Football clubs are no longer merely a sporting entity – they’re content brands. Enjoying massive followings across multiples platforms, like TikTok and Instagram, clubs have taken to short-form and long-form storytelling. Aimed at building and growing global fanbases, enhancing brand value and driving emotional engagement to the club. Clubs mix banter, emotion and storytelling to reach a global audience- and connect to people who may not even follow football, never mind support the club.
The PR strategies in football is an untold story and under-appreciated yet over complicated idea that is so simple.
Manchester City, Arsenal, Wrexham, Salford City, Tottenham, Leeds United, and Birmingham are just some of the clubs who have used behind-the-scenes led documentaries to engage fans of all colours in an immersive experience football fans crave. You don’t need a Premier League budget to tell a story in this way, what matters is authenticity and an ability to tell a story. The rapid rise of TikTok by football clubs has shown the value in this style of offering. Fans crave the behind-the-scenes aspects of football clubs, they’re followed as closely as a religion and this can be used to attract new fans, humanize their players and alter brand perception.
Wrexham AFC are the perfect example of how a smaller, once lesser-known club representing a working-class town in North Wales can enjoy a meteoric rise of fame and fans. Powered by their Disney takeover by Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney when languishing in non-league, Wrexham’s rise in fan numbers can be linked with their money-powered rise into the EFL to the Championship for the upcoming season. From obscurity to international recognition in just a few years powered by effective PR. This rise has shown the value of an authentic PR campaign combined with authentic football passion and professional-grade storytelling.
The result for Wrexham?
A hit docuseries Welcome to Wrexham on Disney+, a TikTok-first content strategy featuring emotion, accessibility and authenticity and sponsorships from companies way bigger than the club itself. And un-parallelled global engagement and reach.
TikTok, United Airlines, Aviation Gin have all been a part of their journey through the EFL and have played their part off the pitch enhancing the clubs brand profile. The key to all of the above is the level of resonation this has to fans.
It’s not just the town of Wrexham who follow this story, or the following of Arsenal or Manchester City watching their Amazon Prime series. It resonates with every football fan desperate to engage with behind-the-scenes content and the fascination that comes with that. Wrexham’s story has been watched across the world and they’ve acquired a global fanbase as a result.
It is not just the financial output of these strategies that matters, albeit a nice side hustle for clubs. But the engagement with fans, the relatability to fans and the access to sides of a game people haven’t seen before. An area of the game never before seen is unlocked to fans and with it a fascination almost as a desire to view content.
It is a simple strategy; create content fans want to see. Ask a football fan what sort of content they dream of. They want to see the stars of the game in a human way, people-led storytelling. Show me the dressing room before a game, the manager’s half-time team talk and the lives of the people fans idolise.
Elite clubs have seen this PR strategy’s potential to engage with their global fanbases and unlock new ways of connecting to fans on a different level.
Manchester City, before their most recent Netflix movie, produced a series on Amazon Prime that was polished, aspirational and took fans into the heart of a dressing room stacked with world-class stars. This reinforced City’s brand as modern and methodical – but added human element. Allowed fans to see a world they’d only dreamt of being within and that is content fans want to view.
The game has always been more than 90 minutes on a Saturday at 3pm or a Tuesday night. You don’t need a Premier League level budget and a camera crew the size of a football team. Clubs realize that they can win through capturing authentic content fit for a Gen-Z audience. Not on the pitch, but on the screens a connection to a club has been forged and an audience captivated.
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