ESPN: “Worldwide Leader in Sports”…and Social Media?
ESPN. “The Worldwide Leader in Sports” seems to have begun making its push to become “The Worldwide Leader in Social Media Television” this past year. ESPN has taken a giant leap into the utilization of social media, infusing YouTube clips, tweets from athletes, and viewer-generated polls in many of its programs.
SportsNation is social media heavy
The first program I want to draw your attention to is SportsNation. If you have not yet seen this show, I highly recommend it. SportsNation is an absolute innovator for the integration of social media and television. This show is generated almost 100% off of viewer input. ESPN.com offers an interactive page for the show that is riddled with poll questions where you can vote and the resultant fan opinions dictate the flow of that day’s television show, influencing what issues are most talked about on SportsNation.
Not only does SportsNation’s website offer a series of daily polls, but it also includes an inbox to post your own sporting YouTube clips and provides space for fans to “post their own blog entries and go toe-to-toe with commentators.
ESPN’s flagship news program, SportsCenter, has also begun the transition to intertwining online media with television broadcasts. Twitter has become a vital resource for obtaining information. Tweets by athletes, coaches and the like have all appeared on SportsCenter newscasts. Twitter has proven to be a great avenue for gaining information and insight in an instantaneous fashion. ESPN has done a great job utilizing Twitter as an information source for their broadcasts. SportCenter has recently created feeds for their top stories and breaking news available to the public via Twitter and RSS.
Since its beginning, ESPN has been a one-way distributor of news and “expert” opinions. Now, with the integration of online social media and television broadcasts, the power has shifted to us, everyday viewers and sports fans. ESPN has empowered its target audience, an experiment that in my opinion, has worked brilliantly.
These programs are the first major step a sports-oriented network has taken to intertwine the two mediums, and so far ESPN and social media have proven to be nothing short of a match made in heaven. Job well done.
I think that with ESPN using more social network sites, and listeing to their viewers more, it will become even more liked among its audience. The fact that SportsNation is 100% from viewer input is a great advantage for both ESPN and the viewers. I think that the viewers will feel like they have a say in what ESPN is showing, and they will get a lot of loyal veiwers that are interested in interaction, and not just watching television. I also think that it is a great idea to use twitter to get quick little sports tidbits throughout the day. It is also a great idea to use for a big news story, like a star player getting traded, or a serious injury corrupting a key player’s chance to play. It will keep the followers interested in what ESPN will post next.
It seems like ESPN has done a great job at intertwining the 2 mediums. Having information available on TV and the internet gives ESPN’s audiences alternative ways of getting the information. Information such as breaking news and top stories is available both by appointment (on television) and by demand (on the internet). With these 2 major outlets being used it would probably be a little difficult to escape a ESPN breaking news story!
This blog post really gave me good insight as to how ESPN is using social media in sports. My current blog is all about Social Media and the Sports Industry. I visited SportsNation and found it some great resources regarding youtube clips and really focused on fans and gave them a place to communicate. I also agree that Twitter is really beneficial to athletes and coaches. It also gives fans a place to go to connect with their favorite teams and athletes. Social Media is creating an interactive network between TV network and sports and I enjoyed reading some of their tactics.
It is really cool that ESPN is combining TV with the Internet. In another SMAD class we were learning about remediation and how forms of communication either use old tactics to grab the audience’s attention or steal another’s tactics or create new tactics. I think this is an example of creating a new tactic because Twitter is collaborating with them to be put on TV. Since tweets about ESPN are updated consistently, fans could essentially use Twitter instead of going to the ESPN website. Before it was always us just watching ESPN and yelling at the TV when something bad happened but now we can just respond to ESPN Twitter comments personally.