198 replies to this topic

[SophieB]

There's been a couple of stories in the F1 press of later covering teams exploring social media as a way of boosting engagement etc and I couldn't really find anywhere fitting to talk about it. Well, now we can discuss it here! Who is doing it well? What would 'well' look like? 
 
Some recent examples/stories/opinions:
 
 
Jon Noble ‏@NobleF1  15 mins15 minutes ago
Interesting insights from Twitter/Facebook on why #F1 stands 'alone' in social media stance http://www.http://www.motorspor...ce-say-experts/
 

And...
 
Alan Baldwin ‏@alanbaldwinf1  Dec 8
At McLaren #ThinkDigital2015 event in the Thought Leadership Centre. Learning about dark social and digital water holes.
 
Alan Baldwin ‏@alanbaldwinf1  Dec 8
Main 'takeaway' from today's #ThinkDigital2015 event is that despite Ron's recent comments re Twitter, @McLarenF1 are fully engaged.
 
 
What were those comments from Ron? Well...
 
Andrew Benson ‏@andrewbensonf1  Nov 29
Ron Dennis, winner, Marketing Society’s Outstanding Leadership Award: “I hate Tweeting & all social media; it’s not the way for the future.”

 

 

Discuss or add other examples if you want. (But please don't use it as a backdoor way of complaining about drivers by moaning about individual tweets.)

[Marklar]

Lotus is doing that perfectly in my opinion. Mercedes and McLaren are also doing an good, albeit not very good, job. Everyone else is not really exploit this opportunity IMO.

[YoungGun]

Quantity vs quality, twitter is not something I subscribe. However I do follow Ferrari on a professional networking site and they do promote themselves and engage their followers. It's of appeal if you like all things Ferrari and not just F1.

[Marklar]

By the way Jon Noble tweeted the wrong article. He meant this one

 

http://www.motorspor...ce-say-experts/

 

And also one interesting one from the Brazilian GP with regards to the Alonso hashtag

 

http://www.motorspor...m-brazilian-gp/

[SophieB]

By the way Jon Noble tweeted the wrong article. He meant this one

 

http://www.motorspor...ce-say-experts/

 

And also one interesting one from the Brazilian GP with regards to the Alonso hashtag

 

http://www.motorspor...m-brazilian-gp/

 

Thanks, corrected. Weird, because I read the article and thought I had done so through his tweet.

 

 

Lotus is doing that perfectly in my opinion. Mercedes and McLaren are also doing an good, albeit not very good, job. Everyone else is not really exploit this opportunity IMO.

 

As to this, yeah, they're mostly doing awesome work. I appreciate the way they try and respond to fan tweets and indeed admire their restraint in not telling more people not to piss off at times. They do like to use the word 'banter' unironically, though ;)

[Nonesuch]

Dara Nasr, managing director of Twitter (!!!), claims: 'When people are watching F1, more than 80 percent of them are tweeting about it'.

Yeah right. To their two siblings, one co-worker and friend from high school perhaps. Who cares about some Random Ron saying 'OMG @therealFelipeMassa totally loses out #Williams #FireSmedley'.
 

Jennifer Louis, head of Global Creative Strategy at Facebook and Instagram (!!!), says: 'here is a huge opportunity for them [F1] to do a lot more across the board, because it is a really passionate audience',

 
It's no wonder that these United States-based companies, selling ads around other people's content, are so hungry to attract F1 to their platforms.
 
Unfortunately for them, F1 has many, usually exclusive, deals with national companies for the rights to broadcast F1 videos and the like.
 
There is tons of F1 content online, just not always available to a global audience.
 
There is more to the internet and to 'social media' than Google and Facebook.
 
For example, Ferrari ( http://formula1.ferrari.com/en/ ) has hours worth of video and text about the latest F1 season. Interviews with people in the team, the drivers, great photos, the lot.

Edited by Nonesuch, 10 December 2015 - 15:20.

[HP]

 

¨

The more we elaborate our means of communication, the less we communicate.

J. B. Priestley

Read more at http://www.brainyquo...clc5jAgbfCVH.99

I'd rather chat with fellow enthusiasts over F1 face to face rather than over any media. In that sense Twitter and all the others are to me a poor substitute to the real thing.

 

So F1 doing things well to me is if they are more accessible and approachable. Even those that present themselves very well, they still remain largely unapproachable. And digital communication simply cannot bring over the entire experience of communication. Communication to me is sharing life together in reality, unfiltered, unedited. However brief these moments may be, for me they are much more meaningful and intense than to read pages of an event.

 

How to make F1 more of that that is difficult to say for me, but personally I was much more griped by it, before it became family friendly. Even disappointments stuck with me better until now. (I was at Regazzoni's house with a mutual friend of him, but he wasn't at home that day).

[Ross Stonefeld]

Even if he means 80% of F1 fans, that use twitter, are tweeting; that seems horribly exaggerated.

But, I kind of agree with Ron.

"Formula 1" gets on Twitter or Facebook or Instagram....and...what? Start posting avocado smoothie photos, get a few million YouTube subscribers, make an extra million or two a year as a lifestyle of thought-leader? What's the goal here?

I don't think the current system is bad where the TV companies, sponsors, teams, drivers, can embrace social media/the internet as much as they want and in the way they want.

The issue here isn't social media, it's the continuation of the lack of a central effort by F1, which applies to all promotion and marketing. Calling Bernie the promoter is the silliest thing in motorsport. I can't remember a time he actually *promoted* the sport.

[Lotus53B]

As to this, yeah, they're mostly doing awesome work. I appreciate the way they try and respond to fan tweets and indeed admire their restraint in not telling more people not to piss off at times. They do like to use the word 'banter' unironically, though ;)

Well, death is too good for them....

 

 

Marklar said:

 

Lotus is doing that perfectly in my opinion. Mercedes and McLaren are also doing an good, albeit not very good, job. Everyone else is not really exploit this opportunity IMO.

 

But there's no synergy.  The tweets exist as they are, they don't link to e.g. a video of the pits, there's no extension of the 140 characters, and that's what's needed - if you're saying Pastor has had a prang, add a photo, or whatever - the tweet should never be an end unto itself, but the beginning of something more

[loki]

Yeah right. To their two siblings, one co-worker and friend from high school perhaps. Who cares about some Random Ron saying 'OMG @therealFelipeMassa totally loses out #Williams #FireSmedley'.
 
 
It's no wonder that these United States-based companies, selling ads around other people's content, are so hungry to attract F1 to their platforms.
 
Unfortunately for them, F1 has many, usually exclusive, deals with national companies for the rights to broadcast F1 videos and the like.
 
There is tons of F1 content online, just not always available to a global audience.
 
There is more to the internet and to 'social media' than Google and Facebook.
 
For example, Ferrari ( http://formula1.ferrari.com/en/ ) has hours worth of video and text about the latest F1 season. Interviews with people in the team, the drivers, great photos, the lot.

 

 The business model of those companies isn't content delivery.   Sports that engage with viewers or aren't distributing the content on those platforms.  They use the platform as a means of engagement to attract viewers or retain viewers.  Attracting and retaining viewers is something F1 does poorly these days.  They can't capture younger viewers if they aren't first in a place to get them the message. They aren't watching broadcast TV on Sunday or reading magazines.

 

Ron Dennis is right about one thing, Twitter isn't the future. It's the present as well as the past.  The future is more like Snap Chat, Instagram or Periscope.  Except it won't be those, soon those will be old.   Facebook and Twitter are seen by many younger persons as stodgy and not cool.It will be something different though the engagment is still the same.   When someone like the chap in charge of digital media at McLaren expresses amazement at the Alsonso photo being 'shopped that says a great deal about how well they know the platforms.  People have been 'shopping those kinds of photos for the last 10-15 years.  A key issue is that several rich, stuffy old, white men are pontificating about what media was in years past rather than what it is today.  They are out of touch with us commoners.

[Pimpwerx]

Social media is the future. Ron sounds old and out of touch. F1 needs to start posting highlights in-race of overtakes and special moments. Get people not currently watching an event to tune in. As it is, they're going a good job of stifling F1's reach to a younger, more tech-savvy audience. Lewis Hamilton has really done a fabulous job of self-promotion through social media. He gets mocked for his Roscoe tweets and his #blessed tags, but that's just evidence that it's working. I hardly read Twitter, but I'm kept abreast of his escapades through other people who go read it. That's the networking element that's often overlooked. PEACE.

[Nathan]

I think a lot of what FOM should do - highlights, passing moves etc. - right now they legally can't.  I think more than anything the onus is on the teams and drivers to adopt social media.  What Alonso or McLaren have to say or show is probably going to be of more interest and engaging than what FOM will say.

Edited by Nathan, 11 December 2015 - 14:29.

[jonpollak]

Not interested in 99% of what transpires on social media as it's mostly just noise. However if you use your 'follows' selectively one can get a lot of timely info from real racing people. Kinda like our dear departed Yoof Club... But different.

What can F1 do to improve its perception on social media ?

Revamp the TV rights deal to include live InCar with your favorite driver?

Enlist smart phone cameras in the crowd showing the 'atmosphere'

Any stuff that involves the fan in the stands, making attendance more attractive, is a winner.

Jp

Edited by jonpollak, 28 February 2016 - 18:38.

[Kev00]

http://www.motorspor...rosjean-676090/

FOM are a bunch of knobs. Haas are a new formula one team trying to promote themselves and FOM asked Romain Grosjean to remove the videos he posted on Facebook (which had over a million views) of their own filming day!

[jjcale]

http://www.motorspor...rosjean-676090/

FOM are a bunch of knobs. Haas are a new formula one team trying to promote themselves and FOM asked Romain Grosjean to remove the videos he posted on Facebook (which had over a million views) of their own filming day!

 

They are not officially in F1 yet, I think. 

[jjcale]

To be honest, as much as I would like to see F1 streaming live and for free on youtube .... I do recognise that too much social media/free stuff is actually contrary to the current business model. 

 

Right now the F1 business is built on exclusivity and commercial rights - unless and until they figure out how to actually make money from new media they have to keep a lid on it ... even as a purely promotional tool (... and I am very sure they would love to use new media as a promotional tool). 

 

Its a catch 22 ....but these things happen ... even without anyone being at fault. 

Edited by jjcale, 28 February 2016 - 08:48.

[Lotus53B]

When was following testing working from on home on Thursday, Renault and Mercedes were tweeting back and forth, I thought it was great, and pretty funny, but I also think that it was so niche and so self referential that it would be utter drivel to 99% of twitterati.  And there lies the problem of F1 trying to engage through social media - outside of the already interested folk are very few folk who would be interested in F1, and those that are interested already engage via the forms of social media.

 

In short, F1 (and in fact, most motorsport) has little that can act as a hook to folk that are not currently intersted, and that it would be hard to use social media to try and engage.

What they could do though is stop losing supporters by making key areas of the sport value added - by that I mean by charging for timing data and similar - this is alienating so many folk, and increases that impression that F1 an elite sport that is only available to the rich and famous.   This isn't football, with hundreds of games every week, and thousands of participants at all levels from Premier league to "coats down on the local park", this is a sport that most folk don't have the money to participate in, if you want to keep it popular, you have to make it easily accessible.

[ArnageWRC]

The issue here isn't social media, it's the continuation of the lack of a central effort by F1, which applies to all promotion and marketing. Calling Bernie the promoter is the silliest thing in motorsport. I can't remember a time he actually *promoted* the sport.

 

Ah, yes, Bernie doing promotion - that would be a first. He's not alone though. Most of the other world motorsport series are the same; they sell TV rights, and charge hosting fees for events. And that is your lot!!

None of them actually do what I would call 'Promotion'. Why? Because it would cost too much money and is too much hard work to do properly. 

[Tsarwash]

http://www.motorspor...rosjean-676090/

FOM are a bunch of knobs. Haas are a new formula one team trying to promote themselves and FOM asked Romain Grosjean to remove the videos he posted on Facebook (which had over a million views) of their own filming day!

I'm just going to quote myself from the Azerbajan thread.

 

Oh and classic moment of shooting themselves in the foot because of greed by FOM again. I understand that you need 100,00o views on Youtube in order to start generating revenue, but if you have less than a million views, the money coming in is likely to be so minimal from what we know of this kind of thing. Most of their videos have 130,000 ish views. I'm assuming that they are just delighted with their thirty dollar cheque from Google so far. It's as if your granddad has just discovered the internet and is clicking all of the millionth customer banners.  

The behaviour of FOM really is pathetic. It is exactly what I would expect of a petulant three year old child, selfish and greedy. Short sightedness is going to kill this sport. it's going to fall off a cliff. 

[pdac]

 

I'm just going to quote myself from the Azerbajan thread.

 

The behaviour of FOM really is pathetic. It is exactly what I would expect of a petulant three year old child, selfish and greedy. Short sightedness is going to kill this sport. it's going to fall off a cliff. 

 

 

As jjcale points out though, it's all about their current business model. They sell exclusivity for big bucks. For those big bucks, those people would expect FOM to defend that exclusivity. F1 needs to stop selling these contracts and rethink their entire business model as there is now most obviously conflict between current revenue generation and future growth.

[OO7]

Social media is the future. Ron sounds old and out of touch. F1 needs to start posting highlights in-race of overtakes and special moments. Get people not currently watching an event to tune in. As it is, they're going a good job of stifling F1's reach to a younger, more tech-savvy audience. Lewis Hamilton has really done a fabulous job of self-promotion through social media. He gets mocked for his Roscoe tweets and his #blessed tags, but that's just evidence that it's working. I hardly read Twitter, but I'm kept abreast of his escapades through other people who go read it. That's the networking element that's often overlooked. PEACE.

Very very true (for me at least).

[OO7]

FOM must be sitting on literally tons of F1 footage that people would pay to watch and what are they doing with it?

[Kvothe]

FOM must be sitting on literally tons of F1 footage that people would pay to watch and what are they doing with it?

God forbid FOM actually use their app ala netflix to create a subscription service that allows people to stream the archived content for on a monthly, or yearly subscription programme. They could include all sessions, from multiple camera point of views, live timing, and commentary from the commercial broadcasters they have contracts with in the various languages. Pending the success of such an app, the app could then be used for live streaming, once they have enough customers. 

 

They could also bring in other features such as the ability to use the app on more then one device at the same time for the multi-screen tech geeks out there and features such as getting drivers, team managers, or high profile engineers to commentate on their favourite race, or to explain what happened during the controversial ones. The possibilities would literally be endless, and then they could then offer the product at a reduced price to FTA broadcasters. Especially if you consider  a lot of the old races can be downloaded already if you know where to look. It could also make it easier to show highlights on their social media accounts to attract new individuals.

 

Would it be this easy? Probably not, but the worrying thing is no one in the upper echelons even attempting to suggest such a thing.

[pdac]

FOM must be sitting on literally tons of F1 footage that people would pay to watch and what are they doing with it?

 

If they want to attract people to the sport then they need to give stuff like this away. Same with live timing. But maybe their afraid that if people saw what it used to be like they'd be disappointed in the current offering.

[Clatter]

FOM must be sitting on literally tons of F1 footage that people would pay to watch and what are they doing with it?

I think many over-estimate the numbers who would pay. Are there any figures available for how many have subscribed to the F1 timing now that they have put much of it behind a paywall?

[Marklar]

I think many over-estimate the numbers who would pay. Are there any figures available for how many have subscribed to the F1 timing now that they have put much of it behind a paywall?

Considering that you can just pay with an credit card and that you have to enter all your personal informations, probably not many

 

At least that are two reasons for me to not subscribe.

Edited by Marklar, 28 February 2016 - 18:39.

[Clatter]

Considering that you can just pay with an credit card and that you have to enter all your personal informations, probably not many

 

At least that are two reasons for me to not subscribe.

Just the fact you have to pay now was enough to put me off.

[Marklar]

Just the fact you have to pay now was enough to put me off.

Yeah, that was a reason too. Although the prize in 2014(?) of £10 was somehow acceptable. But yeah, I can't see why to pay for that if I am usually able to find somewhere else a free live timing with sector times.

[superden]

Yeah, that was a reason too. Although the prize in 2014(?) of £10 was somehow acceptable. But yeah, I can't see why to pay for that if I am usually able to find somewhere else a free live timing with sector times.

Paying for timing, something that is a by-product of data that is collected already for other purposes, is another massive F1 own goal which just reinforces the fact that F1 management are only interested in maximising the currency they collect from fans.

Edited by superden, 28 February 2016 - 19:37.

[krod]

These old men don't have a clue. Where will they find the new generation of fans?

 

I can see that you old farts are comfortable with the status quo, but have a look at what Formula E and MotoGP are doing with their online presence.

 

With a subscription, why can we not watch live F1 on YouTube? Why can we not watch previous GPs or see highlights, crashes, and famous passes? All that Bernie sees is rich men going to GPs and wanting to buy Rolex watches and Ferraris. I suspect that he couldn't open Facebook or send a Tweet if his life was at stake.

 

The new generation of young fans will be very different to us. They will watch in different ways, and they will be interested in different aspects of F1. 

 

Move with the times, or you will lose the support of the people that pay for F1.

[pdac]

These old men don't have a clue. Where will they find the new generation of fans?

 

I can see that you old farts are comfortable with the status quo, but have a look at what Formula E and MotoGP are doing with their online presence.

 

With a subscription, why can we not watch live F1 on YouTube? Why can we not watch previous GPs or see highlights, crashes, and famous passes? All that Bernie sees is rich men going to GPs and wanting to buy Rolex watches and Ferraris. I suspect that he couldn't open Facebook or send a Tweet if his life was at stake.

 

The new generation of young fans will be very different to us. They will watch in different ways, and they will be interested in different aspects of F1. 

 

Move with the times, or you will lose the support of the people that pay for F1.

 

No, the new fans won't appear because they won't be able to watch in different ways and so they'll go watch something else. F1 is as dead as Bernie.

[loki]

They are not officially in F1 yet, I think. 

Hass F1 are a registered entrant of the Formula One World Championship.  They do not yet have commercial rights agreement from which they will be paid for participation. The FIA controls the entries and FOM determines the payout.

[oetzi]

FOM must be sitting on literally tons of F1 footage that people would pay to watch and what are they doing with it?

Sitting on it

[OO7]

Sitting on it

Don't get smart with me!

[Marklar]

After many years F1 finally made it to facebook....

 

https://www.facebook.com/Formula1/

[DaddyCool]

Better late than never I guess...

[Clatter]

They made a real effort in launching it. Anyone visiting it will be instantly hooked.

Edited by Clatter, 15 March 2016 - 23:33.

[RedBaron]

People that don't like social media, fine.

 

People that don't get the significance of social media in today's society, out of touch.

 

People that outright dismiss it's importance, morons.

[teejay]

FOM should just do a deal with netflix/stan and have their own content channel - old races etc. 

 

Opens you up to a masssssssive audience! and generates income!

[TomNokoe]

In the past, Facebook have transferred likes from pages. I hope they do that here, there's more than 1 million likes on the other F1 page.

[AustinF1]

Yeah right. To their two siblings, one co-worker and friend from high school perhaps. Who cares about some Random Ron saying 'OMG @therealFelipeMassa totally loses out #Williams #FireSmedley'.
 
 
It's no wonder that these United States-based companies, selling ads around other people's content, are so hungry to attract F1 to their platforms.
 
Unfortunately for them, F1 has many, usually exclusive, deals with national companies for the rights to broadcast F1 videos and the like.
 
There is tons of F1 content online, just not always available to a global audience.
 
There is more to the internet and to 'social media' than Google and Facebook.
 
For example, Ferrari ( http://formula1.ferrari.com/en/ ) has hours worth of video and text about the latest F1 season. Interviews with people in the team, the drivers, great photos, the lot.

Yeah, 80% of viewers tweeting about the race while they watch? That's nonsense. I'm big into twitter & twitter has taken me places to do things I never thought I'd get to do.  For me, twitter is a great resource. I know some people do that, but the last thing I want to do is tweet about it while I watch. I want as few distractions as possible.  I doubt if that many viewers even have a twitter account, esp considering F1 demographics.

Edited by AustinF1, 16 March 2016 - 03:49.

[d246]

It's always been Bernie's blind spot. A point made several times in Max Mosley's bio.

[RedBaron]

FOM should just do a deal with netflix/stan and have their own content channel - old races etc. 

 

Opens you up to a masssssssive audience! and generates income!

 

 

Yeah at very least that should be done, but it won't happen. I can't imagine the season review DVDs generate many sales these days, so it's not like it would take away from that.

 

Formula 1 prices itself out of everything. Top Gear only ran the full Senna documentary one time, it never airs on 'Dave' in the UK in full and when it does air they cut the Senna segment out because it's too expensive to air the Formula 1 footage. 

 

Not exactly on topic but it's the same theme, not willing to budge to move with the times. 

[Ross Stonefeld]

I actually think they're inadvertently ahead of the curve on charging for things rather than giving it away to boost the audience. 

[Kristian]

I actually think they're inadvertently ahead of the curve on charging for things rather than giving it away to boost the audience. 

 

I don't know - the classic footage of F1 could stir up in the inner romance of potential fans, especially those (e.g. Americans) already with a motorsport background. 

 

e.g. when people started doing the 'live' classic Champ Car races on here with the old YouTube videos, although I didn't have time to join in, I've subsequently spent some time perusing old Champ Car races and reigniting my interest in American motorsport, which has been lost for many years. 

 

I had quite a few friends who watch Top Gear but not F1 who loved the Senna piece, despite knowing notihng about him, then they looked up the Senna movie, and actually ended up asking me quite a lot about the sport in general. Sadly its been so crap recently I haven't been able to get them into contemporary sport, but the point stands - archival footage is a hook. 

[Ross Stonefeld]

Potential fans with potential money. Vs actual money for using the footage. 

 

We're moving more and more away from big audience = dollars. It's getting harder and harder to squeeze money out of motorsport on the traditional methods. 

 

Archival footage is a hook, for old races. Like you said, you struggled to sell them on the current stuff. 

 

Which is exactly why F1 not being on social media(despite F1 itself being very represented on social media) doesn't really matter. It's not like people don't know about the racing or that tickets are for sale or whatever. The things you'd use marketing for. The problem is the product and the price point. 

[D.M.N.]

In the past, Facebook have transferred likes from pages. I hope they do that here, there's more than 1 million likes on the other F1 page.

 

At the moment its on 484,000 likes, the transfer is underway...

[pdac]

People that don't like social media, fine.

 

People that don't get the significance of social media in today's society, out of touch.

 

People that outright dismiss it's importance, morons.

 

That'll be me then.

[Marklar]

Wow. And now the FIA is on Instagram. 

 

https://www.instagra...m/fia.official/

[Gilles4Ever]

Pablo Elizalde @EliGP

F1 has joined Facebook and the FIA is now on Instagram. Welcome to... 2010?