Social Media In Football - How to write in-game Tweets like a pro

This is sourced form that excellent site, run by Amanda Vandervort (GK!) "Soccer Science" at http://www.amandavandervort.com

We continue to explore the inclusion of social media into the Football community. Clubs just have to get into this medium and Capital Football should be leading the way on this one - perhaps they can launch prior to the 2011 season. Just look at how young people, well not just young people, communicate!

What would your tweet be if you saw this at the game?? I observed this a few times this season in the PL. I recall watching a conversation between a player not unlike this fellow, to his mates in the stands (who were playing later for the same club) to a mate in the stands behind them. You could say the world has gone made - me, I say get with the change and use it!

I can only imagine this coach's Tweet if he looked over his shoulder and found his red hot sub on the " blower" talking and tweeting! "Put that bloody phone....." Ouch!

I know a couple of coaches who have their assistants / managers tweet and SMS with trusted observers in other parts of the ground. I watched last season as such person SMS'd an observation to the coach, but got his left and right mixed up. He was behind the opposition goalposts. The on field change that followed raised eyebrows and gave rise to some cursing by the person who gave the advice. The discussion around him quickly made him privately realise that he was geographically misplaced.  He blamed the small keyboard as I recall.

Get with it - its all happening right now.

Every tweet has its time and place, and I’m writing this blog specifically to address the in-game Tweet. If you work for a sports team, department or league as a PR professional, social media community manager, or “team tweeter”, here are some tips on how to write better in-game tweets to help communicate with your fan base. We’ll address:


1. Pre-Game Basics
2. In-Game Updates
3. Post-Game Follow Up

Introduction

Twitter is succinct and it’s real-time. Fans want expect that their team provide pre-game information, live updates in-game and final game scores. But all too often, here’s where sports teams go wrong. “Quantity over quality” is the current trend. Teams pump out as many tweets in-game as they can muster, often saying things like “Press 1v1″, or even “Jon. Busch.”.

If you know that Christen Press is a standout forward at Stanford University or that Jon Busch is a stellar goalkeeper at the San Jose Earthquakes, you can probably already guess that they’re making some good plays on the pitch, but that’s about it. There’s no context – What was the result of the play? What minute of the game are you in? Who are you playing?

Just because the information on Twitter passes more quickly and in fewer characters doesn’t mean it’s less important. In fact, incorrectly tweeting can be a recipe for total disaster. Every. Word. Counts.

1. The Pre-Game Basics.

Help your fans get the information they need to follow the game properly. Here’s an example of a pre-game tweet:
Things to include:

• Twitter handles of both teams. Fans may want to follow or engage with more dialogue than just yours.
• Additional Twitter resources a fan might want in the game, like hashtags, coaches’ and players’ Twitter handles, etc.
• How long until the game begins, because when is just as important as who, what, why, when, where and how.
• Links to useful information. Help your fans enjoy the game online, and of course encourage them to visit your team website or purchase tickets.

More Pre-Game Tips:

Leave room for Retweets: There is nothing that validates you as a good tweeter more than being retweeted by your followers, however if you make your tweets too long you significantly lower the chances of people retweeting you. Additionally, the more folks retweet your messages, the more likely they’ll follow your team’s Twitter feed themselves. Since Twitter only allows tweets of 140 characters that means your tweet needs to be short enough to still allow [RT @username] to be added to the front of it. Note the graphic below, “Average Word Occurance”, which demonstrates that people are more likely to RT tweets that were originally under 20 words.

Here’s a great resource on the Science of Retweets from Social Media Scientist Dan Zarella, “All About Retweets.”

Post links and *CHECK THEM*: To help your fans find the pre-game info, you may need to guide them to a press release, roster sheet or other link. Use a link-tracking service like http://bit.ly will help you measure how many people clicked that link, but importantly, make sure the link works. There’s nothing more frustrating for a fan who’s actually taken the effort to click than to get a 404 error, and to be frank, little that makes you look worse as a sports team/organization.

2. The In-Game Updates.

This is where Twitter seems to go a bit off track for most folks. I strongly urge all my fellow team employees heed the following advice.

• *Always* start with the time in the game.
• Include the current score.
• Include the Twitter handle of the opponent.
• Include proper #hashtags.

Listen, I’m a fan and I love my teams. But when I have a 20 Tweets coming into my home page every couple of minutes, the last thing I want to do is dig through your blur of incomprehensible messages to try and guess how long the match has been going on for, what the current score is, or for that matter, who the opponent is. Go ahead and add color commentary, but within that, I want expect my sports team to make this information as accessible as possible at all times. Leave the one-liners for the fans.

More In-Game Tips:


Edit your tweets: Just because Twitter is only 140 characters doesn’t mean that spelling, grammar, and clarity don’t matter. In fact, they matter more because you’re trying to communicate in such a compact space. Before you hit publish, read that tweet over just one more time to catch any obvious grammar mistakes or misspellings (your players’ parents are reading your Twitter too!). It just takes a second and ensures you’re sending out a professional-sounding message – each of your Tweets represents the team, department or league you’re tweeting for.

Use appropriate hashtags (or make up your own): Hashtags create a huge opportunity if you implement them well. For example, they’re perfect for sports because they allow you to be part of focused conversations or track games and events. Recently I’ve noticed folks using #team1vsteam2 for in-game tweets. Here’s a cool resource: http://hashtags.org/ for your hashtagging (new word?).

3. The Post-Game Follow-Up.

Sure, in-game conversation and key events throughout a contest are vital. But there is so much more opportunity to inform, support and engage your fans after a game than I currently see being utilized. I’m finding that once a game has ended, many social community managers tweet out the final score and walk away from their laptops like their job is over. Instead, consider including these things in your Twitter feed as quickly as you can post-game.

• Indicate that the match has ended.
• Post the final score.
• Include the Twitter handle of the opponent.
• List the goal scorers, include Twitter handles of people involved in the match whenever possible.
• Include proper #hashtags.
• Inform if there are playoff or standing implications of the result.
• Provide information about where and when additional bits will become available.
• Post links to photo galleries, press releases, highlight videos and more.

More Post-Game Tips:

Be timely: The immediacy of Twitter is what makes it such a useful tool for sports teams, where fans want to know “what happened tomorrow”. Satisfy their need by posting as soon as that final whistle blows to earn a good reputation and the trust of your fan base.
Write catchy headlines: Ultimately, sports teams want to drive users to a website, get them to purchase tickets or tune into to television coverage (conversion events that are directly tied to revenue). Much of good Tweeting is tied to the ability to write great engaging headlines and get people clicking on your links. But with 140 characters, there’s only room for the set up. Learn to write the types of headlines to get more from less. Here’s a resource I refer to often, 10 Sure-Fire Headline Formulas That Work.”

Conclusion

Hopefully you’ve found this blog useful. I’d love to learn more about how folks in sports are using Twitter, and if you think these guidelines are realistic and helpful for in-game messaging.

In all my Tweeting-about, I have found a team who’s Tweet-style I really admire, the Seattle Sounders of Major League Soccer. Have a look at how they structure their messages, both in-game and post-game, for some valuable insight. Happy Tweeting!