Inter Miami soars after signing Messi

When a superstar lands at a new team everything changes: teammates, coaches, residence, and even fandom. Great players bring with them a legion of fans who have followed and cheered for them throughout their sporting career and will often proudly wear the new colors of their favorite player and his or her new team.

This is the case for Leo Messi after the announcement of his signing with our friends Inter Miami. Messi is known as the GOAT, world champion, and seven-time Ballon d’Or winner — he has won every soccer accolade there is. Messi has more than 587 million followers on social media, the vast majority come from Instagram where he has 471 million.

Inter Miami wins big on social media

Since Tuesday, June 6, Inter Miami’s followers have increased by 434.5%. In the first 24 hours following the announcement, the MLS side doubled its number of followers, an incredible growth considering that Inter Miami had not yet confirmed Messi’s arrival at their club.

The Argentine star’s new club posted a video on its Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, and Facebook channels on June 7 confirming Messi’s signing after weeks of rumors that number ’10’ was headed back to FC Barcelona or the Saudi Arabian league.

The four Messi announcement posts achieved more than 6.2 million engagements and a total of 54.8 million views as of June 14, 2023. Later, Inter Miami showed the first image of Messi wearing the shirt of his new club, giving visibility to the Inter Miami’s sponsors adidas and XBTO — with more than 177,000 engagement.

In just eight days, Inter Miami has reached 13.2 million followers, making it the most followed MLS team, ahead of the LA Galaxy with 5.8 million and New York City FC with 3.5 million.

Inter Miami isn’t just leading the way in MLS. Here are some Inter Miami social media stats across the NFL, NHL, NBA, and MLB that show the power of Messi. Since signing Messi, Inter Miami:

• Ranks #1 across all NHL teams and MLS teams in terms of total followers
• Ranks #1 for followers on IG and TikTok across all teams in NHL, MLB, NFL, and MLS
• Ranks #1 for followers on IG and TikTok across the NHL and MLS league handles
• Ranks #3 across NBA teams on TikTok for followers
• Ranks #5 across NBA teams on IG for followers
• Ranks #2 across MLB teams, behind only the Yankees; for context — Miami ranked #25 on June 5
• Ranks #4 for most followers across NFL teams; for context — Miami ranked last across teams on June 5
• Ranks #1 for most followers across NHL teams; for context — Miami ranked #13 across teams on June 5
• Rank #11 for most followers across NBA teams; for context — Miami ranked last across teams on June 5

The Messi Effect

The “Messi Effect” is also shown in Inter Miami’s engagement and video view data. In just eight days, from June 7-13, 2023, Inter Miami’s total engagement soared to 11 million. For context, the team’s year-to-date engagement is 21 million. Video views is another metric where Messi’s announcement is proving critical. From June 7-13, 2023, Inter Miami drove 79.3 million video views across TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter, 42.3% of the team’s total video views for 2023.

Messi’s Midas Touch

Messi’s arrival at Inter Miami will not only have a huge impact on his team’s networks, but also the exposure driven for Miami’s sponsors as well as other MLS opponents. 

Social media is a very important asset for clubs, and with Leo Messi on Inter Miami’s roster, the team can now leverage Messi’s 587 million followers. Not that he is the player with the most followers in the North American soccer league, but he has 10 times more followers than the next three players: LA Galaxy’s Chicharito Hernandez (22.4 million), Los Angeles FC’s Giorgio Chiellini (15.4 million) and LA Galaxy’s Douglas Costa (12.7 million).

It is expected that in the first week of July, Messi will wear his new kit and making his debut with his new team. We will then see how Inter Miami, MLS and the rest of the teams make the most of the fact that the best soccer player in the world has headed to Miami.

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