We've never really done something like this before, but now is the time. The world is changing, more people than ever have access to a device with internet and it's time for clubs like us to take full advantage. We've expanded and upgraded our output across the internet and this is only the start of increasing our club size on social media, which is only a positive thing with it making the name 'Leamington' more known and people will start to talk about it.
Below is a little update to keep people up-to-date with how we are increasing our reach on social media.
The National League North last season had 22 clubs, and everyone knows that Leamington is on the smaller side of clubs in this league. We therefore needed to keep up with the big clubs - the Yorks, Gatesheads etc who have a large following to target on social media. We believe we are successfully doing this and are on the right track. To start with the content we create: the 2020/21 season saw the biggest shift in style of our club's social media we've ever seen and last season only went further. A fresh graphic rebrand gave us the spring to create quality content alike to the large clubs.
Our Twitter account grew, and we have gained nearly 2,000 new followers this season - we've been hopping on the latest trends and interacting with fans and clubs. To put it into perspective we have gained in the region of 7,000 followers on Twitter since getting promoted to the National League North in 2017, and nearly 2,000 of those came between June 2021 and June 2022.
Similar percentage changes occurred on our website and on Facebook, with our Facebook page following going up 13% and our website users going up 14%.
Over the course of the season we have amassed over 40,000 views on our YouTube channel and that is an absolute credit to the work put in by the Leamington FCTV team - Nick, Scott, Matt and Shaun. Referencing the latter two, our live commentary numbers have also been very good with hundreds tuning in to listen to the league's best commentary team.
Our two newest social media channels are our two fastest growing. On Instagram we saw an increase of 80% with over 7,200 people following us on there, our accounts reached statistic is well over 500% of last season's tally and our engagement percentage is over 200% of our engagements last season. Over on our newest social media, TikTok, we are the most followed National League North team by a country mile and have broken past 66,000 followers today.
Unbelievably this season our videos on TikTok have had a total viewership of 1,500,000, catapulting our club name to various corners of the world. People all iover the world who have seen our videos have reached out to us on social media letting us know that we have inspired them to start their own Leamington Football Manager save, or buy one of our kits! We're proud of where we're at with our social media, but we know we can go further and push it to the next level!
We've taken fan suggestions on our social media graphic rebrand heading into the new season and I for one can't wait to show you what look we've gone for for the 2022/23 season. If you think we could do anything extra then I'd love to hear your suggestions, so just drop me an email - I'll link it below. We're not up for having a boring social media like some clubs in our league, we want to showcase the Leamington ethos and have a good time.
Here's to a successful 2022/23, both on and off the pitch!
Come on you Brakes!
Max Passantino (max.passantino@leamingtonfc.co.uk)
