Drill Down: Social Media Solution Selling
October 28, 2010 at 2:39 pm | Posted in Business Development, Facebook, Sales Methodologies, Sports Marketing, Twitter | 2 CommentsTags: Facebook, Social Media, Solutions Selling, Twitter
I’m all for short, sharp, blog posts. I touched on some big issues in my last post, and some of the bullets need to be drilled down.
Probably the most important aspect of social sales is determining what the goals of the sponsor/partner are. There are several variables involved and a number of factors to consider. For example…
Does the sponsor have an existing social presence?
What is their strategy? Do they even have one? Is the existing focus on customer service, or loyalty, or engagement? Something else? Do you they look to you for thought leadership? Are they in social because they feel they need to be or because it’s part of their marketing mix? What is the size of their current social population? What platforms do they use (Facebook, Twitter, blogs, etc…)? What kinds of resources are responsible for running/administering their social media activities? How does social fit into the rest of the organization?
What are the goals of the social sponsorship?
What will make the promotion successful for the sponsor? To grow their friends/followers? Drive traffic to their website? Awareness of new products/services? Launch a social media campaign? Brand/team alignment? Track the promotion via key words or coupons? Is the social component tied to existing activations? How long should it run for? What sorts of initiatives have they done in the social space before and what were the outcomes?
These are all important considerations and “must ask” questions required to build successful deals. Again, these aren’t rate card/commodity sales – they are solutions.
Social Marketing Consistency
September 16, 2010 at 10:27 am | Posted in Branding, Digital Strategies, Facebook, Twitter | Leave a commentTags: Branding, Social Media, Sports Marketing
When I start a social media project with a team, one of the first and easiest things that sports teams should do with their social media sites is focus on digital and social consistency.
Your social spaces should have as much of the same look and feel as your website. This is a lot easier to do with Twitter, but there are ways to make your Facebook page fall into line with your website.
Just like the rest of your marketing efforts, your social spaces should reflect the same level of consistency in appearance. Here’s an example:
Check out Minnesota Wild‘s website and compare that to the Wild’s Twitter profile and the Wild’s Facebook page.
If they don’t look the same – the first question should be “why”? In most cases, there hasn’t been enough attention placed on integrating the look and feel of these platforms. Social media has moved from an after-thought or value add space to a front/center position. So by now, if a teams’ social spaces do not share a consistent look it reads as sloppy or second class. The only reason that a teams’ social spaces do not share any consistency is because that is a part of a larger strategy at work.
Checking In on Facebook Places
September 2, 2010 at 1:27 pm | Posted in Facebook, Foursquare, Sports Marketing | Leave a commentTags: Facebook, Foursquare, Goelocation, Sports Marketing
Pun intended, for sure.
It’s been a couple of weeks since Facebook launched its Places feature – a geolocation function that let’s users identify their location within their social networks. I’ve seen a number of posts and articles by sports marketers about integrating Facebook Places/FourSquare into their promotional mix.
Here’s my 2 cents…
While I will agree that Places/FourSquare presents some interesting and engaging opportunities, my own experience has shown that it’s still the early days for these tools.
FourSquare does have a growing user base, but I’ve found that it still requires a fair amount of education to enable fans to use it effectively in promotions. I’m not suggesting to drop the idea of using it, but right now, my opinion is that the time required to educate and inform is greater than the benefits or rewards.
Moving forward, I would look to include a geolocation feature to a promotion, but would probably hold back on building a promo that only focused solely on that platform. Start small, and look to enhance social projects with a check-in element. For example, if you were building a promo that supported a multi-location sponsor in your market, you could offer a tiered prizing/award structure that offered something for check-ins as well as for entries for less savvy,yet still socially aware/active fans.
Ultimately, the last thing you want to do is create a digital divide. Don’t forget, there are a number of privacy concerns that were raised with this launch. So start small, measure and assess your results and continue to plan from there. Be prepared to teach your fans along the way.
Facebook Saturation and Web 3.0
July 22, 2010 at 10:55 am | Posted in Facebook, Uncategorized | Leave a commentTags: Facebook, Web 3.0
As Facebook plows on towards 500 million users, there will be an estimated 6,859,480,895 people on the earth by August 1st, 2010.
So, about 1 in 13 earthlings have a Facebook profile. You get a pretty clear picture that Facebook is quite simply, A BIG DEAL – whether you like it or not.
All this rapid growth has got to stop somewhere, right? Correct. In fact, probably pretty soon. The number of Facebook users will continually grow, but likely not at the same rate. It will begin to level off – then what?
What comes next has already arrived. Recent announcements at the F8 conference back in April showed us that the web was becoming more social in its very nature. You might remember my blog post from a year ago regarding the rise of Web 3.0 – the semantic web.
What Facebook brings across the web now is “meaning”… how the content of the web is presented to the user along with its specific impact to the user’s own experience. We see this in the form of “Like” buttons. When a user reads a story on CNN.com or NHL.com, they can see how many of their Facebook friends liked it. This is what I mean by meaning… its how the web content relates to the user now in a specific and personal way. And there will be more of it… new layers of meaning, and in deeper ways.
Facebook is also changing how people use the web – it is moving from search engine as starting point to social network as starting point. You’ll also notice that Facebook now has “Community Pages” – Facebook is slowly, but surely becoming an online repository of everyone and everything. Like an immense encyclopedia, not only presented with facts – but with what those facts mean to people.
Now, that is a big deal.
Beyond the Team: Social Media and Sports Management
July 20, 2010 at 1:07 pm | Posted in Branding, Content Management, Facebook, Marketing, Personal Brand, Social Media, Sports Marketing, Twitter | 1 CommentTags: Athlete Representation, Online Branding, Online Identity, Social Media, Sports Management, Sports Marketing
The list of benefits for sports teams to be active in social media is clear:
- Marketing
- Fan engagement
- Sponsorship activation
- Monetization/ROI
Who else in the industry can benefit and how?
The past few years have seen the athletes/players themselves participate in social media on their own accord. Shaq being one of the first and most infamous on Twitter. Dozens of pro athletes have followed and built huge followings along the way.
The key here is “on their own accord”. Athlete as celebrity status provides these players with the opportunity to comment on news and events, or anything else the rest of the Twitterverse chooses to tweet about. In fact, the recent experience surrounding Twitter and NBA free agency really proved the medium had arrived and mattered as traditional media took a back seat to the goings on.
The Next Wave: Sports Management Companies and Player Associations
Now that teams have incorporated the social space as an important part of their marketing mix, sports management companies and player associations would be wise to do the same on behalf of their clients. Online identity and brand are of huge and increasing importance, and there are opportunities for sponsorship, promotion and PR that are largely un-managed and underdeveloped.
I realize that every player out there may not wish to be updating their Facebook profile or tweeting about their pre-game preparations – and this is not really required, but it is savvy, smart and time to develop an online identity and brand strategy… now.
This should be a priority for sports management companies and player associations alike.
Micro-transactions and Future Revenues from the Social Space
July 13, 2010 at 10:10 am | Posted in Facebook, Micro-transactions, Social Media | 1 CommentTags: Facebook, Gifts, Micro-transactions, Social Gaming
Last week, Facebook announced that it was discontinuing its Gifts feature as of August 1, 2010.
I have previously blogged about important Facebook changes, but you can only come up with eye-catching titles like “Facebook Changes You Need to Know About” so many times… it is pretty clear that Facebook is a constantly shifting space and you need to stay on top of it both tactically as well as strategically.
Discontinuing the Gift Feature
In past posts, I had presented the idea of micro-transactions – small dollar value ($1 or $2) transactions – as a possible revenue stream for the social space. Conveniently, Facebook did a very good job of facilitating and sharing Gifts – small icons that users could buy (with $ or credits) and display on their own profiles or give to friends. This seemed straightforward enough, and a strong fit for sports marketers to leverage a team logo, a player or other aspect of their sport.
Micro-transactions could generate some fairly high numbers (once the initial outlay was built and in place) for strong sports brands with tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands of fans. For example, a .5% conversion on $1 from 500,000 fans = $2,500.
Perhaps it was a good idea, but also a bit late. Gifting across Facebook was certainly more popular in 2005-2007/08 – add the recent economic downturn and it results in the closing of the gift store today.
Of course, teams can still continue with gifts on their own – but it seems that the gift/revenue legitimacy is now over; however, the concept of micro-transactions is still a powerful one and will have an increasing role in online revenue and also from the social and mobile space as well.
Micro-transactions
A familiar example of a micro-transaction is iTunes – $1 per song. Pretty easy to execute, and some serious revenues follow as a result.
Micro-transactions have been very successful in “free-to-play” online games represented by both the purchase of virtual items as well as in-game progression. Recent years have seen rapid growth in the popularity of micro-transactions in social gaming (consider famous titles such as “Farmville” or “Mafia Wars” on Facebook).
So how can sports marketers benefit?
For one, I am confident that social platforms will increase their focus social gaming. Sports games make very good sense and offer a wide appeal. While some of these opportunities will exist at the league level, imagine a social game in which you are able to manage “your team” as a GM. There could be integrated sponsor opportunities to give your players more energy by providing them with Gatorade for a micro-transactional fee…
As DVRs (or PVRs in Canada) continue to erode effective messaging opportunities on TV via traditional advertising, product integration will increasingly show up in spaces where consumers spend their time or draw their attention. Similarly, consumers are spending more time on their smart phones and social networking platforms. This is not a “better or worse” type of situation or evaluation, but it is clear that things are changing (fairly quickly) and marketers need to adapt, not to mention, innovate.
2 Quick Thoughts
July 1, 2010 at 1:54 am | Posted in Facebook, NHL, Social Media, Twitter | 1 CommentTags: Facebook, NHL, Twitter
1. A follow up on my NHL Draft on Twitter post
There was a ton of info and images pushed out from teams at the draft – at least on the first round. I believe that all in all there was a great deal of good content that gave followers a sense of what was happening on the floor and around the arena.
Highlight of the event: Sponsored tweets from @NHL and Enterprise Rent-a-Car for each of the 30 draft announcements. An innovative activation in this space, and a few promo codes were provided for followers as well.
2. Facebook and Twitter Integration
You have always been able to coordinate your Facebook status update with your Twitter feed – which in my opinion is not a good idea. They are two separate platforms with different capabilities and benefits. Making them redundant is not a good idea – why would someone follow your team on Twitter if the Facebook status update was the same? But that’s not the point here…
The point is – Facebook now lets you see which of your Friends have a Twitter profile as well. This is a big step and should help to increase team Twitter populations and the overall Twittersphere in general. Unfortunately, we have seen more of the FailWhale as well.
This integration deserves a longer separate post – stay tuned for ideas on that.
Minnesota Wild Corporate Partner Summit
May 21, 2010 at 2:48 pm | Posted in Branding, Facebook, Getting Started, Linkedin, Marketing, Social Media, Sponsorship, Sports Marketing, Twitter | 1 CommentTags: Minnesota Wild, Social Media, Sponsorship, Xcel Energy
I was invited to speak at the Wild‘s Corporate Partner Summit this week on the topic of social media. The event was held in the Xcel Energy Center and used the scoreboard as the presentation screen – which was a cool idea.
My topics ranged from:
- Getting started and setting objectives
- Customizing platforms for differentiation
- Monetization and e-commerce integration
- Trends and forecasts
The attendees were the Wild’s corporate sponsors – which is a great value add that the team provides it’s partners. Other presenters included Tom Reutter of Scarborough Research who presented some great data on Wild fans and social media, and Dewayne Hankins / Michael Brinkman of the Wild’s internal DIG group (Digital Interactive Group) who presented on the Wild’s social presence, successful promotions and future direction.
Thanks also to Anna Johnson and Kathleen Borschke of the Wild’s Corporate Services team for all their work in preparing for the event.
True to social media form – some attendees were tweeting during my presentation – which I think is an effective way to measure engagement:
A corporate partner summit is a good way to offer value for any team – and it’s great to have the opportunity to see what your audience is picking up on. As I have mentioned many times, along with many other voices in the social space – one of social media’s key benefits is the opportunity to listen.
Toronto Raptors Changing to Huskies (on Facebook)
May 11, 2010 at 1:41 pm | Posted in Branding, Facebook, Marketing, Social Media | 13 CommentsTags: MLSE, Toronto Huskies, Toronto Raptors
As you may know, earlier this past season the Raptors played a game wearing retro Huskies uniforms. Since then, there have been an increasing amount of fans looking to have the Raptors renamed (back) to the Huskies permanently.
The social space is where these types of movements take place now-a-days. Petitions have been trumped by Facebook Groups, or Fan Pages. Similar to the failed Jim Basillie “Make It Seven” movement from 2009 regarding the movement of the Phoenix Coyotes to Hamilton, a new group is looking to make a social splash in order to persuade MLSE to rename and rebrand their basketball team.
- Here’s a link to the Toronto Huskies Facebook fan page…
- And a Twitter feed…
- And another to a group that is looking to change the name…
As it stands, a recent blog post from James Cybulski of TSN.ca kick started this movement, and a new update today provided a response from MLSE on changing the name – click here for that and the following quote from MLSE’s EVP and COO, Tom Anselmi:
“We’re pleased that a lot of our fans like the Huskies third jersey. It’s a great traditonal brand that has ties to Toronto’s strong basketball roots. That said, there have been no discussions about changing the Raptors name permanently. It has been our name since inception and we know our fans love it and identify with it.”
Cybulski counters…
“The numbers will make them think twice.”
What do you think? Will the numbers make them think twice (<500 right now)? Can fans mandate a team to rebrand?
What are the sponsor implications for re-branding or renaming a team that is not relocating?
Profile and Network Management Tips
May 5, 2010 at 10:50 am | Posted in Facebook, How To..., Linkedin, Networking, Personal Brand, Social Media, Twitter | Leave a commentTags: Networking, profile, Social Media
So you have a Facebook profile, a Twitter profile, a Linkedin profile… perhaps some profiles on other social networks as well.
Here’s my list of do’s and don’ts for your social media profile(s):
- Don’t use 3rd person language – things like, “Carson is a…”. The social space is all about promoting uniqueness and individuality. Your own personal profile shouldn’t read like someone else wrote it.
- Use a picture of yourself. Not having a picture reads as absent rather than private. Unless your profile is actually a brand, don’t use a logo. Show yourself, not your child(ren), or your pet.
- Keep it short and to the point. If you want to share your life story, use each platform for what it does best: Linkedin for work experience, Facebook for things you like – don’t be redundant.
- You don’t need to connect with the same people on each network. I frequently receive (and ignore) requests from Linkedin contacts to join them on another space. No need for that…
- Lots of followers, friends and connections doesn’t mean anything for the sake of network size alone. Small, powerful networks are the way to operate in the business world unless you intend to spam (don’t).
- Everyone is not a lead. Networking is about connecting people. Opportunities will come to you in turn. Provide value in the form of information and connections. Social media is not a hammer – it’s a nail.
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Carson McKee
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