The Sports Info Business

When you combine technology and sports related business, you have my ear.  Or in this case my eyes.  In this case, uh, maybe my legs too.

Yesterday, as I was writing and researching my first blog post for 2012, I came across a start up company called, Gympact.

The concept is simple.  Gym-Pact uses its site as a motivational tool to help get people who pay gym memberships to actually use it.  The concept of GymPact came from a Harvard behavioral economics class, and their pilot in Boston had a 90% success at getting people to the gym when they committed.

Via a free downloadable app, Gym-Pact lets you set the financial stakes of not getting to the gym, plus earn cash rewards and real prizes for fulfilling your Pact.  All you need is an iPhone.   In order to make money from this venture, you have to sign up and meet or exceed your commitment to going to the the gym.

As for getting paid to stay healthy, each Sunday night, the company calculates how much was paid by those who didn’t get to the gym that week. The money is then divided among those who made their Pact, based on the number of days committed (i.e. 3 days Pact = 3 portions).

Do I think this is type of tool can make a difference in motivating people to work out.  Yes, I do.

It reminds me of a story I heard last week, of a family member who joked that they might be thebest customer for a Los Angeles based gym.

This unnamed family member has been paying her gym membership for years and never goes.  I do think this grand mother would get there more often if she knew she might be losing more money but not going. 

As for company co-founders and  Harvard classmates Yifan Zhang and  Geoff Oberhofer,  If they practice what they preach, this dynamic duo is either very healthy or proceeds from their company will help pay for their lack of exercise.

Last Weekend, while researching future Question and answer candidate profiles for this blog, I learned that you can now add a Twitter Button on your LinkedIn profile.  I had not seen it before but I quickly learned how you can easily add this link to your profile to possibly connect with new folks as well as push current contacts to this Twitter stream.  I took a picture of my LinkedIn profile so you can see where it appears today.  If you can scan below, I have highlighted this in red.

So the question is how do you do add this?

I am here to show you that now.

** First log into your LinkedIn page.

** Once logged in, click on the blue “Home” button to return to the main page.

** Now click on the “More” tab

** Once there, I clicked on the “More applications” tab

** Now I clicked on the Twitter option after I scrolled down a bit and installed it wit the setting that I wanted to show.  I have more than one Twitter account but chose my main personal feed, @sportsinfo101

Hope this helps you better market yourself.

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Don’t forget if you use Facebook, add the Sports Info 101 page and never miss a future blog post.

I think it is about time this morning we go back to basics.

Let’s re-examine some of the items and trends people look for on the internet.

When it comes to sports, what are some of the most popular searches going on right now and how do we find what is trending in popular search engines like Google?

Easy.  

Our first stop naturally shoild be to Google Trends.

This site proves insight into the most popular searches, by day on the intenrnet.  So as a little experiment, I wanted to see what was trending on Google this morning.

Not surprising, several sports terms are dotted among the top 20 this morning.  If you look to the right, you’ll see Reggie Bush ranked number one at the moment this morning, Sidney Rice (#4), Carlos Beltran (#10), the Minnesota Vikings (#16) and Kyle Orton (#18).  Each has hit the radar for very different reasons.  However, you can get a quick glimpse of what interests the internet world at the moment.

Click on the search terms and Google provides tyou with more indepth statistics and links to why these are hot searches.

Now, I wanted to take a closer look to see, which of the major sports has been searched for the most and Google certainly allows you to cusomize your search.  My first search term was baseball, since it is is the only major sport currently “in season” meaning the Major League baseball teams are playing meaningful games.

Now that the NFL lockout has ended, I added football as a search term.

To no one’s surprise, footnball searches passed baseball this week as fans want to know the latest information on the most popular sport in America right now.

You can see this below as the blue and red lines cross during the month of July.

The data above is searches, in the United States only for 2011.  Why didn’t I include the rest of the world for this?  Well, much of the world refers to American soccer as football so it could have been a confusing term so I limited the search to the United States only for now.

Next, I added Basketball and Hockey, wanting to see from January to July where the other two major sports teams fell in terms of popular search terms.

Keep in mind, these searches can include anything relates to each sport.

What do I mean?  This could include hockey practice, hockey leagues, and hockey sticks, not necessarily the National Hockey League.  As you can see from above, the search term basketball, outlined in green, received a nice spike in late March and April.

The kletters refer to major stories and links to them which could have influenced a spike.  I did not link those for the use of this blog post.

Lastly, I wanted to show you a full year’s worth of search for the major sports terms so I looked back at 2010.

Certainly from July to December, there is no question which search and probably sport is the most popular in America today.

Don’t forget you can get updates on all sportsinfo101.com posts by liking the page on facebook.  Just click here and like us.

Video has become one of the most popular ways for sharing content over the Internet.  Its no wonder that YouTube has become the second largest search engine on the planet.

Here are a few select videos that show a few different stories.  They are all worth a few moments of your time.

The first story involves two boys attending a baseball game between the Arizona Diamondbacks and the Milwaukee Brewers.  They jostle for a foul ball and one boy walks away with a souvenir while the second one is left empty handed.  Then, the unthinkable happens.  The one boy hands the prize over to the other.

In the end, they are both rewarded.  Watch it here.

Telling good stories never gets old and Showtime has done a tremendous job with its docu-series on the 2011 World Series champion San Francisco.  It’s called The Franchise:  A Season with the San Francisco Giants.  An entire one hour special was recently uploaded you YouTube.  Here is how it is described on the site:  “Episode one follows the team’s biggest players Buster Posey, Matt Cain, Brian Wilson, Freddy Sanchez, Tim Lincecum, and Pablo Sandoval through the early days of the season.

The piece is really well done in telling the team’s story through first half of the 2011 Major League Baseball season.

I leave you with this, um interesting pre-race prayer, provider by pastor Joe Nelms over the weekend, where he paid tribute, among other things, to “his smoking hot wife.”

The unusual tribute before the NASCAR Nationwide Series race in Nashville was also good for corporate sponsors including Toyota, Dodge, Ford, GM Performance Technology, Goodyear Tires. 

Priceless.

Yesterday, I previewed the 82nd Major League Baseball All-Star Game.

Today, I invite you to watch this time lapse photography of a mamjor monsoon that hit the Phoenix area yesterday.  I must say, this is amazing photography and I am sure something that the TV folks broadcasting the all-star game will certainly show at some point next week.

Props has to go out to photographer Mike Olbinski, an accomplished photographer and the creator of the video.  His still shot from flickr wasn’t too bad either.

The fact that this baseball showcase event happens so close to this massive monsoon might put a small damper on the Phoenix Visitor and Convention Bureau’s plan to paint a picture perfect photo of the town for a national audience.

However, with the way mother nature has treated many parts of America this year, its just one surprise after another.

Here is a simple case study, in close to real time, on what sports organizations must learn in order to make an impact when it comes to driving eyeballs online.

Today’s News:  Today, Petra Kvitova beat Maria Sharapova in the Wimbledon women’s singles final to capture her first title at the All England Club and the fourth this year for the Czech.

Now, I wanted to add value to folks that have liked the sportsinfo101 Facebook group page. Naturally, I went to the Wimbledon’s web site and thought it would be great to link a finals story from the home page.

To my surprise, when I clicked on the Wimbledon news section in the tab, the lead story was Djokovic downs Tsonga to become No.1

However, if you did a Google search for Sharapova or Wimbledon in the news section, one of the top placements was a news story from the LA Times sports section, which already posted a brief story by 8:00 a.m.  It was the first listing in my search.

Now, I know that organizational websites are not in the reporting business.  However, I would argue that they need to produce timely content to capture eyeballs from fans that want and need information.

If they do not jump into this space and create this content, then they are losing out in business opportunities like new advertising revenue or creating more value for sponsors that already advertise on their websites.

Organizations must adapt.

I often get asked some basic questions about social networking platforms like Facebook and Twitter that need addressing.

Some of these questions include:

What is the best time to post a Tweet?

How many tweets should be posted, in an hour or per day?

As for Facebook, typical questions include, What is the best day to share information on Facebook and how many times should I share in a day? In order to help guide you, I found this terrific Infographic that has answers to these questions and more.

A few items to keep in mind:

* Be consistent with your postings.

* Always try and add value or start a conversation with value.

* Do not abuse the microphone that is the social media platform.

Don’t forget to sign up for the sportsinfo101.com Facebook group. You’ll see feeds of every posting here within Facebook by linking in.

Quick:  If I asked you what was the most popular sports website was last month, what would you say?

Go ahead, throw me a URL address or think of one.

Last night, I came across the Top 10 visited U.S. Sports websites for the month of May, according to Hitwise and in true David Letterman style, I am about to count them down for you.

#10 ESPN.com NBA (total market share of 1.6%)

#9 Yahoo! Sports NFL (total market share 1.8%)

#8 Rivals.com (total market share 1.9%)

#7 ESPN.com MLB (total market share 2.2%)

#6 Major League Baseball (total market share 2.2%)

#5 Yahoo! Sports NBA (total market share 2.8%)

#4 Fox Sports on MSN (total market share 3.4%)

#3 Yahoo! Sports MLB (total market share 3.8%)

#2 ESPN (total market share 5.7%)

#1 Yahoo! Sports (total market share 7.7%)

Was is interesting to note is, this list includes only one actual sports league, with major League Baseball  sitting at the number six slot.  The rest of the list includes news sites dedicated to covering sports.  Why are there no other leagues listed in terms of popularity.  One would think that with the National Basketball and National Hockey League playoffs that fan support would lift those numbers.

Maybe the audience is too small?

Tan why has Yahoo! and ESPN captured a significant audience based on a specific sport?  The leagues, and teams, still have work to do.

I titled today’s blog, “Using Customer Service for a Save” for a very specific and personal reason.

Recently , I had planned to go out to dinner with my family and wanted to try a new restaurant.  My father was visiting from out of town, so I could not ask him for advice.  So, I did the next best thing.  I used technology to help find a new restaurant.  I went to a site called Yelp!, which lists user comments for many things as a way to recommend or trash consumer brands. (You can also try a popular travel site called TripAdvisor for other travel related reviews).

This one Italian restaurant in Newport Beach received, overall, glowing remarks so I called the restaurant, spoke to the owner, and he hung up on me.

Yep. That’s right.  When I asked him about his menu and a website I could check out to make sure it met our group’s dietary restrictions, he abruptly ended the conversation.

I certainly was not headed there for dinner.  I did the only thing I could.  I went to Yelp, which I did not use very often until last week, and told future visitors, exactly what happened.  I even suggested they go elsewhere based on my experience.  Now I love to compliment people for doing a good job and often ask to speak with supervisors of line item folks like telephone customer service people.

Good people deserve to hear feedback as it does not happen nearly enough.  This however, also needed attention.

Last night, I received a note in my email in box, via Yelp, from the general manager of the restaurant.  Here is what Luke wrote.

“Dear Charles,

My name is Luke, and I am the GM at xxxxxx ( I blocked out the name as it is not important).  I am writing on behalf of the Owner, Keith, who is the least tech savvy person on the planet and doesn’t know how to use a computer.

As soon as Keith hung up the phone with you, he knew he screwed up.  It was peak time hour at the restaurant, and he had a lot of his plate, but there is NO excuse for him not being patient with you and addressing your concerns.  Keith wanted to call you back and apologize, but we don’t have caller ID!  When we saw your review on Yelp, we were pleased that we would have a method of getting in touch with you.

We are in no way asking you to take down your review of us, or change it in any way.  What happened happened, and like I said there is no excuse for the way Keith treated you.  However, if you will allow us, we’d like to mail you a gift certificate so you can come have dinner on the house, and be given the respect and care you should have been shown the first time around.  If you decide to accept our offer, please send me an e-mail (address below) with your physical address, and I will be happy to mail you a gift certificate and a menu so you can look into the dietary needs you mentioned in your Yelp review.

Again, please accept our apologies for the way Keith treated you on the phone.  We look forward for the opportunity to make it right, and hope to hear back from you soon.

The reason why this GM could find me is that the review on the site is linked to an email that was sent to me.  The restaurant could not do it directly but using Yelp as a conduit, it could reach out and try and save the customer.

Not willing to hold a grudge, I sent Luke my address and will be willing to try the restaurant again with the family on another day.

The restaurant potentially gets a save.

As the consumer, I made sure my voice was heard and they responded and did the right thing.

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Do you use tools like Yelp to make sure you are listening to people speaking about your brand?  If not, you need to invest in resources like this to protect your business.

As a potential resource for this story, I went to the Yelp YouTube channel to view and link a “Hot To” video, but could not find one from the company.  Here is a YouTube user generated video for your viewing pleasure