Sports social media

(W)hooping it up at TEDx, Jimmy Lynn Says Sports Social Media Key To Consumer Tech Demand

October 26, 2011 by John Evan Frook 3 Comments

Former AOL Sports head Jimmy Lynn said “sports always drives adoption of new technologies,” and “we’re in the fifth inning” in determining winners and losers in the sports social space.

Lynn, who made his comments at TEDx PennQuarter on Oct. 24, is managing partner of the global strategic advisory firm JLynn Associates and on the faculty of Georgetown University’s sports industry management program.

From 1995 to 2009, he was a driver in creating AOL Sports as a major online destination, and central in AOL’s overall success.

Lynn said sports social media content developers must focus on mobile devices. In such countries as China, Brazil and India, there are huge sports audiences, and those people already get their content on mobile devices, he said. Reliance on the mobile device for sports information is bound to occur among fans in the United States, he said.

“I tell my students: go global, mobile and green,” Lynn said.

The Twitter Opportunity

Lynn said Twitter is already ingrained in the sports fan experience, and it has paved the way for professional athletes to — for the first time — begin making money through digital sports information.

“We’ve been trying to figure out how to monetize athletes on the Internet since 1995,” Lynn said. “And, we could not figure it out. Twitter is one of the first ways. Athletes can tweet they are wearing a product, and that (tweet) moves people (to purchase the product). All of sudden (the athletes) are getting paid five grand, seven grand, 10 grand.”

Facebook Promising, But Untapped

Facebook is also a complete game changer, Lynn said. It is one thing to have a healthy presence on Facebook, and quite another to turn that audience into paying customers, he cautioned.

“To me the Holy Grail in social media is how to take this huge social media audience and drive e-commerce,” Lynn said. “That’s the end game.”

Sports Blogging Sites Promising

Make no mistake, big media is in a run for its money in the brave new world of sports social media, Lynn said. He identified the rise of such sites as SBNation and bleacher report into the top 10 most-trafficked online sports destinations as indication that speaking out on sports is every bit as compelling as reading about sports.

“These guys are competing with ESPN, Yahoo, CBS and Fox,” Lynn said. “And they are right there in the top 10. Why? People like to get their opinion out there. Just like sports radio was the big thing in the 1980s, now, people are blogging, blogging and blogging.”

Lynn said SBNation and bleacher report hold an advantage of the media mainstream. That is, they provide an outlet for people to talk about community sports, including high-school sports. They also facilitate the production of sports video by amateurs, and give amateurs the opportunity to try their hand as sportscasters. That kind of sports social media would get lost on outlets that focus on college and professional sports, and it is a huge opportunity for SBNation and bleacher report and others going forward, Lynn said.

Sports drives consumer demand for technology

“Sports always drives adoption of new technologies,” Lynn said.

In making this case, Lynn took a historical perspective. He pointed up that horse racing, baseball and boxing were key to getting consumers to purchase radios in the 1930s, and that baseball and football drove television purchases in the 1950s, and color television set purchases in the 1960s. In the 1990s, satellite television allowed displaced fans to tune into teams they loved buy couldn’t see because they did not live in local markets, he added. And sports drove the digital revolution beginning in 1995 by providing sports scores and fantasy sports statistics. Today, sports will drive consumers to purchase mobile phones and tablets in ever-increasing numbers, he said.

Lynn on center stage

Lynn’s comments signal that sports social media thought leaders are focusing almost exclusively on the impact of mobile devices when evaluating new sports business opportunities. His appearance at the nonprofit TED means the thought-leadership clearinghouse has begun to see sports social media as a major cultural phenomenon.

As mobile devices win the day among consumers, competitors in the sports social media space must continue to provide the basics, Lynn said.

“Scores drive a sports site,” Lynn said. “It was (true) then and it is now.”

Filed Under: CBS Sports, ESPN, Facebook, Jimmy :Lynn, NBC Sports, Twitter Tagged With: Jimmy Lynn, mobile sports content, Sports social media

PlayUp Brings Broad Strategy, $73 Million Warchest to Sports Social Media

October 25, 2011 by John Evan Frook 2 Comments

An interloper from Australia, backed with a warchest of $73 million, entered the sports social networking arena this week.

PlayUp, released to U.S. markets on Oct. 20, is an iPhone and iPad application that allows people to get scores and stats for NFL, college football, NHL, NBA, MLB, and MLS games, and create private and public discussions by contacting Facebook friends or other directories.

“There is no better platform for social interactivity than sports, but until now the industry has been unable to marry live sports and social,” said Jonathan Press, CEO of PlayUp USA.

Greater than 56,000 free PlayUp applications have already been downloaded through Apple Inc.’s App Store since release, making it one of the five most downloaded sports social media applications downloaded to date. PlayUp plans to release a second version of the application in December, which will include the ability to buy premium content.

Company backers include George Tomeski, a former managing partner at the advertising agency George Sydney, and Luke Bunbury, former head of strategy for the whole finance group of Austalia-based Challenger Financial Services Group, Ltd.

The company used three different investments rounds to raise more than $73 million, according to a report published by the Melbourne, Australia-based small business news website StartUpSmall.

The PlayUp slogan is “where sports gets social.”

Release of PlayUp changes the competition among developers of sports social media applications. First, PlayUp is looking to provide comprehensives sports scores and statistics to its users, as opposed to an interface that tightens the consumer’s social media focus on a single game. Second, it is most interested in an electronic-commerce strategy, as opposed to an advertising- or sponsor-driven model, which will force other developers to consider whether that’s the best way to make money through sports social media. And third, its tight intergration of Facebook as a means to invite interaction forces other application to developers to consider similar connectivity with the social media behemoth or face being left in the dust.

Filed Under: iPad, iPhone, Live sports via mobile, Sports Social Media Tagged With: iPad, iPhone, PlayUp, Sports social media

How To Use Twitter For Sports Promotion

October 20, 2011 by John Evan Frook 1 Comment

Make no mistake, Twitter recognizes that sports social media is an integral part of its appeal, and it has published a guide for college and professional sports promoters on best practices for keeping fans engaged.

The guide is aimed at employees of teams with large numbers of sports fans, but it is a useful resource for anyone interested in using Twitter to build interest in a team. Here’s the case Twitter makes for using its service to get the word out:

Twitter and sports fit together because sports are live, immediate, suspenseful, and fun—and these are qualities Twitter mirrors and enhances in real-time. People use Twitter to follow their favorite players, sports writers, and teams, but most importantly: they use Twitter to talk about games as they happen…With every touchdown, goal, or home run, you can literally see the spikes in Twitter activity.

Statistics Show Sport Fans Interaction

To build its case, Twitter highlighted the 2010 Major League Baseball World Champion San Francisco Giants. It showed that on Nov. 1, 2010, Tweets per minute spiked twice during the game. Once when Giants’ Edgar Renteria hit his three-run homer to give the Giants the lead, and again after the Giants clinched the championship. Here’s Twitter’s graph:

Best Practices in Sports Social Media Promotion

Twitter outlined several techniques that the Giants and other teams use to engage audiences, and several of them are easily adaptable to any sports social media promoter. Here are four things anyone can do to build interest in a sports team:

Live-Tweet Events: use color commentary and live play-by-play
Share pictures: show the team in transit to a game, pictures of the players, practices – anything to keep people in engaged. It is one thing to build excitement with words, another to build excitement with images: Twitter claims photos are the best way to promote an event.
Break news: Even a little league team has news. Keep it appropriate, and don’t get your team disqualified like a mother did on Facebook, according to The Nashville Tennessean. Once you do that, it is OK to send out newsworthy information that will help fans engage with the game.
Interact: talk directly to followers, and ask questions

Additional Steps for Pros

Of course, not everything in Twitter’s guide applies to every sports social media practitioner. Twitter also provided some tips that only apply to professionals responsible for getting butts in the seats. Here are three tactics Twitter identified:

Connect to the larger conversation: It is just fine to mention other teams, athletes and high-profile sports figures, Twitter says. It gives your channel authenticity, and provides opportunities to promote
Run a contest: As evidenced by the Fanatic Fans mobile application currently rolling out at Arizona State University, University of Denver and University of Grand Canyon home games, scoreboard contests tied to branded social media applications are the wave of the future. But that’s not to say you can’t run your own contest on Twitter. There are guidelines for running a contest on Twitter, but it is one heck of a way to engage your audience.
Make Twitter Actionable: Twitter says sports promoters can drive fans to buy seats, especially if a television blackout will occur if they aren’t gobbled up. Tweet on the day of the game and provide a link for buying seats, Twitter says.

Filed Under: Sports Social Media, Twitter, Uncategorized Tagged With: Sports social media, Twitter

Fanatic Fans: An Insider’s Look at Mobile Applications for Live Events

October 6, 2011 by John Evan Frook 2 Comments

Brian Holmes, a driving force behind Calibrus' breakthrough Fanatic Fans application

If you ever wanted a good look into the infancy of sports social media, you could get it by taking a look at Calibrus Inc. Fanatic Fans application.

Fanatic Fans debuted at Arizona State University home games last month, and today fewer than a thousand people have it on their smartphone or other mobile device. Yet that’s enough momentum to convince the 26-year-old developer of the application, Brian Holmes, he’s on to something big – a concept that could fundamentally change the fan experience at live sports events and concerts.

“We feel there is a real opportunity to tap into this marketplace to grow a significant brand with large numbers of users,” Holmes told MobileSportsReport.com.

Indeed, Fanatic Fans marks one of the most aggressive moves to date by a major college athletic program to mirror sports social media innovations occurring in the NFL, according to MobileSportsReport.com. The Miami Dolphins are among the leaders in pro pigskin with an application developed by Mobile Roadie LLC, but the college market is wide open. Beyond ASU, Fanatic Fans is now being made available to University of Grand Canyon and University of Denver sports fans. Calibrus also sees Fanatic Fans as potentially a big winner in the live music space, Holmes said.

While ESPN, CBS Sports, SB Nation and numerous others have won big user numbers for mobile sports applications that provide news and buzz, applications that facilitate live event experience are just emerging. Indeed, the implications of mobile sports applications at live events are often misunderstood even by the experts, as evidenced by the South Eastern Conference’s recent decision to revise such impossible-to-enforce social media policies as the prohibition of mobile devices use at games.

For business, Fanatic Fans and other applications are promising because they can be used to provide offers to consumers at the moment they are ready to buy whether that’s before, during or after and event, according to Fast Company.

Available for Android and iPhones, Fanatic Fans works this way: Users download the application, and log in with user name and password whenever they go to a game. At present, check-in at a game qualifies them for prizes. At University of Denver games that includes a seat upgrade, and at ASU games there’s a $500 cash prize. During timeouts, fans are also prompted to respond to scoreboard contests via text. At ASU, that’s currently a contest to name the MVP of the game. Ultimately, applications like Fanatic Fans can be used by fans to interact with other fans when they are tailgating or at the stadium.

Fanatic Fans took shape quickly, and the speed with which it went from concept to in-game experience underscores how nimble dot.com companies and sports teams will need to be in order to capitalize on the growth of sports social media. Fanatic Fans began to take shape in February, when Holmes took the idea to Calibrus management. At the time, Holmes was working as a project manager on a website called JabberMonkey, which allows people to post questions, videos, pictures and articles that others can respond to via chat, webcam, email or VOIP. Calibrus used its development team in Saudi Arabia to turn the idea into a reality, and quickly won the support of ASU. Its business model is to create an avid user base for Fanatic Fans, and reward affinity marketing points for sports fan participation, Holmes said.

Filed Under: Android, Brian Holmes, Calibrus, Fanatic Fans, NCAA Football, NFL Tagged With: Android and iPhone applications for sports, mobile applications for sports, Sports social media

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