Influencers at this year’s US Open have stolen the spotlight for disrupting play and acting in a way that is antithetical to traditional tennis etiquette, drawing the ire of players and spectators alike. But despite the pushback and complaints, it looks like they’re here to stay. Tennis’s biggest stars weren’t battling weather extremes and challenging court surfaces last week when the year’s fourth and final Grand Slam got under way at Flushing Meadows in New York.
The disruption, rather, came from flashy ring lights, untimely selfies and raucous behaviour from influencers in the spectator stands. The use of influencers – social media personalities who create content for followers online – is a relatively new trend in sports marketing across major sporting tournaments like tennis’s US Open and football’s FIFA World Cup. According to sports media experts, they’re only going to become mainstream and more relevant.
Players aren’t pushing back against influencers, one hundred of whom the US Open has formally accredited this year, so much as they’re calling for respect for the players and the game. A chair umpire was forced to reprimand influencers for staging a disruptive photo shoot while two-time US Open champion Naomi Osaka was serving during her first-round win against Anastasia Zakharova last Monday. Another social media user attracted attention for all the wrong reasons when she posted a series of photos posing inside the Arthur Ashe Stadium while Madison Keys was in the middle of playing a point against Alina Korneeva, which breached basic tennis etiquette.
Videos on social media showed people moving about the stands during play or taking group photographs, often without consideration for fans around them trying to enjoy the match. Influencers are the latest, and a significantly cost-effective, marketing trend in the sports industry, Leslie Koroma, CEO of Africa Sports Ventures Group, told Al Jazeera. The sports media expert agreed with the pushback from tennis fans used to the traditional model of informed journalists covering the sport compared to influencers with little to no knowledge.
What brands and the US Open itself pay influencers is undisclosed, and it depends on their social media reach and following. It can, however, be safely assumed to be significantly less than the $17m spent on marketing in 2023 and 2024, down from $30m in 2021 and 2022, per the consolidated financial statements of the United States Tennis Association (USTA). Influencers are able to reach audiences that traditional media cannot, according to Nasha Smith, a sports media ethics professor at Arizona State University.
Of the 100 influencers accredited by the US Open, 20 are dedicated to providing coverage of the food and beverage scene alone. Others show what fans are consuming (such as Honey Deuce cocktails and overpriced chicken nuggets topped with caviar), what they’re wearing, and what the overall atmosphere is like. Smith cautioned against organisers solely using online views and engagement as a rubric for success.
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