Social Media and Sports Stakeholders Challenges and Opportunities

This study aimed to examine the challenges and opportunities of sports stakeholders in social media use. This study uses thematic analysis to analyze the literature on the research topic. Furthermore, semi-structured interviews were conducted with three groups of sports stakeholders, including players (N=15), teams managers (N=14), and fans (N=26) that were chosen from three professional football teams. The phenomenological method was used to explore the research questions. The study addressed seven categories of sport stakeholders' challenges and opportunities in social media: informing sports stakeholders, sharing information, advertising, shopping, dialogue, and facilitation of communication, which are offering opportunities. Moreover, two challenges, including unpleasant feelings and time consumption, are recognized as dilemmas. The findings showed common challenges and opportunities of all three sports stakeholders in using social media.