Recently I was able to sit down with Terry Savarise, the Senior Vice-President of both U.S. Cellular Field and the United Center here in Chicago. With a full slate of major league baseball, the United Center hosting over 220 events a year, and recently developing the Chicago White Sox & Los Angeles Dodgers new spring…
Vick Has His Say, But Do We Believe Him? Does It Matter?
Despite lots of competition, the lead sports public relations story continues to be former Atlanta Falcons quarterback, Michael Vick. Since we last met, the Philadelphia Eagles signed Vick to a one-year contract for $1.6 million with a second-year option worth $5.2 million and incentives. Vick, for those who aren’t familiar with his story, served 18…
Creating a Personal Advisory Team
Career decision making is tough business. One way a lot of people cope with these difficult considerations is by turning to others for advice. These supporters act as a sort of “kitchen cabinet”, listening to your concerns and giving you their wisdom in return. In a sense, they constitute your personal board of directors. Everybody’s…
Why People Want “Deals” and Buy Value
The promise of a “great deal” or a “one-time-only opportunity” is an age-old advertising message that gets everyone’s attention, even in the world of sports tickets. But is “the deal” what people really want, or is it something else? We’ve all bought a cheap pair of shoes, a shirt, or a bargain electronics item, and…
Should Sports Agents Network With Their Competition?
“If you’re an agent, don’t be friends with other agents.” It should not come as a surprise that the agent who wrote the statement above is one of only a very few in my industry that I do not get along with. He attempts to steal clients from other companies, talks down on his…
Why Hasn’t Social Media Caught on With Baseball?
Let me start by saying this: The MLB not taking advantage of social media is like a slugger with home run power who refuses to swing the bat. It just doesn’t make sense. The Four Major Sports In the heat of this past NBA season, Twitter exploded and Facebook pages were redesigned for businesses. The…
Sports Images Take a Beating, Making Effective PR All the More Important
The sports industry has been fraught with public relations challenges the past 10 days. When I began to form this post in my head, the “only” examples were Michael Vick, Brett Favre, Plaxico Burress and Major League Baseball. Today I add to that the National Football League and ESPN. What could be more appropriate for…
Sports Networker Event Recap: NYC
The first Sports Networker event took place last week in NYC and seeing that it was nearly 100 people over capacity at the venue, I would say it was a fairly big success. I am still receiving thoughtful emails from attendees who said it was packed full of quality sports professionals and they all received…
How can social media tools drive your sports marketing success?
What brands have succeeded in using social tools to increase their engagement with their fans? Enhance their brand affinity? Drive their bottom line? These are all questions WE’RE going to explore today, together. That’s right, I’ll get us started, but then let’s use the comments section to build out both lists until we have a…
Top 14 Career Changing Tips in Sports
The average sports worker will change jobs 8 times with at least 3 career changes, contributing to an annual industry turnover rate nearing 65%. As Sports and Entertainment converge with the new media and expanding sports properties, there is still a critical need for quality senior level executives and specialized professionals. Follow these top…
What Happens in Vegas, Starts with Social Media
True to the social-media savvy, NBA All-Star’s form, Shaquille O’Neal’s two-day stay in Vegas tipped off with on-the-street giveaways as a part of an all-night social media blitz that took place to launch the weekend’s enlyten events. Digital Royalty planned the first-ever progressive tweet-up, known as a Tweethop. It’s a mixture between a Tweetup, a…
The Best Ways to Start a Cold Call
We’re terrified of cold calls. Can we admit that? There’s nothing that strikes fear in the hearts of men and women quite like the icy grip of the COLD CALL. Even the name sounds like a bad B-movie: “You never know who’s on the end… of a COLD CALL!” (Cue terrifying shriek, bad music) “Rated…
A Perfect Day. (In Social Media)
The Chicago White Sox, a Digital Royalty client, practiced perfect social media agility on July 23rd as Mark Buehrle threw a Perfect Game. What were the measurable social media results? The White Sox experienced a 21% increase of their online ecosystem, Positive Sentiment grew 8 percentage points and words like “LOVE, BUEHRLE, PERFECT and OBAMA”…
Keep it Personal or Get Down to Business?
There are not enough hours in the day to successfully manage a plethora of social media profiles. The bottom line is that you need to make money. Social networking sites will help you build a strong network of contacts, but you still must devote a large portion of your business day to selling and perfecting the actual…
Life-Streaming 101: The Starbury TV Experiment
Stephon Marbury should’ve refrained from life-streaming. Starbury TV, as far as I’m concerned, was an epic failure. Why? David Neiman of Athlete Interactive put it so poignantly that I’ll just share what he had to say and let you judge for yourself: “We want athletes to awe us, and that’s precisely what they do when they’re doing what…
Added Value vs. Perceived Value
In the economic times of 2009 everyone is trying to define and produce value. Like most marketing buzzwords, value can be a very ambiguous concept. When fans look to spend their discretionary income to take in a ballgame, they base their purchasing decision on the emotions that the product of sports provides. The emotional aspect…