Document Type

Student Research Paper

Date

Spring 2022

Academic Department

Communications

Faculty Advisor(s)

Dr. Kelly Poniatowski

Abstract

Achieving an engaged social media presence is a crucial task for sports organizations in today’s expanding digital realm. “Instagram Engagement: Comparing Mainstream Sports Brands to Running Brands” explores the evolution of the sports-media relationship and specifically analyzes the engagement rates and types of content posted throughout five sportswear and running organizations’ Instagram accounts. 393 posts were analyzed and classified into three categories: metacommunicative, conceptual, and narrative (Kress & van Leeuwen, 2006; Romney & Johnson, 2018). Overall, sportswear companies posted the most narrative images while running brands shared the greatest number of conceptual images. Significant difference was discovered between the number of comments received on metacommunicative and conceptual posts compared to narrative pictures. No significant difference was apparent between the likes received throughout the three post categories. This study provides a detailed report regarding the social media presence of the ten running-related entities to understand the relationship between the content posted and the number of likes and comments accumulated on each post.

Notes

Honors in the Discipline; COM400: Honors in the Discipline

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