Burnley Football Club wins competitive advantage, increases social media engagement by 54%
The Challenge
Burnley Football Club has made its mark on the English football tradition for over 140 years.
The Premier League team was one of the first teams to go professional in 1883, became one of the 12 founding members of the Football League in 1888 and is now renowned for its training and scouting programs.
With unabashed goals to turn its Northwest England roots into a global brand, Burnley Football Club relies on social media to engage with communities around the world. “Social media is a key way for us to interact with followers, fans or future fans,” says Nathan Kavanagh, Insights Manager for Burnley Football Club. “Even if they can’t attend a match, we can make them feel like they’re part of the club.” To achieve this, Burnley Football Club needed a robust social media strategy to engage fans worldwide and drive revenue beyond match tickets. The club sought an omnichannel social media platform that could:
- Listen across channels to monitor brand sentiment and reach
- Benchmark social media performance against competitor clubs
- Provide comprehensive reporting and analytics in a single pane of glass
- Offer an all-in-one solution that fits within the club’s budget constraints
The Solution
After evaluating a dozen available platforms to identify the optimal solution capable of meeting the club’s publishing, analytics and engagement objectives, Sprinklr Social Self-Serve emerged as the standout choice, thanks to its unparalleled unified social media management capabilities.
Sprinklr provides exceptional value and return on investment, making it a standout brand to have as a partner. It offers a reliable product, a great user experience and interface, and an unparalleled level of customer support.”
Insights Manager, Burnley Football Club
Impressed by Sprinklr's comprehensive features — including reliable publishing, tailored captioning, brand benchmarking against competitors and robust reporting — Burnley Football Club switched to Sprinklr in the summer of 2023. Kavanagh says, “By providing useful insights on performance across platforms, Sprinklr frees up time for our social media team and content creators so they can focus on doing their best creative work.”
Omnichannel publishing with tailored content
Burnley Football Club’s social media team uses Sprinklr’s editorial calendar to strategize, schedule and publish posts across Facebook, Instagram, X and TikTok. It also uses AI-powered caption-tailoring capabilities to modify posts for the tone and voice of each platform.
“Sprinklr is one of the only platforms that offers a really reliable publishing tool as part of its Self-Serve product,” Kavanagh says. “We can use the post builder to change captions depending on the platform we’re sharing to, so we can deliver the right message to the right audience in the right place.”
Competitive insights and social listening power informed decisions
Kavanagh and his team leverage Sprinklr’s benchmarking capabilities, public relations report and brand insights to track brand awareness and measure Burnley Football Club’s social media performance against competitor clubs. “Sprinklr shows us our share of voice and how many mentions we get from both digital and traditional media,” Kavanagh says. “To have that alongside publishing in one place is a big string in Sprinklr’s bow.”
With Sprinklr’s social listening capabilities, Burnley Football Club can also gain insight into perception around its brand. With topics set up in Sprinklr, the team can listen for conversations across social channels, helping them understand the brand’s health. “We can double-click to see the sentiment of discussions online,” Kavanagh says. “If there’s negative sentiment, we can take a closer look and refine our messaging.”
Data-driven insights attract sponsorship opportunities
Sprinklr provides real-time insights into performance for specific posts across channels, which helps prove return on investment to prospective partners. For example, if a brand in another country is interested in becoming a Burnley Football Club sponsor, Kavanagh can pull social media metrics for that region.
“I regularly check Sprinklr to understand where our audience is located on each platform, and to see how much we’ve grown in certain demographics or geographies,” he says. “Diving into the details helps secure sponsors and informs our content strategy.”
Unprecedented, reliable support from the Sprinklr team
Through regular customer success check-ins and hands-on support, Sprinklr is there to help Burnley Football Club get the most of its social media strategy. As Kavanagh says, it’s about reliability and following through. “Sprinklr makes a promise in terms of the ongoing support you’ll get, and the Sprinklr team goes above and beyond to fulfill that promise.”
The Outcome
Burnley Football Club now has much deeper insights into its social media performance, enabling the team to refine its content strategy based on audience engagement and platform preferences.
Meanwhile, Sprinklr's publishing capabilities and brand benchmarking features help the club enhance its global brand presence, reaching a wider audience and attracting potential sponsors.
Since adopting Sprinklr, Burnley Football Club has significantly boosted its social media presence, with a remarkable 264% increase in posts across various channels within a 30-day period, compared to pre-implementation periods. This surge in activity has resulted in notable growth metrics, including a a 655% rise in post clicks, and a 54% uptick in engagements. Additionally, the club experienced a substantial 53% increase in media coverage and garnered 133% more mentions in top-tier publications.
In addition to offering advanced features and superior customer support compared to the club’s previous social media management tools, Sprinklr Social Self-Serve has helped Burnley Football Club achieve significant improvements in its content strategy, brand visibility and cost efficiency. With reliable publishing tools, tailored analytics and robust reporting features, Kavanagh and his team have successfully transitioned from a local club to a globally recognized football brand, driving fan engagement and revenue growth across multiple channels.