Exploring the determinants of women football players’ Instagram popularity

Nataliya Bredikhina, Thilo Kunkel, Heather Kennedy and Francesca Fumagalli

Sport Management Review, 2025, vol. 28, issue 3, 523-548

Abstract: The women’s football market has experienced significant growth over the past decade. Athletes are leveraging this expanding market to develop their personal brands, utilizing social media as a primary promotional channel. The current research explores the determinants of women football players’ Instagram following and engagement within the athlete brand ecosystem. The research focuses on three levels of influence: the team as a master brand, media, and the market. We follow a sequential QUANT → quant mixed-methods design. Study 1, employing negative binomial regression to model Instagram data, indicates a positive impact of account authentication and the team’s audience size on athlete following and engagement, yet a negative impact of joint branding by clubs (i.e. when men’s and women’s teams are branded on the same account). Study 2 delves deeper into the dynamics of teams’ branding to understand the sources of impact on athletes, employing quantitative content analysis. It uncovers inequitable branding practices exhibited by clubs that brand men’s and women’s teams jointly, explaining the hindering effects of such a practice on the women athletes’ social media popularity. This research contributes to sports brand scholarship, while also accounting for gender dynamics in clubs’ branding as a factor impacting athlete brands.

Date: 2025
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DOI: 10.1080/14413523.2025.2468037

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