The Australian Open Grand Slam tennis tournament, which has reached half way stage as I write this, has built on the progress of previous years to establish a strong, recognizable and credible online brand. According to Sam Laird, in a recent post on the US website Mashable, the Australian Open ‘may just be the most digitally connected major sporting event of all time’. High praise indeed.
So why is the event in Melbourne attracting such accolades for its digital presence?
In my opinion, what the Australian Open is doing so well is leveraging digital assets to create deep and meaningful engagement with fans, while at the same time integrating its sponsors. Many sporting events, clubs and organizations across the globe strive to simultaneously achieve these two goals and the Grand Slam for Asia/Pacific has, arguably, pulled it off. [click to continue…]
Chris is a strategic programs analyst at the Australian Rugby Union (ARU) focusing on, amongst other things, sponsorship research, analytics and acquisition. He holds a MBA from the Australian Graduate School of Business (AGSM). Chris took part in the school’s exchange program by completing a semester at Stern business school, NYU where he studied sports marketing and sports economics. Connect with him on Twitter and LinkedIn.
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Here in Australia, sporting clubs are only just realizing the massive potential of social media and beginning to understand the new opportunities they have to connect with their fans.
This week I decided to have a chat to Sean Callanan, the Founder of Australian based digital sports company
Sports Geek. Sean is one of the premier guys in
social media in sports scene in Oz. He works extensively with athletes, sports executives, business owners and leagues to help them develop, or improve, their connection with their fan base to deliver results.
Er, so I’ll start a Facebook page then?
Finding the right tools and platform
The first step to getting involved in social media in sports is to figure out what exactly is the best network to use. It might be necessary to use a combination of networks, but if you are only going to focus on one, it’s crucial to use the one that fans use most.
Once the platform has been chosen, Sean says sports companies or events teams need to know how best to use it and understand what they want to get out of it.
“What’s the goal? Why exactly do you want your club to get involved in social media. Is it to build a fan base? Is it to grow membership numbers or is it to better promote sponsors?” he said.
He believes integrating social media tools in the right platform is essential to maximize opportunities. There’s no point having a presence in social media if it’s not kept up to date or actively in use.
“You have to get fans to like the FB page or follow the Twitter feed, get them to comment and then drive them back to your website,” he said. “Think of fans as long term customers. Essentially you are in a relationship with them – but you’re more of a friend than a sales representative. Key numbers are active fans, it’s important to be engaging them, not just collecting them”.
Claire Kelly is a freelance writer, communications consultant and Australian beach volleyball player based on the Gold Coast, Australia.
Experienced in social media marketing, conducting interviews, ghostwriting, editing, generating publicity and photography, Claire is passionate about about helping athletes and businesses grow through the power of the media and the internet. Follow Claire on Twitter @clairelkelly
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The world is changing rapidly and from now onwards the speed of that change is only going to further increase. We’re daily bombarded with thousands of images. Every photo can be worth a thousand words. But which images are the ones that stick and make a difference? Which (and whose) story is being told (and where) has almost become as important as the quality of the image. Choices about which professional images are created are increasingly made by executives, not necessarily creatives. At the same time, anyone can now take pictures. The quality of a sports photography image is no longer defined by its resolution or razor sharp focus. A picture made by a fan can travel all over the world and end up on the international front pages before you can say ‘bong’.
This post covers the changes in sports photography from the perspective of the photographers, media, sponsors, fans and athletes. Its not intended as a philosophical reflection of the value of a photograph. The digital revolution, which this blog is dedicated to, has resulted in lasting behavioral change as well as the way sports imagery is produced, distributed, and ultimately consumed. How do photographers find their audience, how do sponsors maximize their visibility, and how do athletes manage their exposure? [click to continue…]
Thomas studied Communications in Amsterdam and has been working in international sports for over 15 years. He started his professional career at the Amsterdam Admirals in the NFL Europe and moved to Dutch professional soccer champions PSV Eindhoven in 1997. In 2001 he moved to Southern Germany to join Adidas. He's filled a variety of roles with the sporting goods brand, including 'Head of Global PR'. In 2011 he moved into the role of Global Brand Director.
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Two weeks ago, I had the pleasure of attending the Ivy Sports Symposium at the Wharton School of Business in Philadelphia. The Ivy Sports Symposium is one of the global sports industry’s premier conferences that sets the standard among college-based sports business events. It is widely considered the best and most comprehensive one-day event. The Symposium has gained industry-wide recognition since its inception by featuring more than 180 unique speakers from around the world representing all facets of the sports business. There were a number of great
sports job tips to take away from the conference.
1. Social Media in Sports
The #1 thing that I took away from the symposium was how important it is to possess social media skills. Sports are moving to the social media realm at an incredibly fast pace. Many current industry executives are lagging on social media trends and since younger professionals are more versed, they are being hired to help their company’s social media presence. This skill was emphasized as a potential differentiator to break into the sports industry or creative a competitive advantage in your current job.
2. Sports Job Tips on a Global Scale
Another aspect that was greatly emphasized throughout the entire conference was that sports are becoming an increasingly global enterprise. In the United States, we often think that there are only four major sports that matter to fans and consumers. This is simply not the case. We often fail to recognize sports that are dominant in the international sector such as Futbol, Cricket, Formula 1 racing and Rugby just to name a few. There is enormous potential for brands and executives alike to capitalize on this relatively untapped market.
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Holly Koski is a Senior graduating in December from Indiana University majoring in Sports Marketing & Management. As the Sports Networker Marketing Intern, she is responsible for managing the Sports Networker Twitter, Facebook and YouTube pages while promoting Sports Networker content through various online marketing strategies.
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This article is a guest post by Sam Hawkins
A new free sports app has just been released in the UK. It’s called PlayUp and combines real-time scoring, free messaging and fan rooms across more than 20,000 live games
The free PlayUp sports app includes real time scoring and statistics for more than 20,000 games, along with the option to create private rooms to discuss the action with friends or join public rooms to interact with fans from around the world – goal by goal, play by play or pitch by pitch.
The sports app is available initially for Apple iPhones, iPads and iPod touch (iOS-based devices), other mobile platforms such as Android/Desktop/Windows 7 will follow in 2012.
Already, the PlayUp sports app has achieved strong interest globally ranking as a top free sports app in the highly competitive US (#14) sports market.
The app can be downloaded now at http://playup.com/apps/
For more information, visit http://playup.com/uk or contact:
Paul Nicholson ([email protected]; tel: 07990 586003) or Becki Willis (becki.willis@fourcommunications.com; tel: 07817 368000)
Heidi Howes is a freelance writer,editor, and singer-songwriter living in Columbus, Ohio. She blogs about following bliss at www.theanandaproject.com.
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We can all breathe easy, the NFL is back. And with a little more than a month left until the 2011 NFL season opener (Sept. 8th) we are witnessing a frenzy of a free agency period. In just one week we saw Chad Ocho Cinco traded to the New EnglandPatriots, Reggie Bush taking his talents to south beach, and Nnamdi Asomugha joining the Philadelphia Eagles.
Luckily, fans don’t have to rely on traditional media to stay current with all the mayhem. Social media has solved that annoying problem of waiting to read tomorrow’s paper or catching the news. Here are some ways to keep up with the NFL free agency period through social media.
Twitter
Talk about real time news and information. Reporters like Chris Mortnensen and Adam Schefter have leveraged Twitter to report on breaking free agent signings and trades. These are the two people to follow if you are serious about football. How do you think I heard about Randy Moss retiring? [click to continue…]
www.bluefountainmedia.com Dmitriy Gamarnik is a marketing analyst for Blue Fountain Media. He is passionate about two things – sports and marketing. Sports have been a big part of Dmitriy’s life since he learned to crawl. When he isn’t keeping up with the industry and providing top notch analysis in New York City, he works on his golf swing and coaches basketball in his home town of Plainsboro, NJ.
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Last week I shared a basic social media guide to get you started on the right path. Today I will provide examples of two sports organizations that are using social media platforms correctly.
However, instead of writing about well-known sports like basketball or football I thought it would be interesting to examine endurance challenges that test the human body like no other.
Over the years, endurance challenges have become very popular and to connect with the growing community, organizations embraced social media as their marketing tool of choice. [click to continue…]
www.bluefountainmedia.com Dmitriy Gamarnik is a marketing analyst for Blue Fountain Media. He is passionate about two things – sports and marketing. Sports have been a big part of Dmitriy’s life since he learned to crawl. When he isn’t keeping up with the industry and providing top notch analysis in New York City, he works on his golf swing and coaches basketball in his home town of Plainsboro, NJ.
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Guest Post by Dmitriy Gamarnik
Before social media, reaching customers was a challenge accomplished by face to face, television, radio, or print advertising. Today, a company can use services like Twitter and Facebook to directly communicate with customers. This also means that crowd is filled with many voices and to be effective the message needs to be clear.
1. Goals
What are you trying to achieve and what is the expected outcome? This is an important question to ask at the beginning of any social media campaign. This step will provide guidance and a clear course to follow as you navigate the world of social media.
2. Metrics
How will you measure the results? There are a variety of ways in which to measure social media success. Typically the goal of social media is to build relationships and trust, which cannot be easily defined. Some common metrics to keep an eye on are the number of interactions, fans/followers, and conversions. [click to continue…]
Sport, unlike other forms of entertainment, lends itself to short bursts of consumption and technology is increasingly becoming an enabler in that process. Technology is driving innovations in how we watch sport and even changing the reason why we watch it in the first place.
Passionate sports fans, especially avid armchair fans, have a scarce resource – our old friend Father Time. We simply don’t have enough hours in the day to watch all the games and action that, in a perfect world, we would like to watch.
Of course, television has historically assisted, in some ways, by offering condensed highlight shows. An example of this for soccer (football) fans in the UK is BBC Sport’s Match of the Day (MOTD), which airs on Saturday night and has held a permanent and iconic place in the weekly viewing schedule since 1964.
Leagues, broadcasters and technology companies can now provide content that only shows the exciting moments (touchdowns, goals, tries etc) or even allow viewers to concentrate on players or statistics which are integral to their fantasy teams. Today’s sports viewer is provided with an array of rich ways to experience this kind of bite-sized action, as well. For instance, MOTD can be watched for free on the BBC’s iPlayer. [click to continue…]
Chris is a strategic programs analyst at the Australian Rugby Union (ARU) focusing on, amongst other things, sponsorship research, analytics and acquisition. He holds a MBA from the Australian Graduate School of Business (AGSM). Chris took part in the school’s exchange program by completing a semester at Stern business school, NYU where he studied sports marketing and sports economics. Connect with him on Twitter and LinkedIn.
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Sports marketing strategies are becoming increasingly sophisticated. The days of corporations walking away satisfied after paying millions of dollars to display their logo on a team jersey are long gone. Savvy marketers know that you to have go where the eyeballs are. Whether it be social media, digital marketing or the more traditional channels, you need to communicate and then engage with your targeted customers (fans) using the medium (language) they favor.
Two recent news releases from the carbonated drinks industry illustrate this.
USA Today last week published an article revealing how large corporations such as Coca Cola are leveraging social media during the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) ‘March Madness’ annual basketball championships. Coke reserved 20% of its tournament spending for social media – a massive increase on the 2% that it gave social media marketing in 2010. When you consider the 11.7 million hours of live streaming in 2010, that is money well spent. As the article states, Coke:
“…devised a social-media gathering place dubbed the Coke Zero Social Arena, where fans can go for professional commentary and fan chatter. Coke will aggregate tweets about the game by team and try to refine social chatter in one place”.
On March 17th, The Wall Street Journal published an article revealing that Diet Coke is now the second best-selling carbonated beverage in the U.S, behind Coca Cola, but significantly in front of arch rivals Pepsi Co Inc who are pushed down to third place. [click to continue…]
Chris is a strategic programs analyst at the Australian Rugby Union (ARU) focusing on, amongst other things, sponsorship research, analytics and acquisition. He holds a MBA from the Australian Graduate School of Business (AGSM). Chris took part in the school’s exchange program by completing a semester at Stern business school, NYU where he studied sports marketing and sports economics. Connect with him on Twitter and LinkedIn.
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The Australian Open Grand Slam tennis tournament, which has reached half way stage as I write this, has built on the progress of previous years to establish a strong, recognizable and credible online brand. According to Sam Laird, in a recent post on the US website Mashable, the Australian Open ‘may just be the most digitally connected major sporting event of all time’. High praise indeed.
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