Contact
Michael Hsu
michael@rapleaf.com
Demographic Study on Sports Fans Across Social Networks
San Francisco, CA – May 19, 2009 – Rapleaf (www.rapleaf.com), the leader in automated search for
people information on the social web, recently conducted a study on the demographics of basketball,
baseball, and hockey fans across social networks.
While the study’s overall findings are not surprising (fans of the three sports tend to be males under 35
years of age), demographic and social graph data across the sports provides interesting insight on
differences between basketball, baseball, and hockey fans on social networks. For example, despite
being fewer in number, hockey fans tend to be the most gender-balanced and also the best-connected.
The results of the study are based off a sample of 2,850,000 basketball, baseball, and hockey fans.
Rapleaf determined a user to be a fan of a particular sport if mention of the keywords basketball, hockey,
or baseball was found in publicly-available profile information. This study found basketball to be the most-
popular sport, followed by baseball then hockey.
The following are highlights from the study:
Women fans have largest presence in hockey
Nearly half of the hockey fans surveyed was female, compared to 40% of basketball and only
35% of baseball fans. Overall, 60% of the sports fans sampled were male while 40% are female.
Over 85% of sports fans are under 35 years old
Almost half of sports fans sampled were between 18 and 25 years of age, with another 24%
falling within the 26 – 35 age range. Baseball fans tend to be older, followed by hockey fans, with
basketball fans being youngest. Over 90% of basketball fans sampled were under 35 years old.
Sports fans tend to be social creatures
More than 60% of sports fans sampled have over 50 friends online. In a typical brand’s
consumer list, only 10% of the people have over 50 friends. Hockey fans were the best-
connected with over 63% having more than 50 online friends.
Rapleaf ▪ 657 Mission St, Suite 600, San Francisco, CA 94105 ▪ www.rapleaf.com Page 1

Figure 1: Gender Split of Basketball, Hockey, and Baseball Fans
Figure 2: Ages of Basketball, Hockey, and Baseball Fans
Rapleaf ▪ 657 Mission St, Suite 600, San Francisco, CA 94105 ▪ www.rapleaf.com Page 2

Figure 3: Percentage of Sports Fans with Over 50 Friends
About Rapleaf
Rapleaf is the leader in automated search for people information on the social web. Top retailers, telcos, political
organizations, hotel chains, social networks, and other consumer-facing companies use Rapleaf's services to gain
insight about their customers and improve their customers’ experience. Consumers use Rapleaf's services to conduct
individual people searches and to find and manage their own online “footprint.” Headquartered in San Francisco, the
company has processed over 500 million unique searches for businesses and consumers.
Rapleaf not affiliated with any sports organization or social network.
www.rapleaf.com
Rapleaf ▪ 657 Mission St, Suite 600, San Francisco, CA 94105 ▪ www.rapleaf.com Page 3