Fantasy Breakdown: A Case Study on Organizational Crisis Communication and Stakeholder Reaction During Mass Product Failure

On the first Sunday of the National Football League’s 2016–17 season, a technical issue caused ESPN’s fantasy-football website and mobile application to fail. ESPN’s product failure is no small problem and represented a major organizational crisis; with 7.1 million unique users, ESPN represents the...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:International journal of sport communication 2018-12, Vol.11 (4), p.552-572
Main Authors: Ruihley, Brody J., Simmons, Jason, Billings, Andrew C., Calabrese, Rich
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Football
Social networks
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Summary:On the first Sunday of the National Football League’s 2016–17 season, a technical issue caused ESPN’s fantasy-football website and mobile application to fail. ESPN’s product failure is no small problem and represented a major organizational crisis; with 7.1 million unique users, ESPN represents the largest provider of a multi-billion-dollar fantasy-sport industry. This case study examined ESPN’s organizational communication strategy, as well as the stakeholder responses surrounding the failure of ESPN’s fantasy-football website and application on the most anticipated day of the fantasy-sport season. Using content analysis and partnering with a social media data insights company, the study examined social media messages from both the organizational and consumer side of this fantasy-sport product failure. Through ampling 1,542 social media messages from a population of 11,881 unique comments via Twitter, the reactive nature of ESPN’s messages and the direct responses from its consumers was ascertained.
ISSN:1936-3915
1936-3907
DOI:10.1123/ijsc.2018-0090