The video features Andrew Rosen (Washington Wizards), Mark McClure (DC United), Sean Parker (Washington Capitals) and Steve Cobb (Activ8 Social). Hope you enjoy.

Sports Teams on Social Media – 140 Conference Video from Jason Peck on Vimeo.

I highly recommend you check out a 140 conference in your area if you get a chance. The events, put on by Jeff Pulver, are a great way to learn about “the state of now” and how real-time tools and technologies are affecting a variety of industries and businesses.

Yesterday I was in New York for the 140 Conference, which brought together some amazing, smart people to talk the effects of the real-time web on people and businesses. Like some of the other conferences I’ve been to lately (such as Social Fresh), the content was stellar. But what I really enjoy about these types of conference is meeting new people and hanging out with other people I’ve met before.

Ok, on to the sports stuff. Here are my notes from a panel titled “How Social Media is Changing the Face of Golf.” Panelists included:

• Dennis Allen (@dennis_allen) – Golf Industry Veteran
• Kathleen Hessert (@kathleenhessert) – President, Sports Media Challenge
• Ryan Ballengee (@waggleroom) – Blogger
• Scott Gutterman (@PGATOUR_EP) – Executive Producer, PGATOUR.com

As you might be able to guess from the title, the panel focused on the intersection on how social media is changing golf. This topic is very interesting to me because I play golf  and watch the tournaments occasionally, but don’t really think of myself as an avid fan. I always root for Phil, since us left-handers have to stick together, but I don’t feel a strong connection with any one golfer.  Like baseball, golf is tough for me to watch live on TV, because it’s pretty slow. I think the more golf can utilize social media to help make the sport and golfers more accessible and interesting to casual fans, the more the game will grow.

Please see below for some of my notes and thoughts on the panel.

Why does social media matter?

Kathleen kicked off the panel by asking why social media matters in golf. A big plus is that information moves so quickly through social media compared to golf, in which things typically move slower. Kathleen highlighted an Arnold Palmer quote: “Watching golf on TV is like watching paint dry.”

Scott mentioned that social media is enabling an interesting thing to happen; fans who aren’t able to attend the tournaments in person are acting like an online gallery. They’re talking about the tournament and players as the action unfolds. And some moments (ex: Brian Davis calling a penalty on himself to give up a shot at his first TOUR win) generate a considerable amount of conversation on Twitter.

Kathleen revealed that she had posed a question on Twitter asking for people’s thoughts on the future of golf in a social media world. She shared on of the more interesting answers she received, which predicted the formation of virtual clubhouses. This is a very interesting concept. On one hand I really like the concept of exclusive communities; on the other hand, the exclusive/off-limits notion of golf that people have is a detriment to the game.

Here’s a half-example of a virtual clubhouse. American Express has its Members Clubhouse, a microsite which highlights the company’s golf-related sponsorships and gives cardmembers access to exclusive golf deals and discounts. The site is very well-done, but all good things can be improved, right? If I were them, I might take it a step further and integrate more social elements to turn it into more of a community where golfers/cardmembers can connect with each other, share travel and course reviews, talk about golf, and also learn more about how American Express can help people live the golf lifestyle to the fullest. American Express has done a great job with its OPEN FORUM, a resource/community for small business owners. Maybe they can do this with golf. What do you think?

Back to the panel. Dennis Allen shared the news that he’s starting a golf entertainment network called “The Back 9.” The network aims to make golf more accessible and interesting to average people. Golf by the fans, for the fans. If they can figure this out, I think it definitely has potential to shake up the golf world.

What will change about golf?

Kathleen wrapped up the panel by asking participants what will change about golf in the future. Ryan said that social media will enable fans to get to know golfers more and see more of their personalities. News will continue to spread faster, he added.

Scott said there will be more focus on getting people to interact with golf and the tournaments no matter where they are. I’m excited for this. One of the social media’s strengths is being able to compliment real-life events and extend their reach and interactivity.This should bring more fans to golf and more revenue opportunities for brands involved in the sport.

Dennis offered the final thought of the panel – that in the near future, more focus will be around developing golf programming based on fan feedback. From the  short chat I had with Dennis, it sounds like this is the approach they’ll be taking with “The Back 9.” I’m looking forward to seeing how this unfolds.

Thanks for reading my thoughts about the panel. What do you think about how social media will change golf?

On a side note, I was recently nominated for a Business of Sports Award (best Twitter account). There are a lot of other smart folks who have been nominated for awards there, too. If you’d like to support me, drop a comment on the  site. Either way, I’d encourage you to check out The Business of Sports. It’s a great resource!

On January 29 sports agents, litigators, salary cap analyst and sports law students will meet at the University of Florida Levin College of Law for the 2010 UF Sports Law Symposium.

The 2010 UF Sports Law Symposium, “Discussion: Bargaining Collectively,” presented by UF’s Entertainment & Sports Law Society, will bring together sports law experts and representatives from the National Football League, National Basketball Association and Major League Baseball to discuss why CBA’s exist, how they help players and owners, and to identify contract terms that will likely be argued before the agreement expires. The free event, set to kick off at 11 a.m. at UF Law’s Chesterfield Smith Ceremonial Classroom 180, will offer CLE credits.

The keynote speaker for this year’s symposium will be Harvey W. Schiller, Ph.D., who has served as president of the International Baseball Federation since 2007 and is also chairman of the board and CEO of GlobalOptions Group, a multidisciplinary international risk management and business solutions company located in New York. Prior to joining GlobalOptions in 1994, Schiller held posts at Turner Broadcasting System, served as the executive director/secretary general of the United States Olympic Committee and was the commissioner of the Southeastern Conference.

Closing the day-long symposium will be Donald Fehr who served as the general counsel of the Major League Baseball Players Association beginning in 1977, and as its executive director for 26 years from December, 1983. In his role as executive director, Fehr served as the players’ chief negotiator in collective bargaining with major league owners and was responsible for contract administration, grievance arbitration and pension and health care matters. Fehr will address the role of collective bargaining in professional team sports, and discuss his experiences in his role with the players association.

To view the symposium agenda, speaker profiles and designated CLE credits, visit http://www.ufsportslaw.com/symposium.html.

For more information regarding the symposium, contact Darren Heitner at heitner@gmail.com.

It is my pleasure to present the ebook, Sports and Social Media Predictions 2010, which features 16 smart people and thought-leaders who have graciously shared their opinions, thoughts and predictions for sports and social media in 2010.

Feel free to download this, read it, blog about it, and share with your friends and coworkers. I hope you find it interesting.
Sports Social Media Predictions 2010

Thank you all for your participation. It’s been great connecting with you this year!

Special thanks to Ash Read for helping with the design/layout of this.

I also want to thank Dr. Tim Newman, the Coordinator of the Sport Management Program at York College for recommending me to Erik and sharing some of his time with me. I met Tim early this year on Twitter, then in person at the CSRI Conference in Chapel Hill. It was good seeing Tim again and meeting his wife and one of their daughters. Here’s the video interview Tim did with me. Tim-thanks for the opportunity and hopefully, I’ll see you again soon. And have a safe trip/awesome time in Malaysia!

• Market research
• Product development
• Customer service
• Sales and marketing
• Employee hiring

A few businesses and teams get this, but overall we’re still not there yet. Many teams are getting involved, but not always with a purpose or clear strategy. A Facebook page that has 100k people on it is worthless, without the proper strategy behind it. If you’re a team, you don’t really want Facebook fans, you want ticket buyers.

The video below describes some ideas for ways that teams can use social media the right way and what benefits they (and their fans) can get from this.

The last idea in the video is one I look forward to exploring more, and would love your thoughts on. It’s one thing to do some basic videos occasionally and make them exclusive to Twitter or YouTube to drive awareness and engagement. But hardcore fans are always willing to consume more, in my opinion. Why aren’t teams capitalizing on this?

More and more fans now want to participate, be involved in the creation of ticket packages, get exclusive, behind-the-scenes videos, articles and real-time updates, get personalized merchandise, vote on ideas for sponsor promotions, etc.  Clearly people want content in new forms as indicated by the explosion of sites like Twitter. Why aren’t more teams taking some of these concepts, creating new content areas and fan clubs and charging fans for access to drive revenue?

If you’re a die-hard Lakers fan, wouldn’t you pay for the right to see Kobe’s real-time updates right after the game, before the press get a crack at him? Wouldn’t you pay to have access to short, 30 second videos from Phil Jackson before and after practice? Wouldn’t you pay for a chance to ask a member of the Lakers staff or ownership any question you wanted once a month? I know I would.

I think teams may need to rethink a lot of the things they’re doing online. There should be a balance between using these free social media tools to expand an audience and keep a pulse on what fans want/think vs. charging people for access to really cool content and opportunities. Some of the things teams and players are doing on outside sites could be moved in-house (and on team communities, so they have a better value proposition) so they can be better monetized and packaged for hardcore fans. I think this is the only way teams will see a good ROI from their efforts and will be able to justify spending money on new opportunities that serve to engage fans in more ways.

I’m always interested in hearing what you think. Thanks for watching/reading and I look forward to your thoughts on this.

Do you think the term “sponsorships” is outdated and everything should be called partnerships? just an idea I’ve been thinking about…

It was really just an idea I’ve briefly thought about on occasion. A lot of times the terms “sponsorships” and “partnerships” are thrown around and used interchangeably to describe deals between entertainment and sports properties and brands. But does the wording that properties/brands use reflect how they actually see their relationships? Should we be moving towards the use of partnerships (which imply that both sides benefit) and away from sponsorships (which unfortunately has not been very well explained to the general public)?

Your Responses

After I posted that message on Twitter, I got some great responses. Thanks to all who contributed the thoughts below (earliest responses posted first):

rscibetti@JasonPeck I definitely see a mix of both terms. Definitely tells you something about how the entity views the relationships

MJMunson@JasonPeck No, people just need to know what it means. Look up the latin roots for sponsor and you’ll see it is a perfect word for its use.

BizballMaury@JasonPeck It’s moving more & more toward partnerships as deals are multi-pronged. See my NY Post article on Yankees/Audi http://ow.ly/hoef

jpbrunelle@JasonPeck I think it depends on the context, but ’sponsorships’ will remain in play for the foreseeable future. Bigwigs want to sponsor.

MJPatzwaldt@jasonpeck i still think there’s a difference between sponsorships and partnerships…those sponsored tend to have longer term benefits

jeffmard@JasonPeck partnership implys 2-way street, sponsorship implys other “partners” exist. Which is more true? then u have advertiser…

Play3r_VP@JasonPeck sponsorships is out. partnerships are in. it’s about relationships + alliances… NOT about hand outs.

mmahoney13@JasonPeck I think the Sponsor should be emphasized more in many cases, esp PGA Tournaments and even teams. they enable us to do more

sponsorpitch@JasonPeck IMO, not outdated & no need to hide from the term + lots of different types of biz ‘partnerships’.. something more narrow needed

EmilyRCampbell1@JasonPeck There r still true mktg sponsorships out there even tho’ some local partnerships may lean more toward philanthropy.

briangainorRT @JasonPeck poses a great question – thoughts on “partnerships” vs. “sponsorships”? How do you see your relationship with partners?

Darren_Heitner@JasonPeck I love the idea of banning the word “sponsorship”, all successful “sponsorships” are partnerships. Both sides should win.

Sponsorships vs. Partnerships – My Thoughts

Let’s see how Wikipedia defines the terms.

“A partnership is a type of business entity in which partners (owners) share with each other the profits or losses of the business.”

“To sponsor something is to support an event, activity, person, or organization financially or through the provision of products or services.”

The partnership definition that Wikipedia gives isn’t completely relevant to this conversation–which is about using the term sponsorship vs. partnership when describing deals between sports/entertainment properties and brands. In most cases, no brand is going to be willing to equally share in the losses of the property’s business–unless it’s a special deal where the brand is actually able to share in the profits, too. I’m not aware of this happening very often.

The sponsor definition is interesting as it emphasizes giving support. In my opinion, this “giving support” aspect has not been emphasized nearly enough in discussions and articles about sponsorship. For example, all we heard about for awhile was that since Wachovia wasn’t doing well, they shouldn’t be wasting money on sponsoring their golf tournament (and they actually removed their name from it, even though it was paid for). Or that Northern Trust shouldn’t have had a party for their best executives at their tournament. People hear that, instead of hearing about how much money from each PGA TOUR event goes to charity or that the money spent on parties/events provides jobs for cooks, caterers and others. But I’m getting off subject here.

My thinking about this sponsorships vs. partnerships issue is that it’s more of a reflection on how each side sees the other and how they approach relationships. My feeling is that it starts with properties. Do you want a sponsor (someone who supports you via money or services) or do you want (can you get?) a partner (someone who has a greater stake in your success)? While some smaller properties may be happy just finding sponsors, some of the most prestigious properties can be more selective and seek partners who have very strong brands and who must commit more than just money to the relationship.

What do the big leagues/events call these relationships?

Let’s check out some websites to see what wording some of the major pro leagues and premier sports events use when publicly describing their relationships with brands.

• AVP – sponsors (listed on bottom of home page)
• MLB – sponsors (here’s the link)
• NBA – not clear from their website
• NFL – not clear from their website
• PGA TOUR – title sponsors for tournaments and huge list of marketing partners
• USGA – partners (logos listed on bottom right of their home page and here)
• The Masters – no official wording but relationships with IBM, AT&T and Exxon Mobile
• US Open (Tennis) – sponsors (list is here)
• Breeders’ Cup – partners (list is here)

The funny thing is, for some of these properties (and many teams as well), it’s hard to even tell who their sponsors are by looking at their websites! Or they hide them and make you really look around. That would not make me happy I was a sponsor/partner-no matter what the relationship is called. It definitely didn’t make me happy when I used to spend a lot of time researching that stuff.

As consumers’ attention becomes even harder to get (because we have more choices now than ever), my feeling is that the term “partnerships” will be used more often. Properties who used to sell out every event and may have been content just getting money are now in the same boat as brands–they need eyeballs and attention, too. Now both sides are asking each other for access to market to their customers, and the best relationships will be those where both sides help each other. Sponsorships certainly aren’t dying–I just think the word “partnerships” may be more beneficial in describing these relationships and ensuring that both sides are getting what they want and working to help each other succeed.

But maybe I’m completely wrong. Maybe the words should be used interchangeably and there isn’t really much difference between them. Maybe good sponsors are essentially partners. What do you think?

The platform includes standard community features such as profiles, blogs, pictures, and videos, as well as a ticket marketplace (powered by AceTickets.com) that enables fans to buy and sell tickets. Very cool idea with the ticket marketplace, but I wonder about the long-term viability due to ticketing agreements teams have with the StubHubs and Ticketmasters of the world. The platform also enables the communities to have aggregation features, similar to a Digg or Reddit, so users can submit and vote on stories about their favorite teams. You can see more about the platform on TruMedia’s website.

TruFan plans to monetize via advertising, merchandising, ticketing and sponsorships.  A few weeks ago, I was able to have a conversation with TruMedia’s CEO Rafe Anderson about the platform and where they’re going with it. See below for some of my notes from the conversation.

More about TruFan

Their focus is really on the local scene, enabling fans to  keep up with their favorite teams, no matter where they live. One thing they’re doing is helping to support local media properties—for example, they have a partnership with Boston.com to power fan vs. fan debates, known as Slugfests. I think this is a great way for them to get some additional exposure while also helping local media websites stay relevant and become more engaging.

Facebook vs. TruFan

I asked Rafe something to the effect of “now that many teams are engaging fans on Facebook and MySpace, why do you think fans should join TruFan communities?” Rafe said that while Facebook is a great way for teams to communicate and market themselves, fans don’t get the full benefit of local engagement there. TruFan’s value lies in being able to provide an outlet for fans to connect around extremely niche content.

Consolidation

We discussed a little bit about the fact that there are sports communities (official team communities and individual startups) popping up everywhere. While Rafe said he thinks there is room for multiple players, he believes there will be a lot of consolidation over the next couple years. Online sports properties will be able to create a lot more value together than apart.

My Thoughts

I think TruFan is on the right track by partnering with local media and focusing on scalability. They also seem to be thinking about the right things re: monetization.

The only concern I have is that as more teams have their own official  communities and start paying more attention to them (if they can monetize successfully), will fans join these unofficial communities? Also, will sports teams themselves figure out how to partner with local media to share content? This question has been brought up before on Sports Marketing 2.0. How will this affect TruFan and other non-official team communities who want to do these types of partnerships?

There is probably room for multiple team communities in the same market (just as there is room for official and unofficial team websites, blogs, etc.).  What do you think? I certainly don’t have all the answers (I’m not sure anyone does), but certainly would like to hear your thoughts.

Special thanks to Rafe for taking the time to talk about TruFan and what they’re doing.

On Thursday and Friday last week I had a great opportunity to attend the 2009 College Sport Research Institute (CSRI) Conference in Chapel Hill. The conference brought together some of the brightest sports minds, students and faculty to discuss issues facing college sports. I really enjoyed meeting Jeremy Bloom and hearing about his ordeals with the NCAA. Others such as Jay Bilas, Dick Baddour, Bernie Mullin, John Gerdy, Amy Perko and Andrew Zimbalist provided valuable insight on a wide range of issues.

I also especially enjoyed meeting Tim Newman (Coordinator of the Sport Management Program at York College)  and Steve Dittmore (teaches Sport Management at the University of Arkansas), who I’d connected with prior to the conference on Twitter. Tim can be found on Twitter @TimNATC and Steve is @SteveDittmore, if you’re interested in connecting with them there.

I found out about the CSRI Conference through Darren Heitner’s Sports Agent Blog, and he posted my notes from the conference there.

• Day 1 from the CSRI Conference
• Day 2 from the CSRI Conference

Teams and properties often include a lot of different assets in packages for sponsors. Signage, radio and TV spots, other media, experiences, tickets and more and the impressions, ratings and other metrics can be difficult to keep track of. When sponsors ask for results at the end of a season or after an event, you need to be able to tell them exactly what they got and what the results were to ensure that they are happy with what they paid for.

The Solution:

SponsorshipPRO+ presentation software

I was fortunate to speak with Tom Stipes recently about his company and its SponsorshipPRO+ presentation software tool that enables teams and properties to more easily track their sponsors’ assets so they can give them accurate and detailed post-event recap reports. These reports help properties demonstrate that they fulfilled or exceeded what they were supposed to deliver. He didn’t ask me to write about his software, but I wanted to anyway, because I was very impressed with its features and ease-of-use. Tom walked me through a demo (which he’ll happily do for you as well), but you can also see how this works online.

On the admin side, the tool allows properties and teams to create presentations for specific sponsors and catalog and identify assets. You can use some of the built in categories (radio, TV, tickets, etc) or add your own. Within each category, you can assign a description and results to specific assets and upload documents, pictures, and videos to help tell the story of what your sponsors actually received.

After you finish putting in information about each asset, you can easily turn this information into a presentation which you can put on a CD for sponsors. You can include a video intro if you’d like, and you can add any file type–including large audio/video files, spreadsheets, pictures, documents, etc. At anytime during the presentation, you can pull up these specific files to really show the aspects of the program and the results. If you or your sponsors just want to see everything together in a chart, the software enables you to do this as well.

The software isn’t cheap ($699 for the first license and $449 thereafter). However, I think it would pay for itself due to time saved, money saved (on printing costs–no need to print pages and pages of notes and put them in binders anymore) and features that enable you to track assets and results to show sponsors and keep them happy. One thing that may be interesting to develop in the future is an online version of the software, so people can access the data anywhere. But I can see the value in presenting this information in person, so sponsors really get a good picture of what they paid for. And you can always give the sponsor a copy of the presentation so they can look at the data again later.

Has anyone else used or tried this software? If so, what did you think?

Super Bowl Ads

Russell Scibetti from the Business of Sports shares his picks for Super Bowl Ad winners and losers. Also, here’s an interesting post from a UNC business school senior about what makes a Super Bowl Ad super.

Michael Phelps

Caught by the camera for taking a bong hit, Phelps was suspended by USA Swimming for three months. CNBC’s Darren Rovell says this is a joke. Kellogg’s announced that it won’t renew his deal when it expires (but it might have decided that before this whole thing came out), and Sports Media Watch writes that his day’s as America’s golden boy are fading fast.

The Economy’s Effect on Sports

Dominic Perilli wrote a great article at SportsAgentBlog.com about the effect of the economy on sports. The outcome is that sports aren’t as recession-proof as you might think

NJ Nets Creative Promotions

Brian Gainor at Partnership Activation writes about an interesting promotion the NJ Nets are doing to give local CEOs a chance to win 2-months free sponsorship next season by participating in the Metropolitan Madness Basketball Challenge in March. Nets exec Brett Yormark is also teaming up with his brother Michael and the NHL panthers in a promotion to allow fans of either team to cash in unused season tickets for a seat at the other team’s games.

National Signing Day Thoughts

Marc Isenberg, author of Money Players (the book and the blog), provides some interesting thoughts on National Signing Day and how the process could be improved to better help/protect student-athletes.*Side note* I’m very pleased that the Tar Heels are ranked by Scout and Rivals as having a top 10 recruiting class. Big things are coming for UNC football.

Marriage of Live Nation and Ticketmaster?

The Wall Street Journal announced that Live Nation and Ticketmaster, two of the largest players in the sports and entertainment ticketing industry, are close to a merger. Russell Scibetti provides some thoughts about what this could mean for venues, teams and other ticketing companies.

“Just in time to keep the partnership bull raging, Singularity—sudden, unprecedented progress including breakthroughs in brain science, social media and digital data—alters the physics of sponsorship.

Sponsorship is founded on the instinctive, often subconscious, equation that together, the value of each partner is worth more than either could achieve on its own: 1+1=3.something, or Pi.”

In our economy today, it is even more vital than ever  that companies in the sports industry figure out ways to work together and use new strategies and tools to survive and generate revenue.  I’ve never attended an IEG conference before, but I’m planning on going this year, as I think there will be a lot to be learned from some very smart people. They’ve got a great lineup of keynote speakers, including:

• Peter Diamandis, X PRIZE creator
• Rolf Jensen, award-winning author of The Dream Society
• Johan Jervoe, corporate VP, global marketing for McDonald’s
• Tony Robbins, Life coach (I’m a pretty big fan, and am pretty excited to see Mr. Robbins)
• Keld Strudahl, international marketing director for Carlsberg Breweries

It looks like this conference will also feature some great presentations and worshops conducted by thought-leaders from companies such as:

• American Airlines
• Chevron
• MillerCoors
• Kodak
• P&G
• Sprint
• Visa

You can see more about the conference here. It looks like a great event and I’d love to connect with any of you who are planning on attending. It’s not cheap (individual ticket is $1,895), but I think it will be worth it, and you get a discount for purchasing multiple tickets. IEG was nice enough to get in touch with me and provide a discount code. The first 25 people who register using the code “AC2009Sports” will get 10% off the cost of their tickets.

According to their website, almost half of the 1,200 tickets have sold, so if you’re planning on attending, you might want to register soon before the tickets sell out.

Let me know if you’re coming to this event and let’s meet up!

Sponsor Pitch, which launched in closed beta in early December, aims to connect sponsors, properties and agencies to improve the sponsorship discovery/pitch process for all parties. I first heard about the company from founder Kris Mathis on Sports Marketing 2.0 about a month ago, so I requested an invite to see what it was all about. According to the Sponsor Pitch blog, they recently had their 1,000th beta user sign up, so I thought this might be a good time to explore the site a little more and try to help them get the word out. I really like that they launched in beta and are soliciting feedback and involving their users in the development process.

First, a little more about Sponsor Pitch. The site lets properties to upload a video and add information to explain their pitch and what they are all about. Sponsors can search through pitches based on a variety of criteria to find something they’re interested in. The search criteria includes:

• Property Genre (arts & culture, sports, charity, etc)
• Location (city, state and/or zip)
• Timing
• Media assets
• Audience demographics (age, gender, HH income)

After I received my invite code, I signed up as a property so I could explore the site. I searched for sports properties and found that there were already 10+ results, such as the AVP Crocs Tour and The CollegeInsider.com Postseason Tournament. Each property has its own page, which includes a logo, description, who to contact, video, existing sponsors, and event location/s. I really liked this layout, which you can see on the AVP Crocs Tour page (and the picture below). Another added benefit here is that people can rate sponsor pitches, and the best ones appear on the “Hot Opps” section of the site. You can also share these pitches on Facebook, LinkedIn, Delicious and some other social sites.

Next, I decided to check out the “My SponsorPitch” section, where properties can enter details about themselves (and I assume sponsors can do the same here). I decided not to do this tonight, but the fields were very easy to navigate and it looked pretty easy to complete.

Other interesting parts of the site include areas for resources, recent news headlines and a place for service providers (agencies, media, etc) to add their own informational pitch.

Overall, I think Sponsor Pitch has a ton of potential and can help save marketers time by allowing them to more easily find and filter sponsorship opportunities according to the criteria that they’re looking for. Did I mention the site is free for both sponsors and properties?

Have you had a chance to look at Sponsor Pitch yet? If so, what are your thoughts?

Since the NBA season has started, I thought it would be interesting to see which teams are using Twitter to post team news and engage with fans. To identify teams that are on Twitter, I used a combination of Twellow, Twitter Search and my own investigation to identify “official” Twitter accounts of teams (ones that looked official and had links back to the official NBA team site). In many cases, a blogger or other website (ex: sportytweets.com) has established a team Twitter account to post scores and news and links back to his/her blog. I didn’t include this stuff in my investigation, since this does not count as something that is coordinated by the team itself. I haven’t spent an eternity on this and have probably missed a few things, so feel free to correct me if I have.

 NBA Teams on Twitter (official accounts)

Detroit Pistons

Chicago Bulls

Miami Heat

**update **

Philadelphia 76ers (thanks to Russell Scribetti for the find)

Portland Trailblazers (thanks to Lauren Beyer and Kelsey Thompson)

Memphis Grizzlies (thanks Lauren)

I didn’t think every team would be involved with Twitter, but I’m surprised how few are. Other teams are missing a huge opportunity for community relations. They could be providing fans with official news, updates and discounts and learning about what their fans like. Instead, they are absent from the conversation. Instead of finding Twitter updates from official team sources, fans are finding them from other bloggers and websites, and teams are missing out on the opportunity to use Twitter to drive traffic to their own websites. I wonder if the NBA’s rule that restricts teams’ marketing territories has anything to do with the lack of teams on Twitter?

Do you think teams should be on Twitter? Would you want to see updates, news and ticket discounts from your favorite team (NBA or other league) there?

One main theme of the day was access–giving fans exclusive content and making them feel like they’re getting something unique/special. Some sponsors/teams are already doing a good job of this, but others should think about this more. I took a decent amount of notes so I won’t make you read through all of them. But I do want to share some key points on widgets that I made note of.

Widgets can be a powerful way to reach people and spread content, though I think the majority of people still don’t know what one is, so it’s not easy to create a widget that spreads easily. People are lazy, and as content creators, we should think about ways to go to them, instead of asking them to come to us. The NBA has over 700 widgets (player stats, pictures, videos, etc) and monetizes by selling ads/sponsorship across units. The Washington Wizards Playoff widget was successful in generating ticket revenue last year.

Widget best practices
1) content needs to be exclusive
2) Individuality- let people take what they want and customize it

Thanks to Pat Coyle for organizing this conference. You can see some pictures from the event in the widget below.

Find more photos like this on Sports Marketing 2.0

I’m excited to meet new people and hear some new ideas tomorrow. I actually attended the first ever Sports Marketing 2.0 Summit (also in NY) back in January and really enjoyed the discussions about how technology, the internet and social media are changing the sports and sponsorship landscape. You can see some footage from this event here.

If you read this blog and are attending the event tomorrow, let me know so we can meet up and get to know each other better.

We’re still very early in the game with live streaming so I just wanted to provide a few highlights from Adweek’s article and see what you think about this topic. This is all very interesting to me.

What Leagues Are Doing.

• NFL – Live streaming Sunday Night Football Extra on NBC.com and NFL.com
• MLS – live streams games on MLSlive.tv – subscription model and no games from tv partners are shown. MLS hopes to make this service free/ad-supported next season
• NHL – streams out-of-market games (honors local broadcast agreements) via subscription service
• NBA – plans to stream live-games in local markets on team sites in 2008-09 season, but this will infringe on local TV partners’ broadcast rights. Pricing model is TBD
• MLB – became first league to stream a whole season of games in 2003 via MLB.tv (subscription required).

Other Live Streaming Examples

• CBSSports.com and NCAA Basketball Tournament. Entire tournament streamed free this year, and ad revenue was $23 million this year, up from $4 million in 2006. Advertising is sold separately from the TV broadcast.
• ESPN 360 – streamed 3,000 events in the past year (for a variety of sports), with 60% of that content exclusively shown on the site.

Major Questions

• Does live streaming increase or decrease number of TV viewers?
• Should leagues hold onto these rights or include them in packages to networks?

What do you think about live streaming games and these questions?

Another thing I’m interested in is how his comeback will affect his off-field earnings and money for marketing and endorsement agreements. Last year, Favre earned about $7 million from endorsements, and Sports Business Daily ranked him the 10th most marketable athlete in the United States last year (2nd in the NFL behind Peyton Manning). According to TSE Athletes and Celebrity Marketing, Favre commands upwards of $50,000 for  appearances, endorsements and speaking engagements.

Favre has endorsed products for Wrangler Jeans, Prilosec and Sensodyne toothpaste. When he first retired (after setting the NFL record for passing touchdowns last season), I expected that he would continue to be as, if not more, successful with his off-field earnings. Coming back for another year raises a few questions about how this will affect his marketability.

What if Favre comes in and stinks it up for the Jets? Will marketers want him endorsing their products? Also there’s the question of how long Favre will play. If a marketer signs him to speak/endorse as an active player, how long will that last? Will he make the transition from player spokesman to retired spokesman, and how will this transition work?

Of course, Favre could play awesome this season, lead the Jets to the playoffs and add to his marketability.

What do you think will happen? If he does have a down year, how do you think this will affect his off-field earning power?

Why get involved

Notice how I said “get involved” and not “utilize” or “do” social media. Social media is not just another channel to be used to promote your own message and shout at fans. Social media is about listening, participating and genuinely connecting with people. Through social tools such as blogs, podcasts, video, and online communities, fans now have the ability to easily find others who may share their passions and voice their opinions.

Instead of just reading about you in the newspaper or watching you on TV, fans are learning about your team and publishing what they think in many different avenues online. There is an opportunity to get involved by listening to the conversations, joining in (when appropriate) and giving fans a place to connect on your own team site, as well as on other social-networking sites.

Why should you get involved with social media? This is an opportunity to hear what fans think about your team and what they like and dislike. This is a way to get honest opinions, and there are many free tools for basic monitoring and listening.

Here’s what can happen if you’re not listening. Imagine if a fan has a bad experience with a ticket representative. He can easily post a video on YouTube about this experience. Anywhere from hundreds to thousands to millions of people can see this video and you may even lose a few potential season-ticket holders due to one person’s bad experience. But if you were monitoring mentions of your team, you could get in touch with the fan, fix the situation and be seen as the hero.

Extending your team’s presence on other sites is also a good way to extend sponsorships and generate more revenue. Instead of having a promotion that lives only on your official Web site, why not syndicate it to other sites to increase its reach. You may be able to reach a million fans with a promotion that revolves around your stadium and team Web site, but you have the opportunity to reach millions more on other Web sites, blogs and communities.

Once you’ve done enough experimenting with social media, you could consider starting your own network to provide fans with an official site to connect and generate incremental advertising and sponsorship revenue. The Indianapolis Colts have done a good job of this with MyColts.net, which allows Colts fans all over the world to connect and talk about the team.

How to get started

If you’re new to social media, then I recommend you spend a lot of time listening and learning. Find out where your fans are gathering and talking. See if you can tell who is participating, what they’re talking about and what information they’re looking for. Just as you wouldn’t go to a bar and start shouting to people you don’t know, you shouldn’t automatically start promoting your message on social media sites. Each community has its own nuances. Spend some time getting familiar with each one that you are considering participating in.

There are many free tools for listening. Try doing a Google Blog search for your team’s name and set up an RSS feed to monitor the results. You can also search Technorati for recent blog mentions and find related groups on Facebook and MySpace that will give you insight about where people are talking about you and what they’re saying.

Before you decide to start participating you should think about how you’re going to involve your employees. Set clear rules for your employees about how to respond and what is appropriate. Also, you may want to consider why you’re participating in the first place. Is it to provide valuable information? Build awareness?  Respond to a controversy? Or some other reason?

When you decide to join the conversation, you should place yourself in the shoes of your fans and ask what you’d really like to see and how you’d like to be communicated to. Using your research about where fans are already talking, set up profiles on these sites to reach people who may have never visited your official site. Every video, blog post, article and picture is an opportunity to make a connection with a new fan and deepen your relationship with existing fans. You have to keep these profiles updated and include compelling content so people will keeping coming back. You can drive traffic to your social media profiles through other channels, such as your  website, e-mail newsletter and printed media.

Participating in social media is just like anything else you may do with your friends. You have to listen and learn before you jump in. You can’t just promote your own messages and expect to build relationships.

Five key social media starters for teams

1. Determine your goals
2. Involve employees
3. Listen
4. Learn
5. Don’t promote. Participate