I hope you all had a VERY Merry Christmas, and you’re all into the festive spirit and enjoying yourselves all across the world! As always, here I am with another edition of fight content analysis as the sporting season doesn’t switch off. Therefore, get your reading caps on and tuck into some invaluable insights across the fight game!
Tyron Woodley creates an IG meme competition
Jake Paul’s round 6 KO has hit 9.9m+ views on the Showtime Sports YouTube channel from the weekend.
The knockout has become a viral meme. Despite this likely being a moment most fighters would want to forget, Tyron Woodley maximised this opportunity by running a giveaway campaign on his Instagram account.
The former UFC Champion offered $5,000 to whoever produced the best meme from him getting knocked out and has awarded it to the creator, Chris Ashley.
This is a practical example to demonstrate the power behind meme marketing, and it is a chance to develop further engagement with your audience.
Some MMA fighters have a strong relationship with alcohol
Mype Sports are one of the fastest-growing MMA meme YouTube channels, and they’ve smashed it with this compilation.
Some MMA fighters and alcohol have a strong relationship with alcohol that they can’t help themselves but supposedly consume some before fights. One example includes middleweight Paulo Costa blaming his loss to Israel Adesanya in 2020 because he was drunk the night before. Paulo’s PR team must’ve had multiple facepalms when the statement came out; however, it was a big talking point amongst the MMA community, for the better and worse…
Despite the controversy around promoting alcohol, Mype has found a synergy that can connect casual fans to their channel while promoting MMA. Many memes include drunk compilations, and Mype has applied this into an MMA context.
When building a brand, focus on the bigger picture, look at how you can apply your niche to wider concepts that will appeal to mass-market audiences.
Sean O’Malley recaps on the Jake Paul vs Tyron Woodley rematch
Sugar Sean is back with another upload for the TimboSugaShow podcast where he’s talking about the rematch between Jake Paul vs Tyron Woodley 2.
Something I appreciate that Sean does with his podcasts are he clips the key sections in the description box. This helps his audience find the key parts of content they’re looking for rather than listening through the entire piece and potentially opting out due to not seeing their desired discussion.
O’Malley is a fighter who takes his content creation game very seriously. From his podcast to vlogging, having his own merchandise and gaming, he’s building a personal brand to build himself to one of combat sports biggest stars.
Focusing on the bigger picture, sports fans are just as interested in their favourite athletes outside of competition and inside.
Paddy The Baddy starts a vlog series
Paddy Pimblett has uploaded his first video of his vlog series by popular demand from his fanbase. The content consisted of attending UFC268 as a fan, training footage, and spending time with close friends and teammates.
The video has gained over 221,000 views in the space of 4 days, making that his most-viewed YouTube video.
Vlogs are an effective way of connecting with your audience while you’re not competing in your sport. It’s a chance for your fans to access behind the scenes footage that isn’t covered by typical rights holders like the UFC, BT Sport, ESPN etc. It’s also an opportunity to build your profile in the sport, especially staying consistent with the uploads as personalities and star value influence athlete-driven marketing.
What was the best Boxing vs MMA fight this year?
Boxing promoters, Boxxer, put up a carousel of some of the sports greatest boxing vs MMA events and posed the question, which was the greatest?
Ever since Jake Paul has gotten involved in boxing, its relationship with MMA has skyrocketed to another level. It’s crossed over two audiences to tune in to a new generation of athlete crossovers. It’s encouraged other athletes such as basketball players, including Deron Williams featuring on the undercard of Jake Paul vs Tyron Woodley 2.
The lesson to take away is that when you’ve built a brand, eventually pivoting into different industries is an opportunity to expand reach, brand awareness, and engagement.
That’s a wrap! What was your key insight from this week?
Sharing lessons sports professionals can learn through sports content 