What The NHL Can Teach The NBL About Social Media
09. Jun, 2010 
8 Comments
Disclaimer: I am a passionate basketball fan, and in particular the NBL. I grew up wanting to wear Andrew Gaze jerseys and I have previously worked for the Melbourne Tigers.
The more I think about it, the more the NHL and Australia’s National Basketball League have had similar experiences off the ice/court recently. So how are the two sports similar?
Both have had major disasters to their league that made a once popular league no longer relevant in the eyes of sports fans (in the NBL’s case, more than one disaster).
There were rule changes in both the NHL and NBL as they realised they had to innovate and change rules of their game to become more attractive to TV.
Both have had recently signed TV deals to get back on to Free-To-Air TV in their respective countries.
Where do they differ significantly however? Social media.
Looks can be deceiving
When the NHL resumed after it’s labour strike for the 05-06 season, social media was only starting to take shape as MySpace was dominating and Facebook and Twitter were a little way off. With a need to be relevant again, they got their house in order, changed their rules to become more attractive to the fans, and put a priority on media coverage. Social media only recently became a high priority over the past 12-24 months, and the results are showing.
The following quote is taken from this fantastic article on the NHL’s efforts in social media.
This scenario is a big-picture objective for the League’s social media efforts, which have aggressively boomed on blogs, Twitter and recently on a revamped Facebook home page. The goal is simple: Make it more fun to be an NHL fan, which in turn will make more sports fans want to become one.
“Social networks aren’t about Web sites. They’re about experiences,” said Mike DiLorenzo, director of social media marketing and strategy for the NHL.
With the NBL now going to be live on Free-To-Air, it’s critical that they also make their fans have that “experience” and then keep that fan coming back week after week. As is the theme on this blog, I believe social media is one of the best ways to extend that experience and I really hope the NBL pushes social media in their marketing plan and during in-game TV coverage.
So what are the top 5 things the NBL can learn from the NHL?
1. Establish a presence on major social media platforms
This is the biggest problem that I can see right now, there simply isnt enough official channels. The league doesn’t have an official Facebook Fan Page or YouTube channel yet, and in the past have even posted YouTube videos under a personal account. The NHL’s Facebook Page is fantastic and their YouTube channel (which has 48,000,000 views) is just as good.
One of the NBL’s strongest assets is their video catalogue. Great moments from the 80’s and 90’s with packed stadiums would be great to be viewed again, but it’s been left up to dedicated users to relive these moments with their own tapes.
Does anyone remember this great Andrew Gaze moment?
This video should be posted under an “NBL” account and in a lot higher quality, instead it’s left up to a fan to upload an old VHS tape.
The NBL does have their own Twitter page, but it’s an RSS feed right now and offers no extra incentive for fans to interact with it. There is little official branding on the site, and the colour scheme is rather hard to read when links are posted. The account is lacking in personality (click down to the bottom of the article).
(Note: The Twitter bio of the NBL says the league only has 8 teams, with the inclusion of the Kings the league now has 9 teams)
2. Integrate your social media
If you click here you can see that the league’s website does list all their teams’ social media sites, but the league should be promoting itself, not the teams. It should be the responsibility of each team to pick up the social media slack, but as yet they haven’t. Only 6 of the 9 teams are on Twitter, and the Gold Coast Blaze are the only team without a Facebook Fan Page.
Full integration on NHL.com
As I said above, looks can be deceiving. The button is there to click on “connect with the NBL” but fans shouldn’t have to click on another page to do this. See the image above? You became a fan or follower from NHL.com, you don’t have to open up another screen to do this.
The league does have some social media stars however and those are the Wollongong Hawks, Townsville Crocs and Perth Wildcats who are leading the social media pack.
3. Use your network
Mainstream media may have left the NBL behind, but they still have a passionate fan base. The articles used on nbl.com.au are taken from Sportal, and have had so many mistakes over the years that it drives the diehards crazy. Blogging is a multi-billion dollar business overseas because it attracts readers that don’t want to go to the traditional news outlets, and there are plenty of citizen journalists out there who will happily create reliable, informative content for the NBL for free or a simple link exchange.
“Blogs are the original social networking tool. They bring a voice and perspective to the NHL media property that may not currently exist,” he said. “We’re trying to encourage more of our users to write about their favorite team and inspire more dialogue.
In other words, the NHL wants to activate their fans into content providers and marketing foot soldiers, something evident by the League’s approach to both Twitter and Facebook in recent months. NHL Fans encourages users to bring the NHL to their favourite social media sites and to their personal blogs through widgets.”
You don’t even have to have these blogs directly on your site, you can simply link off to them so that any existing content deal stays in adhered to. With any sport, they have a tribe of fans out there, and in the NBL’s case, they are a battle-scarred fan base that has been through the hard times and want to promote the sport.
Citizen journalists are taking place all over the internet in Australia, sites like crikey.com.au, backpagelead.com.au as well as thebigtip.com.au often utilise those citizen journalists for fresh relevant content. How many NBL-team related blogs are out there?
The tools are are there just waiting to be used. There are some really passionate people out there that blog about basketball already like ASternWarning.com and NBAmate.com. We also have some fantastic forums like hoops.com.au and ozhoopsboards.com and not only that, legends of the game like John Rillie blog, Brett Maher and Kevin Brooks do video blogs and a guy by the name of Andrew Gaze tweets. Why aren’t theye being used?
The sport has lost a lot of valuable people to the game recently, one in particular is Ed Wyatt. He is passionate about the game of as basketball, and recently did some fantastic work for the South Dragons, but after they disbanded he was lost to the league. He does podcasts for another website, can the NBL use him in a similar capacity? Use this network.
4. Live events not at the game
I recently wrote an article on Tweetups, which are live events that start on social media and turn into a real life meet up. The NBL suffers because it doesnt get nationwide coverage, but it is relatively strong in markets like Perth, Townsville and Adelaide. Why can’t they make that community even stronger by creating social media themed events? The NHL has had great success (and media attention) in having NHL fans come together and form a community, without evem being at the game.
5. Be a resource for your teams
As I’ve highlighted before, the success of sports teams in social media is often driven by one person, but what if a team doesnt have that person? This is where the league should step in.
While some assumed this was the NHL’s official policy, DiLorenzo stressed that it’s still a work in progress. “I think it’s most accurate to say that we have guidelines,” he said. “We don’t want to be restrictive, because we understand the great potential of the teams and the players being involved. But we acknowledge there’s a right way to get involved.”
This is a great point. Social media can be a fantastic resource for sports, but you can still make mistakes. There are very few social media guidelines out there for sports, but the league should be able to offer an outline to its teams. Simple guidelines such as what platforms to establish themselves on, what is and isnt acceptable to promote and how their players should be involved.
The league needs a driver of social media, somebody who is willing to push it at all levels.
Conclusion
The social media scene in basketball isn’t all bad, the Wollongong have their own social networking site which shows fantastic initiative and one of few in Australian sport, but the industry can definitely be improved.
I hope that highlighting the two similarities in the league, it gives hope to those diehards that love the sport. The NHL too was thought to be irrelevant as a major sport after it’s player dispute and came back to empty arenas, but only a few years later they are starting to see great in-game attendances and the TV numbers are starting to come back. Not only that, but the mainstream media is starting to pick up again.
The fans the NBL needs to win over is the younger generation, they are the fans that they can make life-long fans. They are the fans that may not have been exposed to the league before, and haven’t been tainted by any failures of the past These kids hang out on social media networks so the league needs to find them, not the other way round.
I know the restraints the NBL faces: small marketing budget, small staff and a list of much bigger tasks to take care of. However the momentum is starting to build for the sport, over the past three months they have signed an apparel deal with And1 and a TV deal with Network Ten which shows the sport is heading in the right direction, they now need to capitalise on that, keep the dribble alive.
Well said, Anthony.
As you say, Wollongong, Townsville and Perth have done a great job with the likes of twitter, youtube videos (including original, creative content) and creating a destination of the net for their fans (particularly the Hawks for this one). Outside of that, the rest of the league is slacking behind. The big thing is, that all of the services involved are FREE to use and the reality is that the teams could get some passionate people to do a lot of the legwork for them for virtually nothing — just by being accredited as a media official for their team.
It really seems as if no one has given much thought to that new thing called the internet at NBL/BA and the concept of Web 2.0 is not even in their vocab. It's amazing how a viral message can be spread across the internet, attracting new fans, by a small amount of work. The returns are exponential.
If the NBL reached out to me, I know I'd be more than happy to help and get A Stern Warning involved. However I've never had one NBL official reach out to me in all the time my site has been live. Former players such as John Rillie, Kevin Brooks and Brett Maher have been great, but it shouldn't be up to individuals not on the NBL/BA payroll to be promoting the league off their own bat.
On the other hand, a league thousands of kilometres away in the NBA have contacted me on numerous occasions, even giving out prizepacks through my site. Yes, a site run by an Aussie has been contacted by a league in the States — showing that it really isn't that hard to connect with fans. Theoretically that approach could be used to unite fans in Australia, New Zealand and selected South East Asian countries to feel involved in the league.
My inbox (and the inbox of many others) is open, NBL/BA.
I've been reading your site for a long time and it has been a lot for the NBA content, sadly. I'd love to read more NBL content but the exposure isn't as great, and I really hope the NBL starts to push great content from citizen journalists, or even gaze.com.au rather than relying on a smaller group of 2-3 people in house.
Nice article Anthony, agree with you entirely.
I think part of the problem for the NBL, like many large organisations in Australia, is that they have underestimated the market penetration of social media, dismissing it out of hand and concentrating on a small bite of the mainstream pie. Lets hope they change that.
I also notice that Sportal are advertising for new writers/editors so who knows, things could be looking up on that front!
You're right, and as a country we really are 12-18 months behind in the social media space. It will get better no doubt, but right now businesses are yet to see the advantages of the medium, which is a shame. Thanks for the comment!
Nice post Anthony. The NBL needs to do a lot of work, more now than ever, to re-connect with their existing fan base and also connect with potential new fans.
The NBL and its clubs have traditionally done a poor job of connecting with their fans. Until recently the Melbourne Tigers had a full time media manager, yet I would argue they we're the least connected of all NBL teams and had virtually zero media presence.
.
The Tigers aren't on Twitter for one, but do regularly update their Facebook page. It is a free platform I agree, but it's not free in terms of time, these things do take plenty of man hours and thats where the NBL needs to open its doors to volunteers like any of us here who have commented here. I think we all want the best for the game, and we are all willing to put the hard yards in, I know I am. Cheers for the comment Trav.
Historically the NBL and its clubs have lamented a 'lack of funding and resources' as a reason for the lack of media and marketing activity. Well as you say, and as Mookie has concurred, here is an opportunity to use FREE platforms that connect with millions of people on a daily basis. It couldn't be any easier than to use a service like Twitter as an example. I'm not as tech savvy as you Anthony, but even I managed to send out over 10 tweets about random topics last night, all from the comfort of my couch using my trusty Blackberry. It really couldn't be easier. As Mookie pointed out, most NBL clubs would have willing volunteers to work on the social media platforms on their behalf, and still nothing!
This is certainly an area that the NBL needs to embrace, and quickly before they spend the entirety of there time playing catch up to the other sporting leagues
Looking at that big "Connect with the NBL" image icon block with the Twitter, Facebook and YouTube icons on it, i'd say the NBL was at least 12 years ahead of time* , long before those three products were even in development.