The World Cup in Brazil this year showed how deeply social media has penetrated into our everyday life – it became the most talked about event on Facebook and Twitter…ever. From Luis Suarez’ notorious bite to Germany’s final win, World Cup 2014 broke all social media records with 672 million tweets and over 3 billion Facebook interactions.[wpsr_retweet]
FIFA’s World Cup 2014 posted several exciting “firsts” for sports fans – it was the first win for Germany as a united country (since 1990), it was the first global triumph of European country in South America, and most of all, it was the biggest event in the history of social media. Of course, we should note that other huge events like the Oscars and the Super Bowl in the U.S. are one-night hits, while the Olympic Games last for 16 days. Still, the global soccer tournament, which trilled millions for a month, is the most talked about event on most social networking websites.
According to Twitter, fans discussed the World Cup 672 million times and with 35.6 million tweets, the biggest deal was the July 8 semifinal between Germany and Brazil. The final match also attracted a lot of attention, generating 32.1 million tweets, followed by the Brazil-Chile meet on June 28 with 16.4 million. The activity on Facebook was even more impressive – more than 350 million people shared their thoughts and emotions about the World Cup with over 3 billion posts, comments and likes. Last year, Super Bowl XLVII broke the website’s records with 245 million interactions, but the big winner turned out to be Sunday’s final – there were 280 million interactions by 88 million people on this match alone. Surprisingly, U.S. fans were the most active in the world – more than 10.5 million people posted about Germany’s win over Argentina.
In fact, the event was expected to be big on social networks. According to the results of a May poll, called “Social Side of the World Cup”, 74.2% of the people said they would be on social media during the matches and 42% of the viewers said they would be posting content related to their favourite ads. Another 52% of them said they would “like” or follow a brand.
So, what was the most talked about thing during the World Cup? Certainly, people argued and shared the most about the ridiculously scandalous Luis Suarez, Brazil’s humiliating loss and Cristiano Ronaldo’s hair. However, if we look at the numbers, we’ll see the actual matches got the most attention. And the players were quite popular as well – Brazil’s Neymar was the most talked about player on social media, followed by the 3-time FIFA Ballon d’Or owner Lionel Messi. On Facebook, the third most-mentioned player was Portugal Cristiano Ronaldo, while on Twitter it was Suarez and his cannibalistic tendencies.
According to FIFA President Sepp Blatter, the event was the first “truly mobile and social World Cup”. In fact, the official FIFA app became the largest sports event app in the history, recording 28 million downloads. The followers of the organization’s Instagram account jumped from 42,000 to almost a million just in a month. It is social media that contributed the most to the rising popularity of soccer in the U.S., say experts. Celebrities also couldn’t stay away from the World Cup appeal, with Rhianna becoming the most famous supporter of Germany.
It seems every little thing in our lives is on social media right now – what we want, how we feel, what we eat, where we go and so on. And huge events become even bigger on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram just like it happened to this year’s World Cup.
