of the most sucessful years in the history of Formula 1.
Researched and written by: Michael Kelleher
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