Tuesday, September 30, 2014

#BUCTOBER

Source: behance.net
Since the Pirates play tomorrow, I felt it was only appropriate to look at all Buccos fans favorite hashtag: #BUCTOBER.

For those of you who don't know, the Pirates will face the Giants on Wednesday, Oct. 1 at 8 p.m. at PNC Park for the National League Wild Card Game.

And in case you haven't heard, Cutch is calling for a blackout.
The Pirates clinched the Wild Card Game last week against the Braves, which immediately followed the social explosion of #BUCTOBER.
 I think the Pirates do a fantastic job with their social media efforts (mainly Twitter). Here's why:

1. Fan engagement
If you take a look the Pittsburgh Pirates Twitter page, you will obviously find tweets of their own but you will also see a lot of retweets and/or replies to fans. This interaction mainly occurs before, after and in between games (obviously). Fans are especially excited leading up to tomorrow's game, so the Pirates are making sure they acknowledge the fans excitement for the game. If I got a retweet from the Pirates, I know I would be even more excited for the game!

2. Awesome graphics/videos
The Pirates are very consistent with the graphics they post before and after games. They always post a preview graphic, highlighting a specific player and important stats to know. The post game graphic is simple, clean and to the point. It includes an action shot of a player and the score. Their videos after the game against the Braves came from their Vine and/or Instagram account. They were an inside peak of the locker room celebration, which who wouldn't want to see that?


 3. Always on their Twitter game
If you follow them on Twitter, you know that they are constantly tweeting. Some people may find it annoying, but I think it's the perfect amount. They build hype prior to games, disperse important information about games, players and events, live-tweet during games, tweet post-game press conference quotes... the list could go on and on! Their tweets are usually clever and catchy too, which I think is awesome. Short clever tweets are what capture our attention as we scroll through our Twitter feed.

Leave some of your thoughts on their social media below!
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College GameDay Live (on Snapchat)

In 2011, an app unlike any other was born: Snapchat.

This app gives individuals the opportunity to communicate one-on-one via photos, videos and now messages.

Last October, Snapchat released a new feature for users called: Stories. This feature allows users to create a collection of photos and videos for all their friends on Snapchat to see. Each photo/video lives on the story for 24 hours, then disappears. Users also have the ability to see a list of who looked at their story (great for brands).

On August 29, 2014, Snapchat announced another new feature called: Live. This feature is described as a "community story" where Snapchatters (yes, I'm creating this word) can contribute photos/videos to the live story feed based on the event they are at. Snapchat tested this new feature early in the summer at the Electric Daisy Carnival and in Rio De Janerio at the World Cup.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Snapchat has more than 100 million active monthly users. That's a lot of people.

Every Saturday morning at 9 a.m. college football fanatics tune in to ESPN for College GameDay hosted by Lee Corso, Chris Fowler, Kirk Herbstreit and Desmond Howard. College GameDay broadcasts live from the school that will be playing that night.

Source: Google Images
Starting this season, Snapchat has added College Football to their Live Story. Snapchatters at games on Saturday may have the opportunity to use an awesome geofilter, which they released this summer. The filters are based on the users location and may be specific to the game they are attending.
Source: inksights.rep-ink.com
Snapchatters are able to share their game experience in real-time with all Snapchat users (remember, that's over 100 million active monthly users). However, fans aren't the only ones contributing to College Football Live. On September 13th, the featured game was Georgia at South Carolina, however the start of the game was delayed due to rain. During the delay, players turned to Snapchat to pass some time.

Source: collegespun.com
So you're probably wondering, who cares? It's just a bunch of random pictures of drunk people and players college football games. Well, in my opinion, this is paving way for so many new things including recruiting and marketing. However, according to a post on Reputation Ink, some may think that these schools are collaborating with Snapchat, but that's not the case. When Oregon played during the first weekend, they said they weren't involved in the initiative. So this is all Snapchat.

College Football Live is a great tool for university athletic departments because it is free marketing and they don't have to do any work either. Obviously problems could arise from students drinking and inappropriate behavior, but the main users of Snapchat are mainly young teens ages 18 and up.
College Football Live also gives users who aren't at the game a glimpse into what goes on at major football tailgates and what the view from the student section looks like. I think it's awesome.

What are your thoughts on College Football Live? Do you just click through the snaps to get rid of them? Or do you actually watch them to see what's going on at the game?

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Monday, September 29, 2014

Welcome!

Welcome to my new blog about social media and sports (clever blog title is in the works)! My goal is to examine/analyze how sports teams utilize social media in all aspects. In case you haven't noticed, social media is changing the way we go about our daily lives and is making a huge impact in the world of sports. Hashtags and Twitter handles are now constantly seen on our TV's when watching a game or now we can interact with our favorite team or athlete. How cool is that??

The thing is, we don't really even think about these things. I mean we don't think about how big of an impact a simple hashtag makes on a team or league (well... I do). It's pretty awesome and I'm here to tell you about it.
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