This weekend’s fight between Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao has been dubbed ‘The Fight of the Century’ by the boxing press, with many experts even going as far as calling it the biggest fight since the ‘The Rumble in the Jungle‘ back in 1974.
Opinions differ as to who will triumph in Las Vegas on Saturday night, but instead of making a prediction of our own, we’ve decided to take a slightly different approach.
Taking 12 different online marketing metrics judged over 12 rounds, we’ve examined how the two fighters are using digital channels to raise excitement and awareness of the fight.
Let’s get ready to rumble!
Our first round compares the two heavyweights on Twitter, where Floyd Mayweather boasts a huge 5.76 million followers – more people than the entire population of Norway (5.1 million)!
However, that’s not to say that Manny Pacquiao’s following is poor. He still has 1.8 millions followers of his own, reflecting his huge worldwide fan base.
Verdict
There can only be one winner here. The sheer size of Mayweather’s Twitter audience highlights the enormous amount of people who are interested in what he has to say.
According to twittercounter.com, Floyd Mayweather is the 293rd most followed person in the world on Twitter, ranking him higher than many influential figures including Richard Branson and Michelle Obama.
Mayweather Win – 10/8
Seconds out. Round 2. It’s all well and good having millions of followers, but if you’re posting things that are of no interest to your fans – or you’re hardly posting at all – your chances of growing the account further are limited.
Floyd Mayweather first joined Twitter in May 2009. Since then, he has posted a total of 5,896 tweets, averaging roughly 982 tweets per year or between 2-3 tweets per day. His continuous updates keep fans interested and engaged with his own personal brand.
In contrast, Manny Pacquiao has posted just 878 tweets since he signed up over four years ago in February 2011. With less than a quarter of the output of Mayweather, Pacquiao posts just 219 tweets per year – less than one tweet every other day.
Verdict
Pacquiao needs to become more active on Twitter if he’s ever going to match Mayweather for followers. Boxing fans expect to see exclusive fight news and photos when they follow a fighter. Pacquiao’s relative inactivity has cost him here. Floyd’s been the busier fighter by far.
Mayweather Win – 10/8
Facebook has the most active users of any social networking site so follower numbers are naturally higher than what we saw on Twitter.
Mayweather has an astronomical amount of likes – 9.4 million – more than Lewis Hamilton and Tiger Woods put together. His huge following is helped by the frequency of his posts and the quality of his videos, which are exactly what fans want to see.
Unlike on Twitter, Pacquiao more than holds his own on Facebook. His 6.3 million likes on the site make his profile more popular than those of Lionel Richie and Sam Smith combined.
Verdict
Floyd Mayweather again comes out on top in this round, but with finer margins than in the previous two. ‘Pretty Boy’ extends his lead.
Mayweather Win – 10/9
Mayweather’s top Facebook post from April 2015 received a staggering 95,000 likes, but incredibly, this is still significantly less than Pacquiao’s.
Despite having a smaller Facebook audience, Pac Man’s posts receive a much higher level of engagement from fans. Manny’s top post in April 2015 – a photo of him and his family going to church – attracted over 925,000 likes.
Many of Pacquiao’s posts are centred around his fans and his religion, providing regular updates and showing gratitude for their support. In contrast, Mayweather’s favourite subject is always himself.
Verdict
Pacquiao’s fan-focused Facebook posts have generated a high engagement rate of 33% compared to Mayweather’s 3.5% (Facebook claims that 7% is the minimum for achieving success).
Manny Pacquiao picks up his first round of the article with a dominant display – could the comeback be on?
Pacquiao Win – 10/8
Instagram has fast become one of the most popular social networking sites with millions of users around the world, including many high-profile boxers.
Floyd Mayweather has accumulated a huge 5.4 million followers on Instagram since he joined in December 2011, racking up a total of 406 posts.
Manny Pacquiao joined Instagram in February 2014, and in that short space of time has managed to gain a following of over one million. He has made 482 posts to his profile in the past year – more than Mayweather has in the four years since opening his account.
Verdict
Mayweather may have been a member of Instagram for much longer than Pacquiao but he isn’t nearly as active. It’s a close round that could go either way, but for us, the sheer size of Floyd’s following and his ability to reach a larger audience (if he can be bothered) just edges it.
Mayweather Win – 10/9
A study has shown that 60% of internet viewers will watch video before reading any site text.
Not only does Floyd Mayweather use video to document his vigorous training regimes, but also as a platform to flaunt his extravagant cars and enormous stacks of money.
Mayweather’s official YouTube channel has 45 videos and over 130,000 subscribers. However, he hasn’t posted a video to his account since September 2014, preferring to use Facebook, Instagram or his website to engage his fans.
Manny Pacquiao doesn’t have an official YouTube channel. Instead, he shares videos from his promotion company on his website. Many of Pacquiao’s videos showcase the intensity of his training sessions, but there are also a few personal clips of him playing the guitar and singing, something that no doubt endears him to fans.
Verdict
Weighing up Pacquiao’s lack of YouTube channel with Mayweather’s lack of variety, we’ve scored this round a draw.
Draw – 10/10
Mayweather has an impressive three websites of his own, each showcasing different pieces of content for his fans to view. One of his websites, www.floydmayweather.com, collates the photos from his many social media accounts. While it looks clean and colourful, we’re not sure it really offers any true value of its own.
His second website, www.mayweatherpromotions.com, contains much more information, offering a more engaging experience despite lacking the visual appeal as the first. This is the site we will focus on in later rounds.
Mayweather’s final website, www.themoneyteam.com, acts as a store for his wider brand and features a range of clothing and training accessories. The design incorporates large bold images to give users getting a feel of what The Money Team is about.
The official website of Manny Pacquiao, http://mp8.ph, takes a more streamlined approach. The homepage includes links to different pieces of content while also promoting his own store range at the same time.
The site is easy for users to navigate but perhaps looks slightly dated in comparison to Mayweather’s offering. The homepage also includes a slideshow for easy access to priority website sections and promotional messages about his upcoming fight.
Verdict
We personally found Pacquiao’s single site a much more involved experience than Mayweather’s three, combining multiple elements into a more unified offer despite a weaker overall appeal. Is The Money Team favouring style over substance?
Draw – 10/10
Arguably the most important element of any website is the user experience. For this round, we’re going to focus on just one of Mayweather’s sites – Mayweather Promotions.
The Mayweather Promotions website is busy. There is no real sense of direction and a lot of information is displayed with little explanation.
The top navigation bar helps to provide context and visitors are quickly made aware of the option to subscribe to the newsletter.
Pacquiao’s website takes a cleaner approach, with different sections clearly labelled and the opportunity to ‘quick shop’ straight from the homepage.
The only downside to Pacquiao’s website is the use of Google display adverts in prominent positions above the fold.
Verdict
We have awarded the eight round to Pacquiao due to the superior usability of his site and its more integrated approach to functionality.
Pacquiao Win – 10/8
The website’s of the two fighters should act as information hubs for fans looking to indulge in pre-fight content and hysteria.
The Mayweather Promotions website includes many mentions of the fight on its home page and features interactive elements including a quiz designed to educate fans on previous bouts.
Tweets about the fight are integrated into the homepage from sources including the MGM Grand Hotel venue and Floyd Mayweather himself.
There is also a dedicated Mayweather vs Pacquiao news page which includes links to the latest updates about the fight.
In contrast, the homepage of Pacquiao’s website contains much less pre-fight content. However, visit the news page and you’ll find interviews with Manny, details of ticket prices and the latest photos from his training sessions.
Verdict
Although Pacquiao’s site features content specific to the fight, we feel that Mayweather’s more immediate focus helps to draw visitors into deeper site pages more effectively.
Mayweather Win – 10/9
Merchandise plays just a big a part in boxing as it does in other sports, providing the fighters with a very direct way to capitalise on the increased interest and hype surrounding an event.
Mayweather’s merchandise is split over both the Mayweather Promotions and The Money Team websites, with the latter providing a much larger branded range.
Products range from casual clothing and training wear to boxing accessories and equipment, and vary in price from $30 for a t-shirt to $400 for a signed boxing glove.
The store experience on the Pacquiao website is a little less slick with standard navigation functionality replaced by filter options.
The range is heavily clothing-based but does also include Pacquiao-branded headphones, priced at $149.99.
Verdict
Pacquaio’s store experience isn’t necessarily poor, we just don’t feel that it embodies the brand in the same way as The Money Team site. The presentation of Mayweather’s products suggests higher quality products and service.
Mayweather Win – 10/9
The link profiles of each fighter help us understand the popularity of their content and the status of their domains.
We used the fresh index of Majestic to compare the homepage URL link metrics of the two websites. While the top-level citation and trust flow values of Pacquiao’s site are stronger, his ratio of backlinks per referring domain is not.
In fact, Pacquiao’s site received roughly five times as many links per referring domain as his opponent. Mayweather’s profile could be an indication of his wider influencer, expanding its footprint across a wider area of the internet.
We must admit to being slightly surprised about how few links each homepage has accumulated given the status of the fighters, however this is something we expect to increase in the coming days as the media ramps up its coverage of the fight and its eventual result.
Verdict
Dizzy from the data? With Mayweather ahead going into the final round, could this be another victory to add to his unbeaten professional record?
Draw – 10/10
So we find ourselves in the final round of biggest fight for over 40 years. Surely Mayweather has it in the bag?
We’ve used Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test to assess the mobile experience for visitors to both sites – and it’s good news for Manny.
Mayweather’s website is not mobile-friendly. With text that’s too small, content that’s too wide and touchpoints too close together, is Pacquiao ready to pounce and unify the internet division?
Pacquiao makes a strong start. The mobile viewport is set correctly making the layout far more digestible for users on smaller devices, and every area of the site is fully responsive allowing fans to quickly browse and shop on the go.
Verdict
We were surprised to see that Mayweather’s site is so unfriendly for mobile users. This really should be a primary consideration for anyone creating a website nowadays, not least the self-proclaimed best ever. Pacquiao dominates, but is it too little too late?
Over to the referee.
Pacquiao Win – 10/8
| Round | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mayweather | 10 | 10 | 10 | 8 | 10 | 10 | 10 | 8 | 10 | 10 | 10 | 8 | 114 |
| Pacquiao | 8 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 9 | 10 | 10 | 10 | 9 | 9 | 10 | 10 | 112 |
The judges have scored the bout 114-112 in the favour of ‘Pretty Boy’ Floyd ‘Money’ Mayweather.
Pacquaio’s strength through the middle website rounds was let down by his shortfalls on social media. The king of self-promotion stole the show with the influence of his larger followings playing a key part.
Score things differently? Post your round by round results in the comments.
We’re off to the bookies…