Swimming Australia has seen a huge increase in their fan base after having a successful 2016 Hancock Prospecting Australian Swimming Championships.
Over the eight days of the Olympic Trials there were 4.66 million people who viewed the event on Network 7, which has just come on board as a broadcast partner. 1.5 million people tuned into the sixth night of competition, a night that included World Champions Mitch Larkin and Bronte Campbell in action in the 200 backstroke and 100 freestyle.
Head of Sport, Network Seven, Saul Shtein said “We were delighted to launch our long-term partnership with this year’s Championships. There are some emerging new stars who will do our country proud at the upcoming Olympic Games and Paralympic Games and beyond. We look forward to bringing their success to all Australians.”
The growth of their fan base was not only measured by television viewership, but the Australian Dolphins Swim Team social media following increased by 8% over the length of the event. Over the eight days of competition there were 6.6 million people reached, 3.6 million video views and 134,000 people actively engaged.
Currently they have a following of 135,697 on Facebook, 19K on Twitter and 12.7K on Instagram.
Daniel Cameron, Partner – Strategy, W3 Digital said “Swimming is one of Australia’s most loved sports. We’ve been honoured to work with Swimming Australia to grow the sport of swimming in Australia. The level of energy, engagement and talent we saw during the Champs was massive.”
Chris Forbes, Swimming Australia Chief Commercial Officer said, “There’s a lot to be excited about with Swimming at the moment. An enormous amount of work has been done in the last 2 years to prepare the business for this year and beyond. It’s exciting to see sponsors coming on-board, the Championships delivered so successfully by Channel 7, our own content broadcast on swimming.org.au and to see our social media enjoyed by millions of Australians, fills me with pride. The next step is Rio then we want to maintain momentum all the way through to Tokyo 2020.