Som Tenis

Abstract

Som Tenis is a media specialized in covering tennis news at a semiprofessional level in the Valencian Community. This cybermedia is created with the main objective of giving greater visibility to Valencian tennis players who are in a stage of training and growth, and who compete with the aim of being able to make a leap to professional tennis in the future. These tennis players often compete at the highest possible level in their category, and dedicate their entire lives to this sport. Som Tenis also aims to inform about the results of Valencian tennis players who compete in more important international circuits, such as ATP or WTA. Despite being very important circuits within this sport, the tennis players who do not occupy the top 50 ranking go quite unnoticed by the mass media. For this reason, Som Tenis wants to follow the different tournaments that Valencian tennis players play around the world and publish his results especially on social networks. This media seeks to cover an informative need that is present in this sport within the Valencian Community. Although in other communities of the country this sport has much more visibility in the media and networks, in the Comunitat Valenciana does not happen the same. And this is something quite surprising, since this community is one of the ones with more fans and athletes. Historically, there are several Valencian tennis players who have been trained on the clay courts near the Mediterranean coast and have managed to compete at the highest international level such as David Ferrer or currently Roberto Bautista and Sara Sorribes. Like them, many other Valencian tennis players have also managed to get into the ranking of the 200 or 300 best tennis players in the world. A tremendous merit in sports that in the traditional media has gone largely unnoticed. My love for this sport has been an important conditioning factor when it came to taking on this challenge. I wanted to create a media about a subject that would motivate and excite me to do my best. In addition, as I had practiced this sport at a semi-professional 19 level several years ago, I knew perfectly 17 well the real situation of this sport and I knew many sources that could help me to create a good cybermedia. In the Comunitat Valenciana, the only alternative to consult information related to semi-professional tennis is the official website of the Federación de Tenis de la Comunitat Valenciana (FTCV). This web portal publishes little news and information, but often the page is outdated. In addition, it can be seen how the design of the web is very antique and the information published is not very well organized. As for social networks, the FTCV does not have an account on the social network Instagram and on Twitter the activity is minimal. I have not found any other media specialized in this subject within the Valencian territory. It is true that in the national panorama the reference media is Punto de Break, but it is dedicated exclusively to cover tennis at professional and international level. I believe that in this area there was an informative need for players and fans of Valencian tennis. Som Tenis has taken advantage of the little or nonexistent competition to break into this sector with the illusion of creating a professional and modern journalistic project. This media project has had some very well-defined bases. Firstly, in social networks I have opted for a very visual and innovative design. I believe that, nowadays, visual content has more and more weight in the digital panorama and the media has managed to adapt to this trend. Another of the bases has been to maintain a well-worked and create a useful website for Internet users. Apart from the current affairs section where news, interviews and all kinds of journalistic pieces were published, the most innovative part of the web portal has been the tournament calendar. This calendar has become one of the most visited sections by Internet users. I believe that the way of grouping all the events in an orderly and easy to consult calendar has been a great informative help for fans and players. For this reason, it has been the most successful section of the online media. Som Tenis could not be understood without the images. From the first moment, the project was to develop a very visual media and in which the photographs of the different matches and tournaments were the protagonists. I believe that the publication of all these images has given great visibility to 18 the cybermedia and has also achieved a significant number of interactions on social networks. In addition, the sale of these photographs has helped to monetize the media expenses.20 The name of the cybermedia, Som Tenis, I think it has been great with what this media wants to represent. It is a short, simple and easy to remember name. To make the logo, this name help me a lot because I have been able to make a very striking logo. In addition, being a name in Valencian language, you could sense that it was a provincial digital media. The idea of creating this name was that all followers feel part of this cybermedia. The objectives to be achieved with this cybermedia were quite diverse. The first and most important was to give visibility to this sport with a professional journalistic work. I am very happy because I have been able to achieve this goal, and at all times I have received many expressions of gratitude for my work. Another of the goals I set myself at the beginning was to build a media in which the images were of high quality. For this, it was essential to have advanced knowledge of photography, which I have been able to acquire throughout the development of the cybermedia. I have managed to grow in terms of web traffic and the number of followers in social networks, something that perhaps seemed an odyssey at the beginning. As for the target audience of Som Tenis, it is mainly made up of those people interested in semi-professional tennis in Valencia. There are many Valencian tennis players who have managed to make the leap to professional tennis and are competing in the most important international circuits such as Roberto Bautista or Sara Sorribes. Very important training academies have also been created, such as the Juan Carlos Ferrero Equelite Sport Academy or the David Ferrer Academy, where top-level tennis players from all over the world train. For this reason, there is a great love for this sport throughout the territory of the Valencian Community. In addition, the target audience of the cybermedia would also be formed by those players and coaches who want to be informed about the different tournaments that are going to be played or about the results of their teammates. 19 The Som Tenis media has managed to take advantage of the little activity that the Federación de Tenis de la Comunitat Valenciana has in social networks to be able to capture all this audience in our cybermedia. The social networks that have been used to disseminate the content of the media have been Twitter and Instagram. I chose these two social networks because they are the ones 21 that most people use nowadays, and they were also the ones that best matched the content of the cybermedia. On the one hand, being present on the social network Twitter was indispensable for me at the beginning, as I believe it is the social network that people use to stay informed. In this social network it has been very complicated to get a following and a high number of followers, since the feedback was much smaller and there was not a very large community. On the other hand, on Instagram, the media has been able to take off perfectly. In this social network, visual content has triumphed and has helped to achieve a significant number of followers. In addition, the feedback has been very good and both players and fans have uploaded content from the media to their profiles. The interviews and reports that were published on Instagram TV have also had many reproductions and have reached many people. The contents published on the media have always been developed from an informative approach, and looking for topics that were interesting for the followers. In summary, I feel satisfied with the work done during these months in the cybermedia and with its growth. I believe that this project can still grow more, and there is a very nice community that encourages me to continue. I feel very proud of the work I have done with the media, and I think I have managed to create a serious and entertaining journalistic product. There are still some weak points that can be polished, such as trying to maintain a more stable traffic on the web or achieve a greater following on Twitter, but with time and dedication Som Tenis can become the reference media of the semiprofessional Valencian tennis on the Valencian Community