The unusual and original content that is successful in Brazil

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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.

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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.”

Flamengo’s winning streak in the LATAM standings continues into the new year, despite a drop in total interactions

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Since last year, Samba Digital has been paying close attention to what LATAM football clubs are doing to stay in touch with their fans, supporters, and clients. One of the most enjoyable aspects of checking these numbers has been discovering traces of each country’s culture in the content uploaded.

Another key piece of information that this article will provide is where the local user is being influenced by this content. Is Mexico similar to Chile? Are Argentinians, who make up one-quarter of Mexico’s population, more devoted to football topics? Continue reading to discover our comments on what happened in LATAM in January.

Flamengo, always Flamengo

The Brazilian Championship, which was still being played in the traditional month of vacation and the start of the season in January 2021, caught fire in its final third, with Flamengo fighting for the national title, which it would win. That month, the Rio de Janeiro club received 29 million interactions. This is not surprising given that there was a dizzying increase throughout the year, reaching 48 million total interactions.

The video of Michael’s goodbye showed a ceremony among the squad to award the title of “ugliest player” to right-back Rodinei, which really broke out with Flamengo’s fans.

With 2.5 million views, the stunt is the highlight of the month:

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A post shared by Flamengo (@flamengo)

Despite Flamengo and Instagram…

When compared to January of last year, the number of interactions in Brazil has decreased. While Instagram increased from 125 to 141 million users, Facebook decreased by more than half: from 30 to 14.1 million users, and it continues to lose continental reputation.

Twitter, on the other hand, showed a total increase of 10% over the previous year and reached 32.5 million interactions, with Brazil boosting Twitter’s performance.

A Good duel: Corinthians vs River Plate

The two clubs have already battled in the Copa Libertadores da América a few times, but this time the battle has been fought digitally, mainly on Instagram.

The two clubs have been increasingly close in terms of interactions over the last four months, and they have even switched positions. Regardless of this duel, the truth is that, over the last four months, Corinthians and River Plate have always come after Flamengo.

The Mexican consumption pattern

Mexico demonstrated a technical tie between Facebook and Instagram interactions in January 2021. There were 14.9 million interactions on Facebook and 15.1 on Instagram out of the 30 million total.

However, like in other countries, Facebook’s performance fell, and in January 2022, while Instagram maintained 15.1 million interactions, Facebook fell to 10.7 million. This research reveals a consistent shift in how Mexicans consume content from their football clubs. When it comes to Facebook interactions, Mexico comes out on top in terms of proportion.

Click here to learn more about Samba’s LATAM rankings, which include a remarkable total of 366 billion interactions in 2021.

And the result of the highest Mexican % in the division is…

(…) the presence of three Mexican clubs among the 10+ on Facebook. Cruz Azul, Club América, and Monterrey were among the 10+ clubs on the list in January. Cruz Azul came in second, with slightly over 2.4 million interactions, accounting for over 20% of all interactions on the social network in Mexico.

The usual intruder

As previously mentioned, Twitter maintains its performance as a result of the platform’s expanding relevance in Brazilian digital consumption. This is demonstrated by the fact that, of the 11 clubs with the highest number of interactions, ten are Brazilian, with River Plate, from Argentina, serving as the intruder.

The Argentine team almost jumped the line of the Copa Libertadores final on Twitter, since Flamengo and Palmeiras, the protagonists of the last decision, were the two clubs with the most interactions on the blue bird’s social network.

A record for a Chilean club

For the first time since the Monthly Ranking’s creation, a Chilean club is among the top ten. The feat was achieved with 5.94 million Colo-Colo interactions, thanks to the Copa Chile titles, against Everton, the Supercopa de Chile, over Universidad Católica, and the club’s appearance in the Summer Tournament, when the team competed against Universidad de Chile and Boca Juniors.

Total numbers

Despite some highs to kick off the new year, the number of interactions declined from 290 million in January 2021 to 289 million in January 2022. Unfortunately, the positives did not exceed the negatives this time, as the cause of the dip was that last year’s calendar saw fewer matches – primarily from the Brasileirão – due to the pandemic.

Top LATAM clubs total 3.66 billion interactions in 2021

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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

Brazilian soccer clubs hope to have their own top-flight by 2022

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Clubs in Brazil’s top flight, Campeonato Serie A, are planning to continue their efforts to secure control of the league from the CBF. Not only that but a new competition could be running as early as next year or even 2023.

Serie A is presently one of the few major domestic leagues still under the national federation administration. We discovered in July that Brazilian clubs want to break free from the CBF and build their own governing organisation to administer the competition. They’ll have greater control over how club games are run now that they’ve made this breakaway.

Learn more about the most recent football club ventures, such as PSG expanding its licensed product range in Brazil.

Behind the scenes

Rumour has it US-based private equity investors have committed between US$750 million and US$1 billion to the competition. And now with this investment, they are now moving forward with the project.

One of the project’s consultants is Ricardo Fort, a seasoned sports executive and the founder of Sport by Fort. Former ESPN executive Scott Guglielmino is to be playing a part, as is Charles Stillitano, co-founder of Relevent Sports. Of course, that is not all as Flavio Zveitler, a Brazilian sports lawyer, Lawrence Magrath, director of Rio de Janeiro-based investment firm Cremon Participacoes, and Rick Parry, current chairman of the English Football League (EFL) are all involved.

Click here to learn more about what’s going on in Brazil, including Globo’s exclusive survey of Brazilian gamblers.

They will not only make direct financial investments in the clubs. They will also bring in experienced professionals who have previously worked in major leagues. This professional team will act as a resource to help make the Brazilian football league a success. This new league would have to be with the CBF’s approval and the clubs’ desire to communicate with the national governing body.

Samba Awards 2021 entries are now open!

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The Samba Awards 2021, sponsored by Samba Digital, an international sports marketing agency, will open just before Christmas on December 23rd. During this ceremony, we will recognise the best campaigns created by the Latin American sports industry in three categories: Social Action, Audio Visual, and Engagement. In the 2020 edition, we saw a lot of excitement as more than 100 campaigns – among the most relevant football clubs on the continent and sports entities – were registered and subjected to the review of a specialised jury comprised of big names from international clubs and federations in the global sports industry.

In 2020, the lucky winners included Club Atlético Talleres, which won the Audio & Visual campaign, Clube Atlético Mineiro, which won the Engagement category, and Ceará Sporting Club, which received the most votes in the Social Action category.

Learn more about Ceará, Talleres, and Atlético-MG, the winners of the 2020 Samba Awards, by clicking here.

According to Frédéric Fausser, CEO of Samba Digital, in a globalised world, local connections are more than necessary, and among the many actions that the agency develops for clients such as Liverpool, Paris Saint-Germain, Ligue 1 and others, the expansion of conversations between European, Latin, and North American markets is becoming increasingly important.

“The Samba Awards seek market unification.” The first is to ensure that the numerous campaigns well produced by the Latin American sports industry are carefully analysed by major players in the European sports market. And the second is to allow the same share of members of the Latin American sports industry to analyze the best campaigns that European clubs have developed for the public here. They are diverse! And this is the function of the Samba Awards: to generate this continuous flow of content and experiences”.

2020: A focus on people

In a year when global society was experiencing the worst of the pandemic, the campaigns developed gained a new level of significance and sensitivity. So much so that several campaigns, whether successful or not, brought themes related to people’s lives.

Ceará, the winner of the Social Action category, raised the issue of child labour, while Bahia raised the issue of homophobia. The AFA emphasised the importance of confinement in the face of pandemic evolution, while Fluminense addressed Black Awareness Day and the CBF worked to collect food for the needy.

The Samba Awards 2020 also featured creative and engaging campaigns. Atlético-MG promoted the Manto da Massa, which was a watershed moment in the club’s history. In a year of pandemic, they sold 100,000 shirts, increasing shirt sales by 50%. Boca Juniors paid tribute to its greatest idol, Diego Armando Maradona, with fewer numbers but no less creativity, in a simple post that broke the hearts of all football fans.

Not to mention the victorious Audio & Visual campaign produced by Club Atlético Talleres (ARG) in an emotional story of a fan, stricken by a rare genetic disease, and who pushed his own limits – alongside his best friend – to relive the thrill of feeling the stadium’s energy.

Registration for the Samba Awards 2021 is now open on the official Samba Awards website, and we’re hoping that we’ll get emotional and fall in love all over again, just like we did at the Samba Awards 2020.

Please contact awards@sambadigital.com or Bernardo Besouchet, our PR Manager, at bernardo.besouchet@sambadigital.com for more information.

River Plate climbs the LATAM standings, while Flamengo falls

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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

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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.

INTERVIEW: Bernardo Besouchet, PR Manager shares his work behind the scenes at Samba Digital

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With Samba’s recent success and major achievements, it was a fantastic chance to learn more about the people behind the logo and their diverse clientele. This is the second article in a series of articles in which we interview a member of the Samba Digital team and highlight their distinct viewpoints. This series of articles will address some of the most often asked topics about working with major customers and their most compelling case studies.

In the next installment of this series, we’ll meet Bernardo Besouchet, Samba Digital’s PR Manager.

Click here to read the first installment of this series, which features Pedro Caffa, our Social Media Manager & Coordinator.

What is your role at Samba? 

I am the PR Manager, at Samba Digital and as PR Manager, my main challenge is to spread the word about our clients, our content, and the activations we created based on their interests. My major duty, while respecting our client’s strategy and objectives, is to link them and their activations with the consumer, supporter, and client they are looking for. 

Not only that, but as part of my work, I also have the obligation of concentrating on innovation. Creativity attracts people’s attention like a magnet. In the public relations department, we need to come up with new ways to tell stories. Good, unique, and innovative ideas are constantly featured in the media, attracting the attention of the general public, journalists, and social media profiles and content providers. That’s how I view it: dedicated to achieving the goal.

Another key aspect of my job is having a thorough grasp of the types of material that will be used in each medium. Some content is hybrid, meaning it may be used for both TV and social media. Others require special editions to be released in one medium in order to draw attention to another.

This cross-content is one of the most difficult aspects of the ultimate PR universe to plan and comprehend. It is critical for every single journalist, television station, social media content producer, or digital influencer to build a comprehensive strategy that is entirely focused on outcomes.

What is your vision?

In terms of my perspective, I believe that in a globalized world, tailoring a message to the right audience is the finest strategy we can provide our clients. Perhaps this term is too broad, but I genuinely feel that employing up-to-date data and innovative ideas, as well as integrating our customers’ worldwide and comprehensive strategies – and, of course, we can’t forget to use local KPIs! – is the most effective method to create results.

What are your best case studies?

I prefer to think of myself as someone who works behind the scenes, focusing on clients as proof of the job we do. With that in mind, I have a long list of past clients to demonstrate what the PR team is capable of. To begin, as part of a content collaboration with MKT Esportivo, we launched the Weekly Interactions Ranking to Brazil. We follow the 40 most important Brazilian clubs every week to see what sort of material they’re creating and sharing.

With these weekly assessments, we can get a better understanding of the overall picture of Brazilian teams’ digital performances and the strategies they’re pursuing to engage with their fans. With this continual eye, we can provide the finest chances for our clients to form collaborations and produce content that will be beneficial in connecting Brazilians to our clients.

Using this knowledge, we developed the Monthly LATAM Interactions Ranking to gain a better understanding of what clubs in Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, and Uruguay are up to. We have a precise dimension of what the clubs on the continent are producing in terms of material in their official social media accounts thanks to our ongoing research.

Here, we have agreements with MKT Registrado (ARG), Forbes (MEX), and MKT Esportivo (BRA) to magnify and exchange market knowledge, assisting the industry in measuring the true scale of what LATAM’s football teams represent.

On the subject of success stories, Samba Digital was also tasked with creating local activations in Brazil for international audiences. The two most recent examples where we created and enhanced their brands were Liverpool FC and Ligue 1. Some of our goals included producing, employing employees, establishing local relationships, and finding ways to magnify the message to the end target.

However, in the case of LFC, there is one important aspect to mention: brand protection. From a local perspective, we have “protected” Liverpool FC from a problem with the creation of a clothing brand. The Samba PR team informed the client that announcing the launch of the LFC x Roberto Firmino collection wasn’t the best time as the Covid restrictions for Brazilians from the UK government would be mentioned for Brazilian media outlets.

This led to Firmino being unable to join the Brazilian National Team due to these restrictions (and in that week Brazilian National Team was the Brazilian team had its list of players announced for some commitments for World Cup South America Qualify). Thankfully, Liverpool listened to our advice and postponed the debut for over a month. The message was clear and the final outcomes were brilliant, preserving the crisis or other dangers at this new time picked by the team.

This isn’t all we have in our portfolio; for nearly a year and a half, the Samba Digital PR team has been hard at work attempting to broaden the Ligue 1 universe for Brazilians. We’re creating various types of material and establishing local ties with the public to demonstrate the high level of service that the French League provides to its fans. Samba is expanding the amount of information with B2B and B2C points of view, with significant Brazilian players in certain French clubs.

We have delivered outstanding outcomes for our clients in terms of pure PR amplification, such as:

  • Samba’s PR department assisted Ajax in airing unique content promoting Anthony’s arrival on TV Globo during the break from Sao Paulo’s match.
  • For Shakhtar Dotnesk of Ukraine, with its OTT for Brazilians, with 7 minutes on SporTV (the audience’s favorite sports channel).
  • In collaboration with MKT Esportivo, the #1 Sports Marketing media outlet in terms of B2C connection, the Brazilian Everton FC blog with Marketing challenges aims to demonstrate the attitude of a UK club.

How do you see the evolution of the market?

The sports market is much too large to discuss its evolution, so I’ll stick to what I know best: brand extension and public engagement. In this sense, global brands that are conversing with English, Chinese, and Brazilians at the same time must become more surgical in their storytelling.

The cultural variations and interests of each nation necessitate the creation of geolocalized material, which is in high demand. Similarly, the task of amplifying these signals works, always with the professional culture of each nation as a guide.

In Mexico, Facebook was the primary social interaction network until recently – a fact that has changed in the last three months – but when we concentrate the study on football clubs, Instagram reaches an astonishing 85% of all interactions.

As vital as it is to understand behavior country by country, it is equally critical to map out where the message may be amplified, in what fashion, organic or paid, and to use this information to develop effective brand expansion plans, given that football is a global sport.

Understanding of clubs, federations, and events for “overseas” expansion is a factor that causes the market to constantly expand and that, increasingly, requires not only intelligence on the application of methodologies, but also local insights for personalization of its contents to captivate the public and, increasingly, create opportunities whether for interactions, commercials, or any other type of interaction that a customer may have in a given country.

How do you bring added value to your clients?

In terms of value, it is more than just achieving outcomes that add to our client’s brands. The Samba Digital PR Department is dedicated to developing unique possibilities and content innovation. We are certain that by adhering to our final connection briefings, we will be able to accomplish more and better. Personally, I consider innovation, creativity, and data analyses, as well as the element of looking for the end customer method to consume information, to be the primary pillars of the approach that I employ when developing PR solutions for our clients.

INTERVIEW: Pedro Caffa, Social Media Manager & Coordinator, tells us everything we need to know about his role at Samba Digital

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With Samba’s recent success and big milestones, it was a great opportunity to discover more about the individuals behind the logo and their many clients. This is the first of a series of articles in which we will interview a member of the Samba Digital team and feature their unique perspectives. This series of articles will answer some of the most burning questions that are involved when dealing with large clients and their most compelling case studies.

To kick off this series, we’ll meet Pedro Caffa, Samba’s Latin America and Spain Social Media Manager and Coordinator.

What is your role at Samba? 

I am the Social Media Manager and Coordinator for Latin America and Spain at Samba Digital. Within this key role, I am responsible for the strategy of clients (clubs, federations, and betting companies) in those territories. I am fortunate in that I have a fantastic team of experts that make work more enjoyable and manageable, including community managers, content creators, and PR managers.

As part of this fascinating work, we develop and implement online and offline strategies to bring clients from all over the world closer to Latin American fans in an organic approach that ensures solid engagement and growth.

What is your vision?

I joined Samba Digital 5 years ago in September 2016 and have witnessed the company’s rapid, steady, and tremendous growth, which has allowed me to work and reside in Argentina, Brazil, the United Kingdom, and Spain, where I am presently soaking up the sun. I have evolved professionally and personally in Samba as a result of my position, and I am glad to be a member of this team.

I, like the company’s vision, would like to see Samba Digital become a world leader in the development of strategies as well as the monetization of fan bases in the sector of sport and entertainment in the very near future. I believe Samba is a highly valuable, proactive, and full of hardworking professionals from all over the world who give that extra quality to be able to reach this aim.

What are your best case studies?

Fortunately, there have been a number of incredible success stories in the LatAm and Spain teams in the past, and there will be more in the future. The coverage in Paris for Leo Messi’s presentation at PSG is maybe the most resonant that comes to mind. The Samba team was fortunate enough to spend a week there with Tomás Marcó del Pont and Tomás De Micheli. This was a fantastic chance as the team, including myself, was able to put together a fantastic activation with prominent Spanish streamer Ibai Llanos. Thanks to this activation it was possible to have the very first Messi interview on Twitch in history.

Discover all about Samba’s work with PSG, including its activation with Ibai Llanos and Messi.

Of course, there are many more success stories to share, including a few from the difficult year of 2020. Fortunately, the pandemic had little effect on the Samba team’s excellent performance. For example, as soon as the global lockdown began, the team organized the First Virtual Club World Cup on Twitter in collaboration with the influencer Juez Central.

All of Samba Digital’s work with Juez Central to establish the First Virtual Club World Cup on Twitter can be found here.

This thrilling action involved all the clubs we work with at Samba in Spanish and other big LatAm and US teams.

This isn’t the end of the list of triumphs. The world of football mourned the death of Diego Armando Maradona in 2020, and Samba was up to the task of assisting Napoli in honoring the Argentine star with high-quality content in real-time. Samba had very good practices with Everton FC as well: When James Rodriguez’s appointment was revealed in September 2020, they devised an online and offline plan that featured blue lighting of Colombia’s tallest building.

This is not all, during the Toffees’ triumph over Liverpool in the Merseyside derby in February 2021, they planned the inaugural Watch Along exclusively for Latin Americans.

I emphasize the two-and-a-half years in London, where I worked closely with Tottenham Hotspur, a special club in my career. I have had several memorable moments with Spurs, including the team’s journey to the 2019 UEFA Champions League final and the opening of the new stadium.

How do you see the evolution of the market?

I believe we are in the midst of a historic moment, one in which the game is shifting. The way people consume sports is changing, as evidenced by the fact that today’s youth no longer watch football games solely on television. New platforms like Twitch provide a different perspective and storytelling for athletic events that appeal to younger generations. A prominent example of this is Ibai Llanos’ Copa América or Ligue 1 broadcasts this year in collaboration with Kosmos, Gerard Piqué’s company. Many artists and athletes now choose to communicate with streamers rather than journalists, signaling a shift in both the creation and consumption of content.

Social media first debuted as a “second screen” for sporting and cultural events a few years ago. Today, that second screen is not optional: it is required. Fans have progressed from being merely consumers of content to having the ability to create their own content as they see fit, and the opportunities available throughout the world are limitless. As a result, I believe that Samba, by using the fan as the axis of their marketing strategy, has a very significant asset in terms of being able to grow clients.

When it comes to the Latin American region, which is where Samba’s staff focuses most of its efforts, I believe there is still a lot to discover and do. True, it lacks the economic might of Asia or North America, but it does have two very important active assets: passion and creativity. As Latin American football players bring magic and dribbles to the European game, I feel that LatAm professionals, content creators, and fans can also contribute significantly to the digital game, which will be seen in the future years.

How do you bring added value to your clients?

My beliefs are apparent, particularly my opinion that the cultural diversity and skills of market professionals provide enormous value to Samba and, in my case, the LatAm team. They have highly skilled and innovative partners from Argentina, Mexico, Peru, Colombia, Chile, Spain, and El Salvador on the LatAm team. As a result, Samba can provide clients with a comprehensive and detailed view of a market as diverse as Latin America. Knowing the audience and knowing how to communicate with them, whether it’s a football club, a federation, or a betting organization, I believe there is no better added value than that.

Flamengo sets a new record as Facebook interactions decline

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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.