Abstract
This research proposes a model to examine factors that predict user engagement with sports brand-related YouTube videos. This research also investigates which type of YouTube channels generate more user engagement. Prior research on social media engagement, YouTube, social influencers and sports marketing will be analyzed. Ten hypotheses are derived to carry out the research. The model concludes that factors such as the number of channel subscribers, channel age, video age, video duration and video definition have statistically significant relationship with YouTube engagement. Additionally, channel types: brand, private vlogger and news/updates also have a statistically significant relationship with YouTube engagement. Brands channels, having access to a larger network and the ability to feature sports celebrities, are likely to generate four times more engagement than other YouTube channels. This study contributes to the research on social media engagements in terms of examining the type of factors important in predicting user engagement on YouTube. Keywords: Social Media, Social Media Engagement, YouTube, Social Influencers, Vloggers, Sports Marketing and Soccer.
Highlights
The emergence of social media has broken many communication barriers, allowing individuals to connect and communicate among each other conveniently (Keegan and Rowley, 2017; Gerlitz, 2014; Voorveld, van Noort, Muntinga, and Bronner, 2018)
Where b represents the value of unstandardized coefficient beta (B) of the independent variable x and e represents the value of exponential function
Based on the unstandardized coefficient beta (b), the results show a very minimal impact on YouTube engagement for every unit increase in channel subscribers (b=5.10-7), the relationship is positively statistically significant
Summary
The emergence of social media has broken many communication barriers, allowing individuals to connect and communicate among each other conveniently (Keegan and Rowley, 2017; Gerlitz, 2014; Voorveld, van Noort, Muntinga, and Bronner, 2018). Social media refers to the group of Internet based applications that allow users to connect, communicate, create and exchange content among their online groups and networks (Kaplan and Haenlein, 2010). Social media allows users to connect and communicate through the creation and exchange of user generated content (Kaplan and Haenlein, 2010). Online users mainly use social media to seek entertainment, interact among peers and spread or gain information (Saridakis, Baltas, Oghazi, and Hultman, 2016). The number of global active social media users is at 2.62 billion as of 2018, expecting to increase to 3 billion users by 2021 (Statista, 2019a). In Canada, the number of active social media users is at 22.2 million as of 2018, expecting to reach 24 million users by 2022 (Statista, 2019b)
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