Research: WWE dominates social media sports videos
August 31, 2023
Tubular Labs, a specialist in social video intelligence, has released its latest US viewership trends from its Audience Ratings product – giving insight into deduplicated, unique viewership and minutes watched of trending video categories, creators and more across YouTube and Facebook. Top takeaways include:
WWE Still A Hit With Younger Audiences – In the middle weeks of summer, 13-to-24 year-old US viewers are still watching sports content; but overwhelmingly, that time was dedicated to WWE videos in July. Tubular Audience Ratings data shows US 13-to-24 year-olds watched WWE videos on YouTube and Facebook for 147.1 million minutes – this is most among all sports teams and leagues in July, and 70 per cent more than the nearest sports team or league.
A+E’s Summer Boost – With minimal scripted content coming out, A+E’s ability to rely on unscripted programming can function as a strength – both on TV and social video. According to data from Tubular Labs, A+E Networks saw US minutes watched across YouTube and Facebook grow by 29 per cent month-over-month in July – thanks to unscripted shows like How The Earth Was Made and Little Women: Atlanta from History Channel and Lifetime, respectively. By comparison, other media companies (largely more reliant on scripted shows and/or live sports) saw more modest increases or slight dips for the month of July.
Google’s ‘Best Phones’ Ad Get Significant Reach – Google’s #BestPhonesForever videos generated a ton of reach on YouTube in July. The ad reached over 74 million unique US viewers according to Tubular Labs data, which was up 48 per cent month-over-month. Google was also the most-seen brand in July in the US – No. 6 among all properties across YouTube and Facebook in July.
It also wasn’t the only major brand to significantly grow reach through social video in July. Temu’s unique viewers rose another 28 per cent month-over-month, while Booking Holdings rose 22 per cent to coincide with last-minute summer travel. PepsiCo saw unique US viewers climb by 83 per cent, fueled at least in part by PureLeaf ads.
Big Creators Grow Unique Viewers – Summer months created opportunities for some of social video’s biggest creators to grow their reach even more, according to Tubular Audience Ratings data. Pink Shirt Couple grew unique US viewers on YouTube by 28 per cent month-over-month, thanks to a steady diet of short-form videos. The duo averaged more than 32 million views per day on YouTube, posting 60 new videos to the platform during July alone.
Other individual creators like Anthony Wreyn and Justin Flom also saw double-digit unique viewer growth on the month. But Ms Rachel’s Toddler Learning Videos experienced some of the biggest growth of all, with 34 per cent more unique viewers, likely powered by parents trying to balance work and childcare in July. Ms Rachel also grew minutes watched by 37 per cent month-over-month, to an impressive 2.8 billion (nearly double the total for any other individual US account).