SAN ANTONIO, TX – AUGUST 04: Joshua Silveira celebrates after defeating Ty Flores throughout PFL 2023 … [+]
It’s been a busy two weeks in fight sports activities. Each main combined martial arts promotion has had a present of significance. Terence Crawford solidified his standing as the highest pound-for-pound boxer on the planet, Jake Paul scored a unanimous-decision win over Nate Diaz within the newest crossover novelty scrap. Even Logan Paul placed on a present at WWE SummerSlam earlier than catching a personal jet to observe his little brother in motion.
For sure, social media has been abuzz with regards to fight sports activities. The same old kings of clicks, the UFC are firmly entrenched as the largest drivers on a number of platforms. The race for No. 2 is the place issues get slightly attention-grabbing with Skilled Fighters League starting to place vital distance between itself Bellator and ONE Championship
I spoke with Jonathan Cohen of Bedrock PR, Cohen offered knowledge on every promotion and its associated fighters by way of ListenFirst, a social media analytics agency for specifics.
Listed below are the rankings in complete social media following throughout all platforms.
*Fb, Twitter/X, Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok had been the channels measured.
- UFC – 109M
- One Championship – 56.04M
- Bellator MMA – 8.39M
- Skilled Fighters League – 7.27M
Regardless of these uncooked numbers which might be partially defined by the size of time every promotion has been in existence (UFC 30 years, ONE 12 years, Bellator 15 years and PFL six years), PFL sits just below one million under Bellator with regards to general followers. Per the information offered, Skilled Fighters League has been No. 2 by way of being talked about in probably the most Tweets. Between Might – July, 2023; the Twitter deal with @PFLMMA was talked about in 222,867 Tweets, second solely to @UFC which was talked about in 696,301 Tweets.”
From the spectacular UFC 291 card, the promotion’s tweet of Justin Gaethje’s sensational head-kick KO of Dustin Poirier has been seen a outstanding 4.1 million occasions because it occurred on July 29, and that’s simply the quantity of engagement from the UFC’s official Twitter account. Including within the views of the video from different major MMA and fight sports activities accounts and platforms would make the quantity all of the extra astronomical.
Here’s a breakdown of these numbers from Might – July, 2023
- @UFC – 696,301 Tweets
- @PFLMMA – 222,867 Tweets
- @ONEChampionship – 49,550 Tweets
- @BellatorMMA – 32,542 Tweets
PFL’s signing of Francis Ngannou and Cedric Doumbe proved to be among the many greatest needle movers. Ngannou’s reputation has solely grown since he reached free company and subsequently signed a take care of PFL. He’s at present making ready to face Tyson Fury in a boxing match on October 28.
Ngannou’s high put up of the final three months was an Instagram picture selling his October struggle with Fury, that bought 1,109,262 engagements.. His second-best performing put up was a TikTok video selling the struggle. I used to be on the PFL Playoffs in San Antonio on Friday and there have been a number of promotions of the Ngannou-Fury struggle, which additional reveals the promotion’s help of the previous UFC champion’s need to field.
Other than Ngannou, Doumbe was additionally a sizzling ticket on social media for PFL-related ideas.
Three of the 5 Tweets mentioning @PFLMMA getting probably the most engagements over the last 3 months had been posted by Doumbé. For instance, a coaching video exhibiting Doumbé and Salahdine Parnasse coaching collectively, bought 6,693 engagements and 1.7 million views. Even earlier than his promotional debut, Doumbé’s two-year contract with the Skilled Fighters League is already elevating the corporate’s profile on social media.
As we transfer towards the PFL Championship in November, there may be an rising likelihood we’ll see the promotion’s social media profile proceed to rise. Is there an opportunity that we see it surpass Bellator in complete following?
Primarily based on the developments and tempo, that’s in all probability not a foul guess.
Other than UFC 291 content material, which blew away the competitors from July 29 – August 4, the highest UFC put up between Might-July 2023 was an Instagram posts asserting Islam Makhachev vs. Charles Oliveira 2 and Paulo Costa vs. Khamzat Chimaev as the primary official fights of UFC 294. That put up bought 1,390,251 engagements. Different high posts by UFC in that point interval embody a TikTok of Keith Lee selling an ESPN struggle, and photographs on YouTube of Alan Klingbeil dropping Vernon Cathey in Energy Slap.
The highest Bellator put up within the final 3 months was a TikTok of Yoel Romero barking on the digital camera after his unanimous-decision loss to Vadim Nemkov in June, with 176,771 engagements.
In the meantime a Fb clip of Conor McGregor interrupting the Charlie Ward/John Redmond struggle at Bellator 187 was their subsequent finest performing put up. That’s a bit deceiving contemplating McGregor is primarily related to the UFC.
The largest night time for ONE Championship on social media within the final 3 months was on Might 5, round ONE Combat Night time 10: Johnson vs. Moraes 3. On Might 5, there have been 20,796 Tweets mentioning both ONE Combat Night time 10, ONE Championship, or headliners Demetrious Johnson or Adriano Moraes. Johnson is a future UFC Corridor of Famer, so there may be one other tie-in to the undisputed fight sports activities king.
The highest performing associated Tweet on the night time (apart from by media shops), bought 8,041 engagements. It was a put up from @MMAPauli about nonetheless not believing UFC traded Johnson for Ben Askren again in 2018.
With the beginning of free company for heavyweight Derrick Lewis, the PFL Playoffs on August 18, Mike Tyson agreeing to assist prepare Ngannou, Dana White’s Tuesday Night time Contender sequence restarting for a seventh season on August 8, Bellator 298 on August 11 and UFC 292 on August 19, the engagement over the following three months may see yet one more bump.
