IN THE PICTURE

AN ANALYSIS OF YOUR TWITTER FOLLOWERS

PARKRUN UK

ANALYSIS OF TWITTER FOLLOWERS

Analysing existing data - your own internal data, ratings and review sites or social media - can give powerful insight into the performance of an organisation.

In this presentation we have analysed your Twitter followers to understand your performance in attracting followers over time and trends in the number of followers you share with other sports related bodies. We have also plotted the network of accounts that are important and influential to your followers.

This information will help your marketing and social media teams to build engagement and will be of interest to all in your organisation who are keen to grow the sport.

The data in this presentation is a light touch review. It provides solid business insights in summary form. We would be pleased to put together something more detailed and bespoke for you.

FOLLOWERS OVER TIME

The graphic shows the number of new followers on Twitter for each year since 2012.

The number of new followers each year had been on an upward trend until the pandemic in 2020. Not being able to run any Parkrun events during lockdown until July 2021 has had a negative impact on the number of new followers. Unfortunately, there are no signs of a recovery as the number of new followers in 2022 fell again.

It is important to keep attracting new followers because awareness of Parkrun events will drive up participation.

ASSOCIATED ACCOUNTS

This chart shows the number of new followers who also follow other sports related organisations.

The graphic shows that the number of new followers with shared interests in other sports displays the same pattern as we saw above.

Athletics, rugby and football have traditionally been sports that your followers also follow.

Cross pollination with other sports is important because research shows that people who are already engaged with one sport or more likely to become engaged with another, compared with those who follow no sports. Appealing to people who follow other sports is a good way to promote participation in your sport.

NETWORK ANALYSIS

We' ve mapped who your Twitter followers also follow to produce a network analysis. A network analysis is a graphical representation of the relationships between nodes (in this case Twitter accounts) and the lines that connect them (in this case shared followers) known as edges.

Network analysis is used to understand the relationships between organisations. By graphing the connections between them we can see which accounts are the most important to people in the network. The size of the node reflects how many connections the account has. The bigger the node the more connections. The width of the edge represents the number of that account's followers that are shared with the account it connects to. The thicker the line the greater the number of shared Twitter followers. The network also identifies clusters of accounts that have things in common.

From this we can assess which types of accounts are the most influential over the network. The analysis is important because information tends to flow through the most influential accounts.

To be included in the network, the number of shared followers must represent a reasonable proportion of both yours and their total followers. This means that accounts such as Barack Obama and Gary Lineker, who have millions of followers, are not included in the network because although a lot of your followers also follow them, the number of followers you share with them is a very small proportion of their total followers. The accounts that we include in the network are, therefore, defined as the most relevant to you.

ANALYISNG THE NETWORK

Hover over an individual account to view its connections. Zoom in to show specific parts of the network. Zoom out to show the overall network. Use the 🔄 button to reset the view.

On the Community tab you will see four communities denoted by different colours.

The 1st community, in purple, is predominantly running related accounts such as athletes, events and marathons. There is also a sub group of health and wellbeing relating accounts.

The 2nd, in the blue, is predominantly news, politics and current affairs related accounts.

The 3rd community, presented in dark green, consists primary of people from light entertainment.

The 4th community, in the light green, are accounts that relate to the environment, health and wellbeing.

The Parkrun UK is presented in red.

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THE KEY TAKE AWAYS

Currently you have over 126,000 Twitter followers with 2016 to 2019 being the golden years for new followers. Since then the trajectory in the number of new followers is downwards and has not recovered post covid. There's an opportunity here to engage with people who might be interested in trying out a Parkrun event. We recommend developing a social media strategy for increasing the number of new followers every year at a higher level than the existing trend.

The make up of your network shows a variety of interests including news and light entertainment, as well as well known media personalities. This could be leveraged to generate marketing content that will appeal to existing and potential followers.
It would be useful to strengthen your alignment with other sports to build on a shared interest in sport with their followers, which in turn can help you grow. Football, athletics and rugby are particularly popular with your followers and represent a good starting point.

RESEARCHING PARTICIPATION IN THE SPORT

AWARENESS, INTEREST, PERCEPTION

The starting point is to survey potential participants on your sport. This can be used to highlight how top of mind your sport is, how it compares with others, what people think of it, what is good and what is not so good, what are the barriers to entry and whether they are interested in trying it or going back to if they previously played.

From this we identify priority groups for targeting and what promotional hooks will get people involved be it for fitness, to have fun, for social reasons or simply because they want to try something different.

We give you the evidence to develop a short, medium and long term strategy to grow your sport.

THE IMPORTANCE OF SCHOOLS

Many people are first introduced to sports at school and it is vital to include work with schools and children in the research.

We are able to assess the opinions of children and young people aged 6-16 towards the sport. The survey looks at awareness, what sports they play, perceptions and interest in playing.

We also undertake research with schools to see what PE and sports leads think of it, how it fits in with the need for a broad and diverse sports curriculum, what the barriers are to delivering the sport in school, the equipment and skills needed and how sports governing bodies can support schools.

A LEVEL PLAYING FIELD

It is vital for any sport to know the extent to which is it truly inclusive of a diverse range of people and their needs.

Interviews with stakeholders on how the sport can appeal to the widest possible range of people, particularly in relation to ethnicity, gender, disability, faith, body image, and cultural sensitivities, will identify actions needed to maximise inclusivity.

SPEAK TO US ABOUT YOUR INSIGHTS AND ANALYTICS NEEDS