Int. J. Sport Management and Marketing, Vol. 10, Nos. 3/4, 2011 213 Copyright © 2011 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd. Agenda-setting and La Copa Mundial: marketing through agenda-setting on soccer blogs during the 2010 World Cup Lauren M. Burch*, Evan L. Frederick, Matthew H. Zimmerman and Galen E. Clavio Indiana University-Bloomington, 1025 E. 7th Street, HPER 112, Bloomington, IN 47405, USA E-mail: lmburch@indiana.edu E-mail: elfreder@indiana.edu E-mail: mahzimme@indiana.edu E-mail: gclavio2@indiana.edu *Corresponding author Abstract: Media coverage for the 2010 World Cup in South Africa included US-based sports television network ESPN. Along with its television coverage, ESPN’s website featured two blogs, specifically dedicated to the coverage of the 2010 World Cup. However, ESPN was not the only online outlet covering the event. Therefore, using agenda-setting theory, this study attempted to determine if the nature of World Cup coverage differed significantly between ESPN.com blogs (i.e., mainstream media) and blogs from a popular soccer website, BigSoccer.com (i.e., independent-fan media). Results indicated differences among secondary foci. Also, there was an overall trend to give increased coverage to countries that played fewer matches than the World Cup finalists. The implications of these findings will be discussed further. Keywords: agenda-setting theory; sport marketing; online media; World Cup 2010; blogs; ESPN; Big Soccer; mainstream media; independent media; content analysis; sport communication. Reference to this paper should be made as follows: Burch, L.M., Frederick, E.L., Zimmerman, M.H. and Clavio, G.E. (2011) ‘Agenda-setting and La Copa Mundial: marketing through agenda-setting on soccer blogs during the 2010 World Cup’, Int. J. Sport Management and Marketing, Vol. 10, Nos. 3/4, pp.213–231. Biographical notes: Lauren M. Burch received her MS at Indiana University in 2007. She is currently a PhD student in the Sport Management programme within the Kinesiology Department at Indiana University-Bloomington. Her research interests include media effects in online media and qualitative and quantitative analysis of athlete’s portrayals. Evan L. Frederick received his MS at Indiana University in 2008. He is currently a PhD student in the Sport Management programme within the Kinesiology Department at Indiana University-Bloomington. His research interests include the effects of media portrayals on viewer perceptions of sport violence as well as the usage and demographic trends of new media users. He is currently an Associate Instructor, teaching courses in sport public relations and sport blogging.