Now in our fourth year of watching and analyzing the Amazing Race Canada, we’ve noticed a few things. One of these things is that, without fail, the second episode of each season attracts less social enthusiasm than the premiere. With all the promotion and accompanying fanfare given this year’s kickoff episode, Season 4 looked to continue that trend.
After reviewing the data, we found that indeed this season has proved no different, but the drop this year was much less significant than in the past.
Twitter mentions fell from Episode 1 to Episode 2 this season by 41 per cent, which might seem high until you look at last year: Season 3’s premiere hangover resulted in 64 per cent fewer tweets for Episode 2.
As mentioned in our recap of S4E1, the fact that overall Twitter chatter was reduced for this premiere compared to last season’s (-19%) might be a contributor to the smaller drop this year, but what can’t be disputed is that this season’s second episode provoked a lot more conversation than its counterpart in Season 3. Thirty-one per cent more, in fact.
One reason for its popularity? Calgary Mayor Naheed Nenshi.
Love they had @nenshi in the episode. The mayor everyone wants! #AmazingRaceCanada
— (((Shienara))) (@Shienara33) July 6, 2016
Mayor Nenshi proved such a favourite in this week’s episode that Twitter mentioned him 3.6 times more than host Jon Montgomery! And if Nenshi had been racing, this one-man dream team would have placed third among all teams in terms of mentions. Pretty clever of Bell Media to feature the 2014 World Mayor in Calgary’s episode.
Much like last week, when Northwest Territories Tourism, Travel Alberta, and Tourism Jasper made social media hay, Tourism Calgary didn’t miss its opportunity with Episode 2: Calgary’s tourism board beat out last week’s winner, Tourism Jasper, with 43 per cent more tweets.
A major reason for this was Tourism Calgary’s Twitter marketing:
We’ll be live tweeting tonight during @AmazingRaceCDA – follow along and use #AmazingRaceCanada to join the conversation!
— Tourism Calgary (@TourismCalgary) July 5, 2016
By encouraging people to follow along and get involved, Tourism Calgary was able to organically amplify its reach. The proof that it worked? Eighty-three per cent of all @TourismCalgary mentions were retweets.
Other organizations fared similarly well. Mountain Equipment Co-op, a new sponsor for this season, is already reaping the benefits of its partnership:
Saw @mec commercial. Online shopping time! #AmazingRaceCanada
— Sarah Pittard (@Solomomtravel) July 6, 2016
MEC then used Twitter how it’s supposed to be used, tweeting right back at Solo Mom:
@Solomomtravel Fun! Are you looking for something in particular? Let us know if you need any advice.
— MEC (@mec) July 6, 2016
This type of consumer engagement is what makes Twitter so unique, and MEC is smart to put it to use.
Fellow new sponsor, Hotels.com, also received some free advertising:
Tell me somewhere along the race someone replied to @jonmonty, “Thanks, Captain Obvious”. @hotelsdotcomca #AmazingRaceCanada @AmazingRaceCDA
— Craig Drebit (@CraigDrebit) July 6, 2016
And Mentos, while it wasn’t super prominent this episode, still got noticed:
#AmazingRaceCanada mentos gum was in the guitar case? @MentosUS @AmazingRaceCDA
— Jules (@Jules_xox19) July 6, 2016
It’s yet to be seen which company will be able to make the most of the Twitter aspect of its Amazing Race Canada partnership, but MEC looks to be off to a good start.
Check back in next week when the contestants race through Vietnam. Who knows? Maybe they’ve got a World Mayor of their own over there.
Most mentioned contestants:
- Jillian & Emmett (Finished 1st) 28.8%
Jillian MacLaughlin (@JillianMacLaugh), Emmett Blois (@EmmettBlois) - Joel & Ashley (Finished 4th) 25.3%
Joel Ground (@JoelGround /@Joel_and_Ashley), Ashley Callingbull (@ashcallingbull / @Joel_and_Ashley) - Steph & Kristen (Finished 6th) 13.7%
Steph LeClair (@sleclair09), Kristen McKenzie (@krlstenmckenzie) - Julie & Lowell (Finished 7th) 8.6%
Julie Taylor (@JulieLowellCAN), Lowell Taylor (@JulieLowellCAN) - Rita & Yvette (Finished 8th) 6.2%
Rita Yakibonge (@ritayakis), Yvette Yakibonge (@yyakis) - Stéphane & Antoine (Finished 2nd) 6.1%
Stéphane Tétreault (@StephTetreault), Antoine Tétreault (@AntoineTET) - Anne & Tanya (Finished 5th) 5.4%
Anne Morrone (@AnneMorrone), Tanya Muzzatti (@tanyamuzzatti) - Kelly & Kate (Finished 9th, non-elimination leg) 3.8%
Kelly Xu (@kelly_kateTO), Kate Pan (@kelly_kateTO) - Frankie & Amy (Finished 3rd) 2.1%
Frankie Gassler (@FrankieFenix74), Amy Gassler (@amygassler)
