Heart Over Hype: What Really Drives Fan Token Engagement?
Fan Tokens emerged with the promise of a new kind of interactive fandom that empowered fans by including them in the democratic ecosystem of their favourite clubs.
But a crucial question lingers: what actually drives fans to vote? Why do some polls attract thousands of responses while others barely move the needle?
Data from a 2024 quantitative study sheds some light on this question. A large-scale analysis of over 3,500 Fan Token polls revealed an average participation rate of nearly 50% among token holders, suggesting that engagement remains strong but uneven.
How Emotion Drives Participation
The analysis also showed that the type of poll matters: decisions linked to club culture like kit designs, goal songs, or player awards, draw a far higher turnout than mere administrative or abstract topics.
Fans, it turns out, care most when their votes touch the emotional heart of the game and the clubs they love.
This is reflected in the deviation across potential answers in certain polls. As the study states:
“The standard deviation of vote percentages (across answer options) peaks around the 5–10 range, indicating moderate agreement in many polls; but the spread goes up to ~60 in some polls, indicating high disagreement.”
These findings convey that polls with stronger fan agreement attract fewer, but more committed voters. When fans broadly agree on an outcome, participation as a share of total token supply rises, but the number of individual voters falls.
In contrast, when opinions are split, more fans join in, yet each contributes less. In simple terms, when fans agree, fewer people vote but they care more. When fans disagree, more people vote but with lighter engagement.
The study also found that participation rates vary widely between countries, reflecting different intensities of fandom and adoption levels. In Poland, around 1.8% of total token supply typically took part in polls, which was one of the highest median engagement levels recorded. In Portugal, the figure was just 0.09%.
Notably, tokens representing global or cross-border fan bases attracted the largest median number of voters, averaging about 8,600 participants per poll. The findings suggest that while national engagement intensity differs, global communities can mobilize broader crowds even if their per-person commitment is smaller.
The Nature of Polls Matter; The Size of Clubs Don’t
Timing and incentives also play key roles. Polls that coincide with major fixtures, or those that offer exclusive rewards such as signed merchandise or VIP access, see large spikes in engagement.
Conversely, “poll fatigue” can set in if voting becomes too frequent or lacks meaningful outcomes. The best-performing projects strike a balance: frequent enough to stay relevant, but curated enough to feel impactful.
Another interesting insight reveals that community size doesn’t necessarily guarantee engagement. Smaller clubs often outperform globally recognised giants in percentage participation, suggesting that intimacy and a feeling of belonging may be much more important than scale.
Regardless of the size of the club, effective communication strategies on social media, influencer involvement, and even well-timed shoutouts by club captains or ex-pros can dramatically boost turnout.
The findings highlight a critical truth for the Fan Token ecosystem: engagement isn’t automatic; it’s earned. Fans need to feel that their votes matter, and that the digital experience connects back to real-world outcomes.
How Clubs Can Increase Voter Participation
This naturally puts the onus on clubs to be as creative as possible when building bespoke experiences that feel truly specific and relevant to their fan-base. When it comes to Fan Token holder participation, it would appear that the clubs who put the most in get the most back in return.
With Web3 platforms always evolving, features like on-chain verification of poll results, gamified leaderboards, and personalized fan stats could make participation even more rewarding.
However, with many fans still unaware of the concept of Fan Tokens, it may also help if clubs could set up educational programs that introduce the average fan on the terrace to ideas like SportFi (Sport Finance), cryptocurrency and trading, as well as how to become proficient with crypto wallets, blockchain apps, exchanges, and all the peripheral technological obligations that come with acquiring Fan Tokens.
Fan Token voter participation thrives when it bridges emotion, communication and technology. Being familiar with the culture of a club is essential to understanding the psychology behind each vote that takes place, as well as each vote that doesn’t.
Ultimately, strong knowledge of club and/or country culture appears to be key to ensuring fans have a good reason to buy, hold and/or trade Fan Tokens.