SportsKenya: Top 5 Kenya's Football Clubs Social Media Ranking

Monday, 20 February 2012

Top 5 Kenya's Football Clubs Social Media Ranking

Over the last week, there was a survey being conducted on Kenya's listed companies and their use of social media. Along the same lines, we had a discussion with a pal about Kenyan sporting scene and the lack or minimal use of the social media space. While social media has exploded onto the scene in the last 3-5 years, local sports organisations and clubs are yet to realise the potent that this platform has.
A quick survey on online presence, visibility and regular updates and information regarding the clubs' activities leaves a lot to be desired. Kenyan social media enthusiasts take up your roles and make this year a winning one for Kenyan sport on social media.

Tweep, can we play ball? image courtesy of www.flickr.com

This ranking was done on Facebook and Twitter which are the biggest social media platforms currently. Our non-scientific survey is based on clubs' official pages, fan pages and 'likes' as well as official Twitter handles (or pages) and fans too. Since most clubs do not have an official page and even when they do, there are other duplicated ones, we shall aggregate each of these to the nearest 100th person/like( NB: These was as of 17th February 2012 based on Internet findings);

Gor Mahia - An estimated 59,500 Likes on various Facebook pages. These range from official pages to fan pages to others like 'Gor Mahia is not a club, its a lifestyle, but do we say?' Their web-page's www.gormahia.net - this site aggregates info on the club from other news sites and is quite basic. No links to Facebook or Twitter accounts. There are 3 Twitter pages linked to Gor Mahia @GOR_MAHIA - 108 followers, @Gor_MahiaFC - 99 followers and @Onegreenfamily - 289 followers bringing total to 596 followers.
AFC Leopards - An estimated 18,300 Likes on various Facebook pages also has wide range such as ' AFC Leopards Facebook Branch'. The club has a website www.afcleopards.net which is quite interactive. The site has a link to the Facebook and Twitter accounts and also has YouTube channel linked to SmartTV which went burst a few weeks ago. The club also has 4 different Twitter handles @afcleopards_SC - 316 followers, @afcleopards - 272 followers, @ingweleopards (fans page) - 628 followers and @AFC_Leopards - 43 followers totalling 1259 followers.
Sofapaka FC - with an estimated 5,100 Likes on Facebook pages, batoto ba Mungu's football club is 3rd most visible club on social media. The club's website www.sofapaka.com is also quite well-done and frequently updated. It also has Twitter page @SOFAPAKA with 98 followers and another unofficial one @Sofapaka_Kenya with 79 followers - 177 in total
Ulinzi Stars FC - is at number 4 of the social media savvy football clubs. It has 2835 Likes on its Facebook page. Its Twitter handle is @UlinziStarsFC with 234 followers. It is without a website despite being one of the biggest clubs in the country and having a wide followership not just in the army ranks but with ordinary football fans.
Mathare United FC - carries the top 5 of the football clubs on social media. It has a modest 2800 Likes on Facebook. The club has a website www.mathareunitedFC.co.ke which needs a bit of sprucing to meet the current season's set-up and corporate identity. You can also access their details via www.mysakenya.org which is the parent company under which Mathare United FC was borne. Its Twitter handle @MathareunitedFC has 313 followers.

Do you Like what you see? - Image courtesy of www.facebook.com

Take Outs:

A lot of work needs to be done to these among other clubs which are featuring in the Kenyan Premier League. The League is also rapidly engaging with social media enthusiasts and fans alike and revamped its website at www.kpl.co.ke and also has a Twitter handle @KenyaPremierLg with 1,568 followers & 676 Likes on its Facebook page.

Constant review and regular updates are a must in social media where as they say, it's not a monologue but an exchange of ideas between the clubs/management and the fans.
Competitive brand offers can be made every so often to increase visibility and have a sense of ownership to the followers and fans alike - e.g. AFC Leopards did engage some of its fans last season online and even managed to book flight tickets to a local game in Mombasa - brand loyalty anyone?
Instant feedback on ways to improve the clubs' fortunes - from suggested playmakers to colours of the team, club management can use social media to have fans engage them instantly.
Sponsorships - many a clubs internationally have had sponsors who are willing to look beyond the usual streams of revenue to engage and entice users. Social media platforms can supplement to such campaigns and ensure sponsors have a wider audience and measurable means of showing success rate of the campaigns.

These are but a few points which Kenyan clubs and sports management specialists can learn from. Finally let's look at the top 5 Football Social Media League as of December 2011;

Barcelona-25,359,311 Facebook fans(27,030,540 Likes); 2,316,765 Twitter followers = 25,676,076 fans
Real Madrid-22,182,985 Facebook fans( 24,876,778 Likes);2,872,018 Twitter followers = 25,055,003 fans
Manchester United-20,269,260 fans (22,598,283 Likes); 102,773 Twitter followers= 20,269,200 fans
Arsenal - 8,155,842 fans (8,989,136 Likes); 1,061,636 Twitter followers = 9,217,478 fans
Chelsea - 7,885,970 fans (8,704,028 Likes); 501,375 Twitter followers = 8,387,345 fans

This shows you the power of social media. It's free and its waiting for you, just LOG ON & GET GOING!

1 comment:

futainformer said...: this is definitely gonna a be a better year for KPL, encouraged by developments such as; the introducing of kiswahili commentary for KPL games by broadcaster supersport, and the newly revamped KPL official site. This are steps that will contribute to widening the reach of Kenyan football to a largely unpatriotic public who are hooked to foreign leagues.
I recently hosted a website WWW.futainformer.com which will report on the kenyan football, myself i have little or no media experience neccesary to update the site consistently, but i felt that the opportunity to ventuer into such an untapped market whas to good to pass by...my request is for dedicated writers/content developers who would be willing to partner with me in this venture.... you can contact me on highrollerdejure@gmail.com jump on the bandwagon lest it leaves you behind!; 27 February 2012 at 22:31

Profile of a Kenyan Sports Personality

This is a look at a Kenyan personality who may have influenced and continues to affect sports in Kenya and inspires all and sundry in sports. It is our hope that you shall reflect on this, take a moment to appreciate the sacrifices and efforts these heroes made. We do take a bow and wave our hats as we cheer true Kenyan patriots in sport!

This one takes a different twist. Having seen individuals grace this column, we have sought to recognize a team of individuals who did some exemplary work and set what has been an unbeatable national and indeed continental effort.

Kenya has never been a major power in shorter races 400m downwards. Back in the late 1960s and early 1970s, this was a different script especially with the more exciting relay races. It is in 1968 when Kenya’s dominance came into play and with it a retinue of athletes who would become legends of their era.

The 4x400m races are usually the climax in the athletics calendar of events and in Mexico ’68, Kenya’s team including Charles Asati, Naftali Bon, Munyoro Nyamau and Daniel Rudisha ( the latter being the father to David Rudisha - current World and African champion in 800m) had other ideas coming 2^nd to USA.

In 1972, the 4 x 400m team was tweaked a bit and the final race was run by Charles Asati, Munyoro Nyamau, Robert Ouko and Julius Sang blazing the track to come up with the only other Gold medal from the Munich Games. But for this unprecedented move and none that has been done before by any other African nation, we salute our compatriots making them the Kenyan sprint legends!

Know your Sport

Swimming

Recently at some social setting we were engaged in a club quiz and one of the questions was about swimming. This sought to know which stroke was not among the competitive ones till 1956. One of our team-mates (we were 6 said that it was back-stroke while I argued it was butterfly, and the majority thought the former ….guess we should have stuck with my answer though!)

All the same, this sport has become one of the most competitive sports in any major sporting extravaganza in the form of the All-Africa Games, Commonwealth or indeed the Olympic Games. Kenya has lately featured in this very involving and energy-sapping sport. Thanks to the exploits of the Dunford brothers who have shone the spotlight on the country away from traditional sports in athletics, football, boxing and rugby. But what do you understand from the sport? Here’s a brief of it from different sources;

According to Wikipedia, swimming is based on the human act of swimming, that is, locomotion in water by self propulsion, with the goal of completing a given distance in the shortest amount of time. Swimming is distinguished from other aquatic sports (such as diving, synchronized swimming, and water polo) that involve swimming but the goal is neither speed nor endurance.

Competitive swimming consists of four strokes: butterfly, breaststroke, freestyle (or front crawl), and backstroke. When all four strokes are done during a race, it is called medley swimming (otherwise known as the individual medley, or I.M.). It is governed by the Fédération Internationale de Natation Amateur (FINA).

The goal of competitive swimming is usually to have the fastest time to complete a given distance. Competitive swimming became popular in the nineteenth century. Swimming is an event at the Summer Olympic Games, where male and female athletes compete in 13 of the recognized events each. Olympic events are held in a 50 meter pool (long course).

There are 36 officially recognized individual swimming events – 18 male events and 18 female events; however the International Olympic Committee only recognizes 34 of them – 17 male and 17 female. Most swimming sport events are held in special competition swimming pools, which are either long course pools such as those used in the Olympic Games (50 m) or short course pools such as those used in the FINA World Swimming Championships (25 m) (25 yards or 25 m). Competition pools have starting blocks from which the competitor can dive in, and possibly also touch-sensitive pads to electronically record the swimming time of each competitor.

In most competitions, the competitors are required to wear swimwear/swimsuits to adequately cover their bodies for the dip. However some suits have created controversies which have seen FINA coming up with standards to adhere to ensure competitors do not have undue advantage over each other.

The sport can also be pursued for personal fitness and is considered by fitness enthusiasts as one of the few that does an all-round job body of keeping the body in shape. It also requires healthy diets and rehydration (yes even if your body’s dipped in water)! Famous names in the sport include Mark Spitz – 7-gold medals winner 1972 Olympics and Michael Phelps – 8 gold medals - Beijing 2008.
For more info, check www.fina.org

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Monday, 20 February 2012

Top 5 Kenya's Football Clubs Social Media Ranking

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