In the world dominated by Internet how can anyone afford to be behind in technological race. It holds true with soccer clubs, especially English clubs who are known for their optimistic steps to extend their global fan following. Today, internet has made the whole world a small village hence if a club wants to expand its reach, it just needs to offer its contents in as maximum languages as possible digitally and this is what is being done by two prominent EPL clubs: Liverpool and Manchester City. Both these clubs have already their content available in English and several other languages, yet they again made their site and social media feeds available in many more languages, including Chinese, Korean, French, Indonesian, Russian, Japanese, Malay, Portuguese, Spanish, and Thai. Accordingly, there would be new twitter accounts in respective languages along with web portals so that their far distance fans could also enjoy their whereabouts in their local language. With this expansion, these clubs claim to have a reach to almost 80% of the Internal enabled territory whereby they would enjoy more potential sponsorship deals in these new markets.
Actually, everyone wants to make its presence being known by a larger section of the society by covering as many regions as possible, coz it helps them grow to these new markets in future which again opens more money making opportunities by signing more sponsorship deals, broadcasting fees, and so. Marketing Director at City, Diego Gigliani, said about this, “As the club continues to attract fans from across the world and our global community grows, it’s important to find new ways to connect and engage with them in order to build deeper relationships. Translating our website into 13 languages was one step on this journey – creating another ten Twitter accounts is another.”
Similar comments were also passed by Liverpool’s Managing Durector Ian Ayre, who said, “Liverpool FC is a Premier League pioneer for innovation, brand development and international fan engagement. Central to our international brand strategy is the Club’s revolutionised digital output, which is interactive, inclusive and localised to individual territories – delivering content which is tailored to specific markets and accessible in local languages.
“Extending the Liverpool FC brand beyond borders and connecting with our 200 million global fans also makes good commercial sense for the Club and will help us achieve a competitive advantage on and off the field. We can create added value for our corporate partners and maximise the international commercial opportunities that benefit everyone at the Club, including the players, coaching staff and the global community of fans across the world.”