OSC Friday Feature | Not Just for the Likes: How Social Media Has Transformed NIL Opportunities for Athletes
This Friday Feature discusses how social media has created opportunities for athletes and has begun to dominate the NIL space.
The Rise of Social Media in General
It is no secret that social media has become a huge part of society at this point. That said, social media popularity is still growing. According to the Datareportal April 2023 overview, social media use has continued to increase—more than half of the world now uses social media, with 150 million new users joining within the last 12 months. If the sole reach that social media has is not enough, the average daily time spent using social media is almost 2 1/2 hours.
With social media being so widely used, and still on the rise, it presents a unique opportunity for brands, businesses, and athletes alike to advertise themselves and build a following. Recent research from GlobalWebIndex shows that 64% of internet users typically find out about new brands/ products via social media. Therefore, even brands (and athletes) that are undiscovered have opportunities to build a name and generate traffic in ways they could never have done before, and many athletes have.
Click HERE for more social media statistics
(pictured: LSU Gymnast and TikTok influencer Olivia Dunne)
Content Creation Dominating the NIL Space
Similar to how many businesses have shifted towards social media as a marketing tool, so have athletes. Currently, nearly 75% of all NIL activity in college comes from social media posts and content creation. In an exhaustive survey by Bill Carter from the University of Vermont, Social media influencers, content creation, and brand promotion accounted for 72% of the commercial activity by college athletes. The next largest category, endorsements, only accounted for 10% of commercial activity. This disparity shows just how much social media is dominating the NIL space. (link)
Although brands are trying to expand the ways that student-athletes are participating in NIL, the good news is that this is not really. . . necessary. Compared to other social media influencers, student-athletes are vastly outperforming the general standards for success. In the social media industry, engagement rates are a key indicator of an influencer’s reach. The engagement rate is equal to the number of interactions with a post (such as likes and comments), divided by the number of account followers, multiplied by 100.
In the social media world, an engagement rate spanning anywhere from 1%-6% is considered successful, with the average engagement rate for social media influencers falling somewhere around 1.7%. That said, based on data from 2022, the estimated average engagement rate of student-athletes posting on behalf of brands is 5.4%. This engagement rate is over three times greater than successful social media influencers. (link)
Social Media Creating Opportunities for Less Popular Sports
So, what does this social media success mean for athletes? With many fans treating athletes as celebrities, many college student-athletes have been able to grow a social media following regardless of how many fans are in the stands or how frequently their sport is played on ESPN. (link)
One athlete whose story illustrates the potential for athletes is Sam Hurley (picture above). Sam Hurley, a track-and-field athlete, has been able to accumulate nearly $1 million in NIL deals, all while having a few hundred eyes, at most, on him at track-and-field events. This presents a crucial case study. Of the 25 college and high school athletes with NIL valuations of $1 million or more, all except two—Sam Hurley and Olivia Dunne—play an athletic-department driving sport such as basketball or football.
While only two athletes in the top 25 come from less revenue-generating sports, it symbolizes the potential that these lesser-known sports have. Hurley became a TikTok influencer while in high school, and since then has continued to expand his fan base via TikTok videos and trends. Since becoming a college athlete, he has signed multiple NIL deals with brands such as Amazon, Jimmy Dean, and Bubble to name a few.
What makes Sam Hurley’s NIL success even more intriguing is that track-and-field at the University of Texas (where Hurley attends) combined with 13 other varsity sports except football and basketball, account for just 9% of the revenue for the school. But, the market has spoken. Hurley’s TikTok following has created a pathway for him to leverage NIL deals past his athletic contributions. While he is one of the first, he most definitely will not be the last to find NIL success this way in this age of social media.
read more on Sam Hurley HERE
(pictured: Ohio State Men’s Basketball Player and TikTok influencer Jimmy Sotos)
Looking Forward: Social Media Becoming a Requirement for Success?
With social media becoming such a large part of NIL deals, there is greater financial loss and gain associated with building a social platform. Where before athletes could build their brand in other ways, social media has now become a necessity for student-athletes. Athletes have commented on how much social media following affects NIL deals. As Maryland guard Briane Alexander said, “There’s a direct correlation between who has the most followers, and some girls don’t have that type of personality. It’s hard for them to get those big deals… it’s a big popularity contest.”
While social media has been an opportunity in the past for athletes to get involved in NIL, it is now acting more as a requirement for those larger brand deals. Some schools, for example, list social media links on their online rosters. Others encourage their athletes to post on their social media feeds.
As the NIL space progresses, it will be interesting to see if social media will continue to provide opportunities for lesser-known athletes, or if it will act as the “bouncer” for those who don’t meet the social media requirements. With the way that the NIL space and social media seem to be converging into one, it is likely that social media will soon be a necessity rather than an opportunity for athletes. (link)