Women’s Sport Trust and Fifty Digital: Harnessing the power of social media and female athletes to empower change in the sporting world
Women’s Sport Trust is a charity with a crystal clear objective: raising the visibility and increasing the impact of women’s sport.
Since their inception in 2012, they work on shifting the funding landscape for women’s sport; increasing the percentage and quality of media coverage; and promoting a diverse range of female role models. Over the last 18 months, Fifty Digital has touched each of those objectives with our voluntary efforts using social media, digital and creative to help the Women’s Sport Trust broaden their message.
As an agency we are proud to work with teams and rights holders who tackle the gender imbalance in sport head-on. We are in our third year partnering with the incredible all-female single seater motorsport Championship W Series and day-in-day-out enjoy working with the most gender equal sport on the Olympic agenda, Volleyball World.
Our partnership with the Women’s Sport Trust is no different to this, and was born from the place of maximising both Fifty Digital’s expertise in all things digital and our innate passion for women’s sport.
Last month we delivered a Social Media Masterclass to the 2022 Women’s Sport Trust Unlocked cohort; a group of athletes at different points in their elite careers who are the future of spearheading change for women’s sport. It’s the second masterclass we have delivered – the first was to the 2021 group – and our all-female panel enjoyed taking the athletes through a social media best practice guide, covering topics ranging from content planning and content capturing around event periods, to safeguarding oneself online.
Our favourite aspect of the masterclass was the open and honest Q&A to close the event, when we heard the athlete’s own experiences of social and their biggest challenges. It is always valuable to be reminded of just how genuine these athletes are and humble in the sense that they don’t know the influence they hold… yet. We believe social media, when done correctly and appropriately, has the power to help change the women’s sporting landscape and that process can be accelerated by a collective such as Unlocked.
From the realities of balancing being a mother while training for an event, to running a business alongside competing, these are the authentic stories we need to learn more about. We hope that through our masterclasses, we will equip the athletes with the confidence and skills to do just that, and begin to unlock the future of women’s sport at all levels through social media.
We are pleased to assist Women’s Sport Trust’s wider initiatives too, from bringing to life the fantastic research they conduct through fresh templates and graphics for their social media channels, to leading the design of their first ever newsletter. Our belief is that even small improvements can make a big impact, with eye-catching creative increasing the reach and engagement of their content and thereby aiding their stated objective of increasing the visibility of women’s sport.
If you aren’t already familiar with their work, we encourage you to follow Women’s Sport Trust on social media, read their Visibility Reports too, and engage with the incredible Unlocked athletes past and present. You can see all of their fantastic initiatives on the Women’s Sport Trust website.
And last but not least, a huge thank you to Tammy Parlour, Sophie Carrigill, Claire Bennet and the rest of the Women’s Sport Trust team for having us on board.
Maddie Coutts is Fifty Digital’s Senior Business Development Manager and Head of Women in Sport, working to deliver increased participation, awareness and investment in women’s sport alongside the agency’s clients and partners.
