Rob Kelly – Head of Content Strategy at Little Dot Sport – identifies the Premier League clubs best capitalising on their monetisation potential on YouTube, and those that may benefit from a shift in strategy to drive increased social revenues.
As the Premier League pauses for breath with the first international break of the season, its clubs have already accumulated 125m views on YouTube in 2024/25 – building off the back of an incredible 2.77bn views last term.
However, how many of them can truly be said to be making the most of their monetisation potential on a platform that boasts 2.5 billion monthly active users?
With access to some of the most recognisable athletes on the planet, coupled with an unrivalled sporting product and, in many cases, genuinely global fanbases, Premier League clubs can drive significant social revenues from YouTube by optimising their content output to meet the demands of the platform.
YouTube’s audience has well and truly pivoted towards long-form content, with viewership on Connected TV growing from 6% in 2019 to 13% in 2023, while TV watch time has jumped even further, from 10% to 29% in the same timeframe. In short, more people are watching YouTube on their televisions, and when they do so, they are watching for longer – with a recent Ofcom report finding that UK viewers spend an average of 49 minutes per day watching content on video-sharing platforms on their TVs, up 12% year on year.
So why is this important? Well, because aside from an increase in exposure for long-form content on the platform, these uploads also monetise better due to having more ad breaks, attracting better CPMs and more Premium (paying subscribers to YouTube’s ad-free product) viewers – underscoring the opportunity for Premier League clubs in 2024.
At Little Dot Sport, we analysed each club’s total number of 8min+ uploads since the start of last season, as this is a key content length on YouTube due to it unlocking mid-roll advertising – with some eye-opening findings.
Perhaps the most notable is that Manchester United – with 9.2m subscribers – have only uploaded 47 x 8min+ videos since August 2023, which equates to just 5.2% of their content on the channel. This leaves them rock bottom of the table for percentage output of 8min+ video in the Premier League.
Elsewhere, Aston Villa, having secured Champions League football after a superb season on the pitch in 23/24, have posted even less with just 43 x 8min+ uploads (8.6% of total output), while north London rivals Arsenal (21.7%) and Tottenham (17.5%) also post relatively few videos that meet this mark – thus not maximising their revenue-earning potential.
Of course, monetisation may not be the primary objective for some clubs on YouTube and balancing wider business objectives, such as supporting in-house TV stations or video players, is important to acknowledge – yet with such rich content, and all-important match rights, tweaking your YouTube strategy could pay rich dividends in the long run.
Match highlights will realistically always be the strongest driver of viewership for clubs on YouTube and yet, due to rights restrictions imposed by the Premier League and Uefa, these uploads mostly won’t reach that golden eight-minute mark. But this only heightens the need to deliver longer-form content away from the match action, whether that is training footage, behind-the-scenes edits such as Liverpool’s Inside Anfield series, ‘Every goal’ compilation cuts, managerial press conferences or original series like Chelsea Trending or West Ham’s Snack Wars.
That is the case with Premier League champions Manchester City, who aren’t just No. 1 on the pitch – they also top the table on YouTube for 8min+ uploads, averaging 12 per week, with Liverpool and Chelsea in second and third respectively. And, when analysing 15min+ posts – which present further opportunities to monetise – City come out on top too, with these videos making up more than a quarter of their total output on the channel.
Newcastle United also fare well with a video strategy that is optimised for the platform, with 8min+ (50.8%) and 15min+ (19.2%) uploads – such as this edit of players quizzing each other – making up close to three-quarters of their total output. However, it is worth noting that the club would benefit from a significant increase in posting cadence from the current levels of around seven per week (inclusive of both video and Shorts).
Top flight new boys Leicester City also catch the eye with 263 x 8min+ uploads, which sees them in sixth place in the table, above teams such as Arsenal, Everton and Nottingham Forest and posting more than three times the amount of established Premier League clubs like Wolves, Brentford and Crystal Palace.
So if you’re at a Premier League club and reading this, what should you do next? We would advise interrogating all YouTube content to ensure you’re optimising correctly to give you the best chance of success, ensure that you balance that with wider business objectives, and then work with your video team to adjust accordingly.
These operational tweaks can have a really meaningful impact on social revenues, allowing content teams to truly capitalise on the uptick in interest generated by any on-pitch success in 2024/25.
This article first appeared on the Sports Industry Website HERE
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