The unusual and original content that is successful in Brazil

Posted by

A constant challenge for us at Samba Digital is explaining the Brazilian “meme” to the social media directors and managers of our customers’ clubs and entities. In its most basic form, a meme is a digital joke conveyed through an image, such as a photo or gif, that goes viral. The perfect analogy that defines how a piece of content can go viral is a level 5 hurricane, an intense one that destroys everything in its path.

However, it demonstrates to clubs that original content is more than important for them to break out from the repetition of a football club routine. Flamengo, Latin America’s top in interactions, created content that didn’t require any special production other than the sharp eye of its social media manager.

Learn about Flamengo’s most recent endeavours, including its unbroken winning streak in our LATAM standings.

Saying farewell to the club after confirming a transfer to Al Hilal, from Saudi Arabia, Michael has passed the title of “The Ugliest of the Squad” to the right-back Rodinei, another player known for his jokes and good humour. Overall, there were more than an amazing 2.5 million views on this video.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Flamengo (@flamengo)

This is what stands out when looking at TikTok, for example. Despite the lack of a more effective effort from some of the more traditional clubs, which can go weeks without posting on it, the social network, dubbed the dancing social network in Brazil, reached nearly 60% of the total views of Instagram, the platform with the most interactions between February 16th and 22nd. During that week, the right-back Guga’s dance with teammate Mariano received 3.9 million views, propelling Atlético-MG to the top of the social network.

https://www.tiktok.com/@atletico/video/7066951167170874629

Corinthians adopt a different model

Corinthians, which finished 2nd in the Brazilian Serie A with a consistent performance of around 28 million monthly views in the previous three months, bets on on-field content ranging from historical plays to current highlights of both youth and professional teams.

We invited Rodrigo Vessoni, editor of Meu Timão, a website specialized in Corinthians, to give his opinion on the content that the club uses on social networks:

“About Corinthians’ social networks, basically there is a clear fear of going a little over the top when opening up to greater exposure. We feel that the board does not allow the Communication Department to produce funnier videos that can generate greater exposure for players. I don’t know if they are prohibited, but there is a recommendation to avoid moments of too much relaxation as in other social networks. Maybe it’s the directors’ profile, who are a little averse to the social network. Maybe it’s a lack of knowledge about social media that explains why Corinthians has a more serious profile in recent times”, said the professional, who works in Corinthians for at least two decades, both as a reporter and, now, as an editor.

Provocations

Despite wearing down the relationship between the clubs, the provocations always stir up the fans and raise the numbers. After much backroom wrangling over issues ranging from the holding of the Brazilian Supercup since Atlético-MG had won both the Brazilian Championship and Cup, to the stadium that would host the match, Atlético-MG faced Flamengo and won the trophy. This victory came after a lengthy penalty shootout, with the match ending 2-2 after 90 minutes.

Learn more about Brazil’s most recent football news, such as Amazon’s acquisition of domestic Copa do Brazil rights for 2022.

After winning the championship, Atlético-MG tweeted a photo of a model carrying a perfume bottle containing the freshly obtained cup. In the caption, the word “cheirinho” (smell) was the trigger to provoke Flamengo, which was the runner-up in three different tournaments. This post earned 100,000 likes, while the club received 1.6 million in a single day.

https://twitter.com/Atletico/status/1495513073758703617

Wagner Leitzke, Social Media Manager at Samba Digital, discusses how provocations like this work, saying…

“It is necessary to get out of common sense, out of the stagnation. Publications that can have an impact, often with provocative content, will reach other niches. The provocation has always been present in the sports world and with social media gaining more and more importance, it is impossible not to bring them to the digital realm as well. Sometimes, you need to be a little more fan and a little less institutional. Balance is the key.”

Top LATAM clubs total 3.66 billion interactions in 2021

Posted by

These figures take into account likes, reports, and comments on posts from clubs in six countries on the three major social networks.

There were 3.66 billion interactions in 862 thousand posts. This impressive figure represents the total number of interactions from first division clubs in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, and Uruguay on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, the three most popular social networks among supporters, throughout 2021.

Brazil, the most populous country among those studied – with 212.6 million residents – gained slightly over 2.3 billion and accounted for 62.8% of total interactions in the study. Along with Brazil, despite being more populated than Argentina, Mexico, with 129 million inhabitants, added up to 384.6 million interactions, trailing the 617 million interactions produced by Argentines, whose country has roughly 46 million individuals.

Flamengo’s success

Flamengo really stands out among the clubs. The Rio de Janeiro club led the three major social networks with 754.3 million interactions despite failing to win the Brazilian Championship, Copa Libertadores da América, and Copa do Brasil, the three major competitions on the Brazilian club calendar.

Credit: Alexandre Vidal / Flamengo Flickr

Of course, we couldn’t forget Bernardo Monteiro, Communications Director at Clube de Regatas Flamengo, who praised the big numbers and spoke a little about the association’s commitment to the digital universe:

“Since we took over the management of the networks, in January 2019, we were committed to consolidating Flamengo’s hegemony in social networks. We have the biggest fan base in the world, with more than 42 million fans and we believe that, by delivering better quality content, in multiple formats of consumption and with increasing coverage, fans not only get closer to the club but also to use Flamengo’s official channels as their main source of information and to be possible, the consistency of the work needs to be maintained”, stated Bernardo Monteiro.

Bernardo highlighted that consistency of material in many formats, such as journalistic content and entertainment content, as well as other genres, ensure growth and audience retention.

“The results shown in the metric rankings are true reveals of the stratospheric engagement of the Flamengo fans!”, he concluded.

River: the Argentinian highlight

River Plate of Argentina is another club that came out on top in 2021. When we consider that five out of every six persons are Brazilians and only one is argentine, the Argentine club has a strong engagement rate with 319 million interactions throughout the year.

In fact, River Plate, the second-most-interacted-with club on Twitter, is the only team to break through Brazil’s domination on the social network. Surprisingly, Boca Juniors is the next team on Twitter outside the Brazilians, at 12th place.

Learn more about River Plate’s rise in the LATAM standings by clicking here.

Mexico, with a population 2.6 times greater than Argentina, saw much higher numbers on Facebook, but not on Instagram, where it experienced 2.4 times lower numbers. Belonging to North America, unlike the other countries analyzed, Mexico experienced a change in behavior in interactions throughout 2021. In the first half of the year, Facebook typically had more interactions across the months than Instagram. However, the situation progressively shifted, and Instagram concluded 2021 with 194.3 million engagements, compared to Facebook’s 151.1 million.

Video Views

It is vital to note that when we talk about interactions, we only take into account likes, reposts, and comments on posts and videos. Interactions are not counted for video views.

Using Instagram and Facebook, the six countries total 4.43 billion views of slightly more than 115,000 videos posted in 2021. It is wrong to believe that the number of views is bigger since Instagram interactions are considerably more.

Facebook has a superior track record with 2.53 billion views than Instagram, which has 1.89 billion. Mexico is primarily responsible for this disparity, as Facebook had 1.14 billion views compared to only 104 million for Instagram. In addition to Mexico, Chile and Colombia were among the countries with the highest number of users on Facebook. Brazil, Argentina, and Uruguay already exhibit the opposite pattern when it comes to video consumption

River Plate climbs the LATAM standings, while Flamengo falls

Posted by

This month’s look at the performance of our LATAM club rankings on the key social media platforms: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram revealed a few surprises. October brought fantastic news, as the Spooky month exceeded September by 13 million interactions. Surprisingly, Brazil, the nation with the most interactions among those studied, was the only one with a more pronounced reduction in comparison to the others. This country received slightly more than 5 million fewer Instagram interactions and nearly 1 million fewer Twitter interactions. While their Brazilian neighbours declined, the Argentines rose to second place, with 47.4 million interactions on Instagram Stories, and almost reached an impressive 49 million in May. 

To stay up to speed on our LATAM Rankings, read September’s LATAM Ranking leaderboard here.

Brazil

Flamengo has surpassed the 4 million daily engagement threshold on Instagram for the second time. It ensured the club’s 10th place in front of Club América on these two days, and its monthly Instagram performance. Interactions on the 13th were captured in a video recorded behind the goal during Andreas Pereira’s spectacular free-kick against Juevntude. The win over rival Atlético-MG, the Championship leader, the other day was a fantastic effort. Flamengo’s chances of becoming the tri champion were maintained thanks to this stunning victory.

Unfortunately for Brazil, there was a drop of little more than 5 million Instagram engagements compared to September’s total of 163 million. The losses of Flamengo (-9 million) and Corinthians (-12 million) underline this performance. In October, though, there were some bright spots. Atlético-MG and Santos both gained 4 million. Not only that, but among other cities, São Paulo gained 2 million, International got 1.4 million, and Fortaleza gained 1.3 million, helping to offset the loss.

Argentina

We returned to the stadium after 583 days away from the squad to watch a derby against their main rival, Boca Juniors, which they won 2-1. River Plate was the only team – aside from Flamengo! – to have more than 4 million interactions in a single day, which delighted the fans. In total, 4.05 million interactions were recorded, putting Corinthians (BRA) in second place by little more than 400 thousand interactions.

Another significant aspect was River Plate’s dominance on Facebook. They gained 3.3 million interactions compared to 3 million for Flamengo, the team that usually appears in first place. When we consider that Argentina had 5.88 million overall interactions on Facebook, with 3.3 million from River Plate and 656 thousand from Boca Juniors, the data reveals a concentration of concerning interactions and a need for other major football teams to increase content and engage with their audiences.

Learn more about Argentina’s most recent news, including their match against Italy as UEFA and Conmebol deepen their partnership.

Mexico

Previously Facebook and Instagram had the same number of interactions relating to Liga MX teams. But Instagram has begun to stand out, and by October, it had narrowed the gap to just over 8 million: (17.55 million x 9.66 million).

While the monthly record in Brazil and Argentina was over 4 million interactions, Mexico’s monthly peak on October 3rd was 789 thousand interactions. This monthly high was achieved thanks to Club America’s 2-0 Liga MX victory over Pumas in the 12th round.

Video consumption

Brazilian teams make the most use of videos on their Instagram pages. There were 2050 clubs, compared to 1241 Mexican clubs and over 1000 Argentine clubs. Brazilian clubs received approximately 100 million views, 96.4 million to be exact. One thing to remember is that interactions do not include views. In comparison, the 1000 Argentine videos earned 33.37 million views, while the 1241 Mexican videos received only 7.63 million. This impressive result accounted for 50% of Club America’s submissions, which totaled 87 videos.

Colombia

Colombian clubs were the only ones who did not rank among the top 20 on social media. With the exception of Atletico Nacional, which has won the 17th position on our rankings. The country has yet to regain its interaction rates prior to the devastating protests, and it is the sixth month in a row that the country has failed to surpass a million Twitter interactions.

Despite a dip in LATAM club rankings, Flamengo and Corinthians remain on top

Posted by

On a monthly basis, we rate clubs from Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, Uruguay, Chile, and Columbia in our LATAM club rankings. August witnessed a new high since the rankings were created, thanks to the return of matches in Argentina. Unfortunately, this winning streak has come to an end, as September saw a dip in interactions. This reduction resulted in a loss of slightly over 43 million interactions in these six main nations, a 12.5% decrease from August’s record-breaking performance.

Instagram has dropped 12% as a result of this substantial loss of about 79.65% of all interactions. Only one club got lucky in this 12% decrease. With well over 600,000 additional interactions, Chile witnessed an increase. Twitter and Facebook, on the other hand, did not do as well, with Twitter losing 16.5% and Facebook losing 12% respectively. We might blame this decrease on the fact that the World Cup qualifiers were held in September. This, combined with the fact that only three games were played, may have contributed to this drop.

Leaders Again

Despite these dips, there are still winners on the other side. Flamengo is on top of the rankings, with Corinthians coming in second this time. Despite a decline of over 10 million interactions compared to August, Flamengo had its fourth-best year in 2021, with 59.7 million interactions. But it was Corinthians’ performance that attracted attention. With the exception of Flamengo, the São Paulo team had the highest performance of all clubs, with 41.2 million interactions. Prior to Flamengo, the previous club from São Paulo, which had 38 million interactions in May.

Read more about the most recent LATAM rankings, which show Flamengo breaking a new record while Facebook interactions drop.

Speaking of São Paulo, River Plate surpasses

We should talk about SPFC while we’re thinking about São Paulo. We can see a pattern forming as they gained 21 million in July, 20 million in August, and 15 million in September. The decline in digital performance on SPFC’s Instagram meant that the club had been surpassed by River Plate and had equaled its performance in March when it had the same 15 million interactions.

Argentina is dominated by Rivers

Even if it wasn’t the finest monthly performance, River Plate stands out among Latin American clubs with 16.78 million Instagram engagements, equal to third place, and 1.91 million Twitter interactions, also gaining third place.

They should be impressed since their performance on Twitter and Instagram is nearly double that of their rivals Boca Juniors. Boca even saw a decrease from 12.1 million to 9.60 million engagements. Despite the dip, the club moved up to sixth place on Instagram, owing to Atlético MG’s loss of 7 million interactions from August to September.

Peaks of each country

Of course, we must include the monthly leader, Flamengo, who set a new record in Brazil by qualifying for the Copa Libertadores final by defeating Barcelona twice. We discovered that there were 7.13 million interactions in a single day, which is rather impressive. This would put them ahead of their archrival Vasco, with a monthly performance of 7.03 million.

River Plate hit its monthly peak on a day when the Argentine team played at Monumental de Nuez, outside of the Copa Libertadores, which helps to minimize the number of interactions. On the 10th, a post honoring its forward Julián Lvarez, who is available to the Seleço and was at home, had a remarkable 2.96 million interactions.

River Plate’s Interaction Rate draws attention

River Plate’s engagement rate with its followers of 2.88% stands out among the month’s top achievers. This is especially impressive since it is larger than any Brazilian squad. This performance stands out since it outperforms even Palmeiras, the Copa Libertadores finalist, with an engagement rate of 2.71%, making them the best in Brazil in September.

Videos

Boca Juniors is the team in Argentina that has the most videos. There were 97 videos in all, with a total of 11.46 million views. This achievement outperforms River’s 10.28 million engagements, despite the fact that River only posted 59 videos.

For comparative purposes, the figure in Brazil is significantly greater. Flamengo had the most videos with 269, followed by Corinthians with 177. Flamengo received 44.4 million and Corinthians received 28.5 million, making these results even more striking.

Learn more about our LATAM Rankings in July as matches begin, with Flamengo maintaining their lead.

Mexico

When it comes to engagement with football clubs, Mexico, which has traditionally relied heavily on Facebook, appears to be following the lead of other nations that use Instagram as their primary social media platform.

Mexico had 30 million interactions in September, with Instagram accounting for 58% of those. In direct comparison to August, however, the number of Mexican contacts fell to around five million. Club America has fallen out of the top ten Instagram accounts as a result of this. Thanks to this drop, Colo-Colo, a Chilean team, entered the top 10 at Club América’s 11th spot. Unlike Cruz Azul in August, Club America also dominated among Mexicans on Twitter. With an impressive 991k members, the club is on the verge of reaching the 1 million milestone.

On Facebook, Mexican clubs compete almost on an equal footing with Brazilian clubs, with four clubs placing in the top ten. The same brand is used by the Brazilians, with Colo-Colo and River Plate rounding out the top ten. The domain of Club América has 2.23 million Facebook interactions. Cruz Azul, on the other hand, was the most popular Mexican club in August, with 2.59 million interactions.

Flamengo sets a new record as Facebook interactions decline

Posted by

Monthly, we rate clubs from Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, Uruguay, Chile, and Columbia in our LATAM club rankings. After the return of matches in Argentina in July after a temporary delay, a new high was reached since the rankings began. This is a tremendous feat for Flamengo, who has always been a strong club in our rankings. This new record has surely boosted Flamengo’s reputation, considering the squad did not even reach these figures when they were declared Brazilian champions at the end of February. Incredibly, this team racked over 69 million Instagram interactions, the new record in our leaderboard. As a result, Flamengo has maintained its great reputation by setting a new record for all Latin American teams. Flamengo had already won 63 million, a record for any team at that point in time.

To learn more about Samba’s Monthly LATAM Rankings, including Flamengo’s continued dominance as matches restart, click here.

Few clubs have been able to break this new record, with only São Paulo getting close in May, with 38 million on Instagram, demonstrating how significant this achievement is. Unfortunately, it is not all good news for all these teams this month; Colombia is the only country without a representative in the Top 20. Colombia came up short with just more than 13.79 million interactions, causing the team to drop out of the Top 20.

River and Argentina

River Plate’s elimination from the Copa Libertadores in favor of Atlético-MG has resulted in a decrease in interactions for the Argentine squad. Despite having 24 million Instagram engagements, River saw a 22% dip in interactions on July 2nd. Argentina’s social media activity has decreased across all three platforms as a result of their absence from the Copa Libertadores semifinals.

When it comes to Instagram interactions, Boca Juniors witnessed an increase of just 21%. A similar gain of 13% was seen on Twitter, despite a decrease from 11th to 13th place in the rankings. This is not all, they also saw a significant drop of 17% on Facebook, ​which rose from 12th to 11th place in the rankings from the previous month.

Consumption division

Even with a smaller user base, Twitter already outperforms Facebook in Brazil, accounting for 30% of all interactions. In Argentina and Uruguay, the same is true, with Twitter having more interactions than Facebook. In Mexico, Twitter still has a long way to go. This popular platform only represents 32.7% of all interactions between Mexican clubs on Facebook. On the topic of this platform it’s worth recalling that until May, Facebook was the most popular social network in Mexico. However, this platform didn’t keep its crown for long as it was overtaken by Instagram in June, July, and August.

General Numbers – Twitter

Like Instagram, Flamengo also smashed the monthly record with 8.47 million interactions. After winning their second consecutive Brazilian title, Rio de Janeiro’s club gained 8 million in one month, breaking the previous record set by the club. Again, River Plate and Cruz Azul were the only non-Brazilian teams to make it into Twitter’s Top 10. In terms of River Plate, they have managed to climb to the fifth rank despite a decline of 700,000 interactions from July’s second spot.

Although Cruz Azul had 200 thousand fewer interactions, it went from tenth to the eighth rank in a matter of weeks. Due to this small improvement, they even passed Rio de Janeiro Vasco and Fluminense in the standings. Both Colombians and Uruguayans were unable to reach the 20th rank this year. Not only that but both Colo Colo and Atlético Nacional saw elimination from the ranking with 206,000 and 202,000 interactions respectively.

Find out more about our Monthly Rankings, in which we rank sports betting houses, with Sportsbetio taking first place.

An year of decline for Facebook

Users appear to have abandoned Facebook when it comes to communicating with their clubs. August has the fewest interactions of all the months since the beginning, with 37.55 million compared to 69.2 million in January. Only in the month when football was temporary on hold in Argentina and Colombia did Facebook triumph.

Chile

When it comes to rankings, Chile does not typically place in the Top 20. However, it surprised the world by placing Colo Colo at 13th with 804,000 interactions. After a great performance in both the Copa Chile and Chilean Championship, fans have a reason to be optimistic. Thanks to their performance Chile’s interactions have grown on all three platforms. Impressively they increased by 30% on Facebook, 32% on Twitter, and 22% on Instagram when compared to the previous month.

Uruguay

Peñarol took advantage of Uruguay’s statistics, accounting for nearly 70% of the country’s total Instagram interactions. With these impressive percentages in mind, Peñarol finished 18th as a consequence of the results. In terms of Twitter, Uruguay is ranked 17th, with 66% of all interactions coming from Uruguay.

As matches resume, Flamengo maintain their lead in the LATAM rankings

Posted by

On a monthly basis, we rate clubs from Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, Uruguay, Chile, and Columbia in our LATAM club rankings. The Colombian Championship caused a disruption in June, resulting in an absence of matches in Argentina. With this in mind, and in light of the Liga MX’s end, the number of interactions has dropped to its lowest point of 243 million since the ranking began. In July, however, the matches returned to Argentina, and viewership climbed with games in Colombia, not to mention the start of the Copa Libertadores da América following a pause for the Copa América.

Learn more about the LATAM Rankings, as well as Flamengo’s recent achievements.

General Numbers

After the Colombian Championship was interrupted in July, the rankings gradually recovered, and Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook saw some interesting results. On Instagram, all six alternate nations of interactions had a modest 39% increase from June to July. Of course, there’s more, as Instagram accounted for a whopping 77% of all interactions in July.

Instagram wasn’t the only social media site to see success. In comparison to July, Facebook and Twitter both saw an increase in engagements. The number of interactions on Facebook jumped from 34.8 million to a whopping 43.96 million. Twitter, too, increased from 24.46 million to 32.06 million engagements. However, it is not all good news for Twitter. The platform continues to struggle to expand in Colombia and Chile, where the figures are only slightly higher. In terms of growth, Facebook saw a 9.1 million increase from one year to the next, with the majority of this growth occurring in Mexico and Argentina. Brazil, despite accounting for 40% of total interactions, had a drop in the platform’s overall number of interactions. 

Flamengo’s dominance is undeniable

Flamengo reached an astonishing 62.97 million interactions in July. This is an increase from 38.8 million in June and 54.03 million in May. This increase is thanks to the arrival of Renato Gacho, Flamengo’s new Manager, and his consecutive victories by rout. The Rio de Janeiro club has complete control of all social media platforms and engages in social and digital distancing in practically all of them.

Fla x Cruz Azul on Facebook

Only Cruz Azul (MEX), which had been without a title for a long time, has broken its dry spell. The club has gotten its followers to engage in an incredible 4.08 million interactions and came close to matching Facebook. Cruz Azul was on the verge of moving to Flamengo’s place for the second month in a row, with only 531 encounters separating them in June.

Cruz Azul hit its highest point on July 18th, with a total of 882,000 contacts. Flamengo, on the other hand, fell short of the 882 thousand mark, with its greatest performance on Facebook hitting 380,000 engagements. River was in third place with 700 thousand fewer interactions than Flamengo. However, they did exceed Flamengo in the daily peak with 460 thousand engagements after the Copa Libertadores triumph over Argentino Jrs.

Equality only on Facebook

There is definitely a pattern emerging in our leaderboard. Five of the clubs on Facebook are Brazilian, four are Mexican, and one is from Argentina. These clubs have also taken over Twitter’s top ten, with eight of the ten being Brazilians. Not only that, but seven of the top ten clubs on Instagram are Brazilian, two are Argentine, and one is Mexican.

Uruguayan presence

Despite the fact that it has been a mixed bag, Uruguay has come out on top. Uruguay has finally landed in the top 20 on Instagram, the social media platform with the highest rate of interactions. Peñarol, which beat Nacional in the Copa Sudamericana, surpassed Independiente (ARG) in terms of interactions with 2.87 million. They were not only successful on Instagram, but also on Twitter, where Peñarol was ranked 15th and Nacional was ranked 19th.

GET IN TOUCH

To find out more about Samba Digital, get in touch with us via our Contacts Page.

Flamengo announces partnership with the streaming service DirectvGo

Posted by

Flamengo’s announcement of their newest collaboration arrives just as the Euros are in full swing. To expand its reach, this Rio club has partnered with Directv Go, the popular streaming service. With this new collaboration, the corporation will be able to begin advertising on billboards near the Ninho do Urubu training camps. They’ve even left their mark on the team’s press conference microphones. Additionally, as a result of this sponsorship, institutional actions will be carried out.

On June 13th, the post-match press conference with new coach Mauricio Souza, who succeeded Rogério Ceni, marked the beginning of this partnership. Flamengo had recently defeated América-MG 2-0 at Maracana when this statement was made. Not only was this a huge success for the club, but it also helped the brand, since they were featured on the club’s social media platforms.

One of Directv Go’s most popular topics among its customers is football. It is undeniably a national passion that drives the country forward. In light of this passion, it’s only natural for the brand to be where its audience will be. Directv Go respects Flamengo’s prominence in the world of football, and this sponsorship will help to increase the importance and respect that Directv has for the Brazilian sport.

What does this mean for DirectvGo?

Directv Go is a well-known brand that has been a Flamengo partner for a long time. This will be another way for them to feel the overwhelming support of their devoted followers. Flamengo’s confidence in Directv Go’s sponsorship may result in a huge number of new clients from Naço Rubro-Negra.

Directv Go, which debuted in December 2020, seeks to give live national and international programming as well as streaming content to Brazilians. Fans of football can now have unlimited access to the game without the need for a written contract or technical installation services; all they need is a reliable internet connection.

Flamengo’s offering will be available till December of this year. This is not, however, the service’s first venture into Brazilian football. The Campeonato Paulista was the company’s first sponsorship in 2021. They wanted to increase brand visibility which they did through the referees’ jerseys throughout the entire season with this partnership. They were also shown on field plates and in the background of athlete interviews, which were viewed on the grass during halftime and after games.

GET IN TOUCH

To find out more about Samba Digital, get in touch with us via our Contacts Page.

Flamengo maintains its lead despite a drop, and LATAM Rankings has the highest interactions to date

Posted by

On a monthly basis, we rate clubs from Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, Uruguay, Chile, and Columbia in our LATAM club rankings. In May, the results of their club’s achievements across the three major social media platforms reached a milestone, with the biggest number of interactions since the LATAM rankings were created.

General Numbers

May was unquestionably a great month, as it was named the month with the most interactions since the LATAM ranking was established. We found a total of 370 million interactions between Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram across all six countries studied when all interactions were added together.

This month, all three social media platforms saw an increase in the number of interactions, which is cause for joy. Instagram came out on top with a whopping 25% gain, followed by Twitter with 23% and Facebook with 22%. Instagram is on a roll and has had the most engagements in recent months, accounting for 73% of all interactions in May.

Problems in Colombia 

Colombia is already a country that does not stand out in terms of digital challenges, with poor percentage performance in comparison to its population. However, following the social unrest in May, when a large number of people took to the streets to oppose tax reforms, the number of interactions fell even further. Columbia had a total of 48.51% fewer people than April. Total interactions were 7.64 million, compared to 14.83 million in April.

This precipitous reduction is undoubtedly discouraging; it’s possible that the national championship matches are to blame. This tournament was halted, and some of Colombia’s Libertadores games were even broadcast in neighboring countries.

Twitter x Facebook 

This trend has now become a reality. Even though it has fewer subscribers, Twitter has shifted to Facebook. Facebook had 24.99 million interactions in the previous month, while Twitter had 26.58 million.

Uruguay has closely followed this trend and does even better on Twitter. Mexico, on the other hand, has taken the opposite approach. With the growth of Facebook, this North American country now has a larger edge over Twitter, with 19.62 million users compared to only 4.60 million on Twitter.

Leadership Relay

Facebook has introduced three new leaders during the last three months. With 4.40 million interactions in March, River Plate took the lead. Flamengo was the most popular in April, with 4.95 million. São Paulo surpassed them all in May, claiming the top spot with 8.25 million interaction.

Not only that, but Cruz Azul from Mexico is on the rise, with a whopping 7.62 million interactions. If SPFC’s performance had not been exceptional, this club may have been the leader.

Flamengo rules Twitter and Instagram

Despite a decline in performance since last month, Flamengo remains in first place. Rio de Janeiro’s Instagram interactions dropped from 57.66 million to 54.03 million. Meanwhile, São Paulo saw a growth of 38.76 million interactions, which is quite impressive when compared to SPFC’s 23.46 million interactions in March.

Only River Plate and Boca Juniors from Argentina are among the top ten performers, with Cruz Azul from Mexico just missing out in 11th place. The Brazilian dominance on Twitter has been constant. River Plate, presently in third place, and Cruz Azul, now in eighth place, are among the top ten ranks.

Chile

Only Colo Colo, a Chilean group, cracked the top 20 this month. Instagram accounted for 3.01 million interactions, propelling them into the top 20. On Facebook and Twitter, however, the scenario was different, with Chilean clubs failing to make the top 20.

Keep up with the LATAM rankings, including what happened in April, by clicking this link.

GET IN TOUCH

To find out more about Samba Digital, get in touch with us via our Contacts Page.

Flamengo takes the lead in the LATAM rankings, with São Paulo close behind

Posted by

Welcome to our LATAM club rankings, where we rank clubs from Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, Uruguay, Chile, and Columbia on a monthly basis. We saw some impressive results from their club’s performances across the three major social media platforms in April, with Flamengo topping the leaderboards on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

April Considerations

In comparison to March, there was a 14.14% rise in Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram interactions last month. The end of the Brazilian Championship and the start of the Regional Championships could be viewed as key factors in the significant decrease in interactions in March. However, the Brazilians’ bad luck came to an end in April, when they staged a huge comeback. With 142 million monthly Instagram engagements, Brazil has hit the highest monthly engagement mark. This huge increase can be attributed to the launch of the Copa Libertadores da América. Flamengo, in particular, reaped the benefits of the competition’s launch, with 22 million Instagram interactions alone.

Uruguay and Mexico have seen an increase in their social media success on all three channels, following Brazil’s success. The number of interactions in Uruguay has increased by 46.41%, to a whopping 6 million. Brazil isn’t far behind, with 183.6 million interactions, up 25.1% from the previous year. Mexico’s growth continues to rise, but at a slower pace. They increased by 9.02 percent, gaining 31 million interactions, a goal they had also reached in February.

Flamengo: a case of digital success in April

Flamengo has risen to the top of the charts on each of the three social media sites. They have not only been declared champions, but they have also accounted for 37% of all Brazilian interactions between the 20 teams in the first division.

You can not only read about their performance, but you can also see it. The video below shows Flamengo’s celebrations after winning the Brazilian Super Cup on penalty kicks.

Shortly after the victory, this video received 618 thousand views. With 1.54 million interactions in just 24 hours, it rocketed to the peak of the month on Facebook.

This isn’t the only video that has made it to the peaks of the month. After this video of the Super Cup victory over Palmeiras was uploaded – still on the Brasilia lawn – the number of interactions on Instagram skyrocketed. For a total of 2.55 million views, this video below gained an impressive 1.050 million interactions, consisting of a mixture of likes and comments.

Twitter Tupiniquim

On Twitter, our Brazilian clubs are well-represented, with nine of the top ten clubs in April being Brazilian. The only exception to this infiltration is Argentina’s River Plate. This one squad, however, is no match for these nine teams. Brazilian interactions make up 65.2 % of all interactions, or 20.8 million of the 31.94 million total.

This isn’t the only positive news from Twitter; the number of users in countries like Brazil and Argentina is now equal to that of Facebook. For its success in April, Uruguay deserves special mention. This is due to the fact that Uruguayan fans are nearly twice as active as Chileans (977 thousand x 536 thousand interactions). Given that Uruguay’s population is 5.5 times smaller than Chile’s, this is unexpected.

The difference in numbers

There is a large disparity in numbers from April; consider  São Paulo to get a sense of the true gap between first and second place. With a total of 2.5 million interactions,  São Paulo had the second-best social network score of the LATAM countries. This large total is due to its successful debut in the Copa Libertadores, which it won 3 to 0 against Sporting Cristal away from home. In contrast, Flamengo beat Velez Sarsfield 3 to 2 in Argentina on the same day, bringing in 4.42 million viewers.

Mexico in numbers

Mexico was the most divided in April when it came to interactions between the three networks. They’ve seen a slight increase on Instagram, but this hasn’t been repeated across all platforms, as Facebook has seen a significant drop. In April, Instagram accounted for 49.45% of all interaction, while Facebook saw a 40.8% drop. Despite its mixed results, Mexico’s overall Instagram user base remains small, accounting for just 7.25 % of the total 216.7 million interactions.

When looking at their Facebook performance, Mexico’s success is also evident. With 12.98 million interactions, Club América (3rd), Cruz Azul (5th), and Chivas (7th) are among the top ten. Unfortunately, other social media sites have not followed suit, with their results falling short of Mexico’s potential as compared to other countries.

In the Instagram analysis, Club América was in 11th, while Chivas was ranked 16th. On Twitter, things aren’t any better, with Club América in 14th place with 800 thousand interactions and Chivas in 17th place with 412 thousand interactions.

In Mexico, Chivas Guadalajara produced the most engagement on Instagram. Although it does not seem to be a high point, Atlas got 612 thousand interactions on April 24th, a 1 to 0 win. Chivas hit a high of 360 thousand Facebook interactions, with Instagram being their most successful platform.

Argentina

In April, River Plate’s interactions dropped by 8.4 million compared to March. This month’s poor performance may be due to Marcelo Gallardo’s drop from first to the seventh position on Facebook. Argentina’s Facebook interactions are down 2.1 million, and the situation is only getting worse. They continued to lose 5.6 million interactions on Instagram in total.

There is, however, some light at the end of the tunnel: Boca Juniors hit a new high of just over 150 thousand interactions on Facebook, surpassing 1 million. Growth was also slow on Twitter, with just 53,000 interactions and only 10,000 more on Instagram.

The rapid decline of the River and the stability of Boca reduced the total number of Argentine interactions to about four million. In other words, there was a 9.21% drop in April compared to March. Despite the decrease, the number indicates that the other teams saw a small rise, which was insufficient to compensate for River Plate’s decline.

They made an impression in March with 51 million interactions, but they fell short in April with just 46.3 million. The next day, they had their best result in Argentina, a thrilling 3-2 victory over Colón in the 9th round of the Argentine Championship. On this exciting day for Rover Plate fans, there were 1.92 million interactions. This success can be compared to Boca’s best publication on the 28th, which had 1.3 million interactions on the day it beat Santos in the Libertadores Cup final.

GET IN TOUCH

To find out more about Samba Digital, get in touch with us via our Contacts Page.

PALMEIRAS, CHAMPIONS OF THE BRAZILIAN CUP, REMAIN A RUNNER-UP TO FLAMENGO

Posted by

Despite Palmeira’s victory at the Copa do Brasil finals, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram are all down, following Flamengo’s amazing victory at the Brazilian Championship the week before. The total number of interactions decreased by 38%, resulting in 27.8 million interactions. Instagram was hit the hardest, with a 40% drop overall, whilst Facebook and Twitter both fell by 33%.

Digital Title Celebration – Direct Comparison

With two national titles secured in two weeks, a comparison of the clubs’ digital power of the clubs is unavoidable. Flamengo has achieved an impressive number of 40 million interactions, with a loss of leadership in all social media analysed. Flamengo had 11.77 million interactions, while Palmeiras had just 10 million. Despite becoming Brazilian Cup champions on Sunday, Palmeiras is still a few steps behind, and will not overtake Flamengo this week. However, there is light at the end of the tunnel for Palmeiras as they defeated Flamengo on Facebook this week. Palmeiras gained 1.76 million interactions compared to Flamengo who received 924,000 this week. 

Despite winning the Brazilian Cup on Sunday, Palmeiras is still a few steps behind Flamengo and will not be able to catch up this week. Palmeiras, on the other hand, saw some light at the end of the tunnel this week, as they beat Flamengo on Facebook, receiving 1.76 million likes to Flamengo’s 924,000.

End of the Brasileirão x Start of the State Championships

Everything, including the Brasileirão, must come to an end, with some teams being impacted more than others. Thirteen of the teams saw a decrease in results from the previous week. With the start of the State Championship and a large rise of 62% in interactions for Palmeiras in the Copa do Brasil final, things are looking up. However, the runner-up, Grêmio was not so fortunate, as their performance fell by 30% from the previous week.

Stability

Santos has taken the term “consistency is key” very seriously, receiving 2.6 million, 2.57 million, 2.63 million, and 2.65 million in the last four weeks with very little difference. The club finished the last round in 5th, 2nd, 7th, and 5th place, respectively, thanks to their recent results. Santos isn’t the only team that has remained consistent; Corinthians, despite a small decrease previously, has maintained a 3.5 million average since the end of January until now. The Corinthians saw a small rise in performance this week, rising to 3.78 million from 2.97 million the week before.

Together

This week, Vasco and Botafogo were both relegated to Serie B, but that isn’t the only thing they have in common; their performances this week were very close.  Vasco received 990,000 interactions, with Botafogo coming in second with 883,000. Botafogo had a victory this week in the State of Carioca’s inaugural round, whilst Vasco was defeated. Vasco, on the other hand, has over 110 thousand Instagram interactions. On Facebook, Botafogo received 128,000 interactions compared to Vasco’s 118,000. Vasco and Botafogo battled it out on Twitter, with Vasco coming out on top with 136,000 to Botafogo’s 129,000 interactions.

Serie B

Starting next week, Series B will be evaluated and its teams will compete for a place in the Weekly Interaction Ranking. Cruzeiro will play another year in Serie B, and this week on Instagram, they will be in 10th place, beating Vasco with 697,000 interactions. Vitória would beat Athletico-PR, while CSA and Cuiabá would conquer Goiás, Bragantino, Coritiba and Atlético-GO.

GET IN TOUCH

To find out more about Samba Digital, get in touch with us via our Contacts Page.