LaLiga has managed to surpass 4,735,000 Facebook followers in Arab countries. The Spanish competition, which is currently fully immersed in a brand internationalization program, has been publishing geo-localized content across Arabic-speaking countries on its official Facebook page daily since the beginning of this year.
La Liga has also had a Twitter account in Arabic since February 2017, which now has over 70,000 followers. The official account, @LaLigaArab, garnered 17,000 followers in its first week and 2.82 million impressions in its first month alone, and averages 5.5 million impressions per month, with this figure undergoing continuous growth.
Intending to bring LaLiga closer to fans in Arab countries, LaLiga uses Facebook and Twitter to publish information about the competition and its past and present Arab players, plus interviews and statistics, as well as offering congratulations during the main festivals and celebrations. The countries in the Arab world where the Spanish competition enjoys the most robust following on Facebook are Egypt, Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia, and it manages to reach a total of 22 Arab countries through its posts.
The digital growth experienced by LaLiga across the Arab world is a reflection of the global expansion which has occurred in all of LaLiga’s digital channels in recent months.
By publishing content in more than ten different languages, including English and Chinese, LaLiga has amassed a community of over 40 million followers on all of its social media channels. Furthermore, LaLiga has its own YouTube channel.
The provision of content on social media to followers in the Arab world augments other actions taken by LaLiga in Arab countries, including opening an office in Dubai four years ago headed by Fernando Sanz. This office led the way by opening the first LaLiga High-Performance Centre in the world in 2016 and has also managed to make the United Arab Emirates the location for the implementation of LaLiga’s first academy this year.
2017 has been a critical year for the internationalization of the Spanish competition, which now has representatives in the UAE, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Morocco working on different projects extending as far as Mauritania, Algeria, and Tunisia.
LaLiga, whose international presence is practically unrivaled among other domestic competitions, is watched in 182 countries via its 90 international broadcasters. In addition to UAE, it has offices in the United States, Nigeria, South Africa, China, India, Singapore, and Belgium, and it has 44 international representatives selected through the LaLiga Global Network program distributed across other strategic countries.
