Google+ Making a Play During the Lockout

Google+, the new social media arm of Google, is set to host 4 games with multiple NBA All-Stars such as LeBron James, Carmelo Anthony, Chris Paul, and Dwayne Wade.

The stars will work with Google+ and other sponsors to host games in their hometowns in the month of December.

Big move for Google+. This comes soon after a recent Twitter town hall run by (current, but for how long... great piece by Bill Simmons in Grantland) NBA Commissioner David Stern. By hosting these events, this will give instant social media access for the game, the professional players, and the fans which could be a huge win-win for Google+ and the players.

Can't wait to hear what type of social media access and technology will be used for these games.

David Stern takes questions through Twitter

Tonight, David Stern and Adam Silver took to Twitter in a town hall of sorts where they answered tweets from players, media, and fans. Last week they unveiled a new Twitter handle. Tonight, they took the message to the people.

Brillant move by the NBA to get down to the level of the fans through their Twitterview. Change comes from the top and getting Commish David Stern to tweet about the lockout is a great move to make the owners and the NBA look more transparent and sympathetic.

And here is the best part... by responding on Twitter, you get to choose which tweets to answer! Helps you avoid any large gaffes or embarrassing memory lapses, right Gov Rick Perry?

Here's a look at some of the highlights:

The opening of the Twitterview with an answer to Bill Simmons

And even D-Wade gets in on the action

Of course, the most obvious limitation is length. To talk eloquently about the new CBA deal in 160 characters or less is quite a challenge. But all in all, this was a great move for the NBA to get their message out directly to the people. If there is one thing we have seen in social media is that if you are not crafting your message, someone else will do it for you. 

Why it's Hard to Show Marketing Effectiveness of Social Media in Sports

I have always been intrigued as to why sports firms have been so slow to use social media to promote their products. As we all know, social media has incredible breadth in terms of sports fans. So, why don't firms promote their brands on Twitter, Facebook, and other social media outlets?

Well, it's still really hard to gauge the effectiveness and return on marketing in social media. With traditional print and digital media, companies rated effectiveness on cold metrics. Cold metrics are what you normally think of with marketing effectiveness - reach, frequency, page views, impressions. But social media has a different reach then traditional media and needs to look at warm metrics. Warm metrics deal with engagement, levels of "viral", community conversation. Tricky stuff to compute.

Traditional media is a monologue, meaning that it's one way communication. Social media is two way; the company promotes their product and fans immediate respond. Think of it this way, traditional media was a speech and social media is a conversation. Conversations naturally are harder to analysis.

Intrigued like me? Then check out this unbelievable guest article in the Sports Business Journal by Amy Martin. You'll thank me later when you can't fit your brain through the door.

Backlash to NBA's new Twitter account

Incredible reaction coming out from the NBA's new Twitter account, @NBA_Labor. Players are extremely upset with the account, believing the NBA is using the account as a bully pulpit.

Honestly, I think it's brillant by the NBA. The players have been connected to the fans through Twitter for so long and have been able to send out their message. The NBA had to make this move to directly connect to fans.

Now about directly contacting players while they are negotiating, that's a different story. Doesn't seem like it would help to build consensus to me. After reading these articles, you tell me.

Here are some great articles on the matter:

• Article with the actual tweets on NBC Sports. 
• "Player accuses NBA of Twitter harassment" from CBS.
• Even Bleacher Report gets in on the action. (By the way, if you are not reading Bleacher Report, it is the most easy and leisurely sports reading out there. Be careful, you'll get lost in their slides and before you know it, you'll have memorized the 10 dumbest football players based on their Wunderlich. And that's some useful information, people)

World Series Twitter Buzz

It's Halloween and that can mean only two things. The World Series is over and candy goes on sale. And only one of those things make me... wait for it.... snicker.

But with the end of October means the end of a Classic and the World Series truly was classic. 7 games, great storylines, and another long off season for Nolan Ryan and his Texas Rangers. Now that it's over, it's time to see how the World Series played out on Twitter.

Well, the buzz was higher than last year. According to BuzzStudy, the Twitter buzz for the 2011 World Series is TWICE that of last year's Fall Classic. And that was only including Game 6. The figures are not updated for Game 7 and the Cardinals closeout, which will only increase that figure. (I highly recommend checking out this site which follows popular Twitter trends and gives user-friendly graphs. (Did you know that Kim Kardashian's Twitter popularity has never been higher because of her recent divorce after 72 days of marriage? I didn't care, but the figures are pretty impressive)

And my girl, Maria Burns Ortiz, has a good article on the World Series and Twitter. Here is hoping that they publish the updated figures for the entire World Series soon. And you know it's gonna be good, IBM has put there name on this baby.

Gathering the Clouds

Gathering the Clouds is a weekly entry that scours the web bringing together the most important links on sports and social media.

• Maria Burns Ortiz (quickly becoming one of my favorite writers on sports and social media) has a piece on professional sports league's social media policies and the important differences between them. It goes on to list the biggest offenders of the social media policy for each league. Biggest loser: University of Idaho basketball player Kashif Watson who was suspended indefinitely. 
• After another tough loss, this time to the Detroit Lions, Cowboys QB Tony Romo needed a little comforting. Good thing Dirk Nowitzki is there for Tony with a tissue and a tweet.
• Article by Jason Peck about fans checking into MLB stadiums using foursquare, Facebook Places, and Gowalla. I honestly have not cared about sites like foursquare that have fans "check in" to places to share to their network they are at the stadium or bar watching their team... but I can't ignore it, especially if the incentives to "check in" get richer and richer.

Should Sports Teams Move to Google+?

So I've blogged about Facebook and Twitter, but there is a huge elephant in the room that can't be ignored: Google+.

No sports teams have moved onto Google+ yet, but the shift will happen soon. Google+ is putting into motion "Entities" which are basically brand profiles onto Google+. Google+ has exploded in its initial launch, but will not get any traction until they can make these Entities pages. But, watch out Facebook, once this gets going, you know Sports Teams will be all over that. The elephant is about to be released.

The Next Twitter Revolution: Connect with Jets

The NY Jets have launched Connect with Jets that allows fans to connect to all Jets players including Mark Sanchez, Derrell Revis, and the NY Jets official Twitter account.

With just one click, you can immediately get all the Twitter accounts for a team. Good money says all NFL teams with have this technology by the end of the season. Just brillant social media marketing.

Gathering the Clouds

Gathering the Clouds is a weekly entry that scours the web bringing together the most important links on sports and social media.

• TED Talks are incredible videos that I have been exposed to while a Sports MBA candidate at George Washington University. Here is a video from TED by Evan Williams, co-founder of Twitter. Since Twitter is so intergral in sports, I thought I would share this video. Great blurb on Shaq, too.
  
  
• Want to know the Top 25 most influential Twitter accounts for the NBA? Or NHL? Or NFL? Or MLB? (Actaully you can use it to follow any topic or location). It's all on wefollow. This makes stalking so much more efficient. 
• Article on the 10 best apps for the football season on mashable. Now I just HAVE to get the air horn app, if for no other reason than to drown out my Cowboy fan roommates. 
• Another mashable article, but this one on MLB using digital media to innovate itself. 
• If you haven't heard (and believe me, you haven't), London 2012 has a contest that pits countries against one another to see who has the most active social media base. Tweet now, and they'll throw in your own create-a-mascot feature!

New Facebook Changes Will Impact Sports

Facebook recently had their annual F8 conference yesterday and they will be making a significant change to its format. Naturally, anytime Facebook redesigns itself, it affects all sectors, especially music, movies, and sports.

Here is an interview with Paciolan Dir of Social Media & Consumer Marketing Matt Kautz by Sports Business Journal Daily on how the new timeline feature will affect sports on Facebook.

Revolutionary Stadium Technology for Social Media

Update at 4:17: Co-Innovator of FanCam, Tinus le Roux tweeted to me that the FanCam technology is now up to 20 BILLION Pixels. They will be updating their website very soon with that info!

My roommate, Steve, showed me this amazing new 360 camera technology that allows any fan in a stadium or arena to find themselves in the crowd. Yes, that even means the drunken fool in the section 543 can sober up and pick himself out of the 50,000 people in the stadium (as long as he remembers roughly where he sat). This new technology is called the FanCam.

Here is an excerpt from the website. "Technically speaking, Fan Cam is 5 BILLION PIXEL social media engagement platform. It combines the latest in GigaPixel technology with customized social media solutions to create a 'one of its kind', immersive fan experience". 5 Billion pixels... when I first heard that, I pictured Dr. Evil sitting in his chair chuckling and stroking Mr. Bigglesworth. Then I checked it out for myself: Rugby in South Africa and Steelers vs. Jets AFC Championship. This is incredibly legitimate.

Gathering the Clouds

Gathering the Clouds is a weekly entry that scours the web bringing together the most important links on sports and social media.

• Incredible article on Athletes and Social Media and how some play the social game right and others decide to use social media to talk to their mistress. And we thought that Brett Favre was the only one who couldn't keep it in his Wranglers.
• Check out information on the IOC's social media policy for London 2012. Here's an excerpt: "The IOC recommends that postings, blogs or tweets should be in a first-person, diary-type format and should not be in a journalistic style". Now there's some regulation... sounds more like Berlin 1936.
• Great article by Kalia Strong that delves into the social media policies for London 2012, NFL, and UFC. With UFC's pioneering deregulation policy on social media by President Dana White, the league is now renamed the Ultimate Facebook Championship.
• A post on the dangers of mixing social media and athletes by Dave Thomas. Forget about cocaine, this is the new vice of athletes. Love the part about the Texas Tech football player tweeting about being offended that the coach is late to the meeting. What ever happened to complaining to your teammates in the huddle? Isn't that what they do half the time in there?

Which sporting event will break the Twitter record?

If you didn't hear, the Women's World Cup final between the US and Japan this past summer broke the Twitter record for most tweets per second for a sports event at 7,196. Just to give you some perspective of the rise of Twitter, the largest American sporting event, SuperBowl XLV, had 4,064 tweets per second back in February 6, 2011.

Of course, the US-Japan Final had the benefit of Japan tweeting in huge numbers as well, plenty more than for the SuperBowl.

But no doubt, the popularity of Twitter is growing larger and larger and it will just be a matter of time before the record is broken. If Beyonce's announcement of having a baby at the MTV Video Music Awards can garner 8,868 tps (tweets per second, folks), then imagine what the next sports event will attain in terms of tweeting? (And this raises a puzzling query for me... why do so many people care that Beyonce is having a baby? Was it an immaculate conception? Did all the single ladies really have to put their hands up and tweet about it?)

So, let me know your thoughts. What is the next sports event that will break the 7,196 tps record set by the US-Japan Woman's World Cup Final? Do we have to wait until February for the SuperBowl, or will another event take the tweeting trophy?

NFL has top two TV programs in Social Media hits

There is a wonderful website called SocialGuide.com that covers TV's popularity through social media comments in real time. SocialGuide gives the top 5 shows at any given time along with the number of social media comments and percentage of buzz (the percentage of total SocialGuide population that is talking about that program).

Social Guide has specific tabs to filter by subject, one of them being sports so you can compare all sports programming.

Looking at Social Guide for last week, the NFL had the top two most commented programs. The number one slot went to the Green Bay Packers and New Orleans Saints league opener, which had a thrilling ending. The second spot went to the Cowboys-Jets matchup on Sunday night, which saw the Cowboys give up 17 unanswered Jet points in the 4th quarter to give away the game. (Me thinks that the record tweeting to #quarterbackbetterthanRomo probably started soon after this game. And rightly so, Romo was as effective at passing that night as Cheney is at shooting quail).

The two NFL games topped all other programs with a large margin. Jersey Shore came in 3rd place (Dear American Citizen... really?! Jersey Shore is what you want to talk about?) with the GOP debates coming in at 4th place.

America's priorities: Sports, Sports, Trashy TV, Politics. Sounds about right.

NFL Facebook and Twitter followers

Incredible chart put out by The Sports Business Journal. NFL TEAMS' FACEBOOK LIKES, TWITTER FOLLOWERS THROUGH SEPT. 7
TEAM	FACEBOOK	TWITTER	TEAM	FACEBOOK	TWITTER
49ers	779,786	69,777	Jaguars	204,627	20,017
Bears	1,891,174	62,842	Jets	987,064	188,731
Bengals	441,872	47,440	Lions	439,034	43,270
Bills	277,129	36,844	Packers	1,916,649	97,437
Broncos	795,036	59,555	Panthers	294,627	29,907
Browns	330,042	47,596	Patriots	2,443,612	128,674
Buccaneers	352,688	29,231	Raiders	1,097,165	75,487
Cardinals	329,361	10,893	Rams	122,296	24,564
Chargers	900,401	75,578	Ravens	653,674	46,135
Chiefs	493,490	41,564	Redskins	675,184	37,076
Colts	1,466,624	17,832	Saints	2,072,934	74,691
Cowboys	3,470,557	118,499	Seahawks	570,394	45,586
Dolphins	851,940	68,631	Steelers	2,858,532	127,514
Eagles	1,270,789	79,908	Texans	349,320	36,415
Falcons	186,761	58,712	Titans	240,130	41,114
Giants	1,243,427	48,210	Vikings	1,124,093	61,558

Here's what I analyzed from the chart:

Top 5 Teams in Facebook Likes: Cowboys, Steelers, Patriots, Saints, Packers

Top 5 Teams in Twitter Followers: Jets, Patriots, Steelers, Cowboys, Packers

Lowest 5 Teams in Facebook Likes: Rams, Falcons, Jaguars, Titans, Bills

Lowest 5 Teams in Twitter Followers: Cardinals, Colts, Jaguars, Rams, Buccaneers

Wow... Colts have over 1 million Facebook Likes and just 17,000 Twitter followers? Is Peyton Manning quarterbacking the Facebook group and Kerry Collins running the Twitter feed?

Inaugural Post - The NHL's Social Media Policy

What a day to start a blog on Sports and Social Media! Today the NHL announced a new social media policy that promotes the use of social media, but also restricts players and operating personnel from using social media around game time.

From the NHL website, "As per the new policy, there is a total "blackout period" on the use of social media on game days, which for players begins two hours prior to opening face-off and is not lifted until players have finished their post-game media obligations. The suggested blackout period for hockey operations staff is even longer, beginning at 11 a.m. on game days."