نوع مقاله : مقاله پژوهشی
عنوان مقاله English
نویسندگان English
Introduction
Reputation, as a multi-dimensional construct, represents credibility, trust, and appeal for a business entity. It is considered a valuable asset in the sports industry, significantly impacting relationships, performance, and revenue of sports organizations. This reputation is based on both objective and subjective factors. Instagram, as one of the most popular social media platforms, generates a substantial amount of visual content, and the intelligent use of its data can be highly beneficial for the development and management of sports clubs. Therefore, the aim of this study is to perform text mining and analyze the Instagram pages of users following Iran's Premier League football clubs, with an emphasis on the components of reputation
Methods
This study employed a mixed-methods approach to examine team reputation and user engagement for four football teams on Instagram. A sample of 1,910 posts and 7,333,844 comments was collected from the official Instagram pages of Esteghlal, Persepolis, Sepahan, and Gol Gohar using an API. Text mining and machine learning methods were used to extract components of reputation from post captions and comments, employing a predefined list of related terms. Sentiment analysis was then conducted to categorize user comments into three distinct groups: positive, neutral, and negative. Additionally, content analysis was performed on the post captions and user comments to identify key topics and themes. To examine the relationship between content, engagement levels, and user satisfaction, analysis of variance (ANOVA) and Tukey’s HSD pairwise comparisons were conducted.
Results
The team performance reputation component is the most prominent topic, with teams dedicating the highest percentage of posts to this aspect. In contrast, the management quality component results in the highest level of user engagement. This study indicates that fans show the greatest satisfaction with the components of team tradition, spectator experience, and social responsibility, while management quality and financial health are associated with varying levels of negative sentiment across teams. Analysis of variance revealed that posts related to team reputation have a significant impact on comments and likes across all club pages. Content analysis of captions showed that sports, news/facts, and emotional/organizational content are the most common categories, with differing proportions among teams. Emotional/organizational content dominates engagement metrics for Esteghlal, Persepolis, and Gol Gohar, while the Sepahan club page is characterized by high engagement with news/facts content.
Conclusion
The results of this study indicate that the team performance reputation component is the most prominent topic on the Instagram pages of football teams, while management quality yields the highest level of user engagement. Findings suggest that teams should prioritize posts showcasing their team performance, tradition, and social responsibility to attract fans. However, the negative sentiment surrounding management quality and financial health highlights the need for teams to improve their communication strategies in these areas. The significant impact of reputation components on comments and likes across all club pages underscores the importance of using positive and uplifting content to engage fans. The dominance of emotional/organizational content in engagement metrics for Esteghlal, Persepolis, and Gol Gohar indicates that teams can leverage storytelling and emotional communication to build a stronger fan base. This study supports the hypothesis that team reputation and post content are important factors in fan engagement. Future studies could expand on these findings to explore the role of social media in fostering fan loyalty and team reputation.
کلیدواژهها English
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