The days of “there’s
no such thing as bad publicity” are over in a world where transparency has
become so important to fans and sports organizations alike. For the most part,
social media is a compliment to sports the sports industry and organizations,
but don’t be fooled by social medias ability to fuel fan engagement and brand
loyalty so easily. Social media can easily present challenges in the sports
industry when it comes to legal action, athlete contracts, business management,
structure and decisions.
With just a few clicks, 140 characters, a photo/video or a
status update, a social media advocate can post a message to the digital
universe and instantaneously impact a business or organization. This becomes
ever so apparent when we look into the complicated and emotional world of
sports and the social media platforms that influential professional athletes
manage.
When it comes to business management structures, athlete’s
social media accounts aren’t the only things that raise a brow; fans at the
game can also cause sports organizations to be uneasy about the effortless,
un-boundless reach that social media platforms have via smartphones and tablets.
Its more and more common today that fans upload unauthorized live video content
to the internet or social media accounts that they’ve captured from their seats
at the stadium. With new shifts in technology, advertising and media rights
could become a major issue when discussing where to draw the line on fan
involvement and contract breaches. Public domain rights are going to be a hard
thing to hash out with teams, stadiums, advertisers, media rights holders and
fans while all in the same territory. The use of wireless devices like iPad’s
and mobile phones have created complex sponsorship and media rights issues that
could affect and are affecting hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue that
leagues, sponsors and rights holders need to manage and work though now and in
the future.
Sports organizations are increasingly recognizing social
media’s ability to critically damage a valuable reputation. There’s a long list
of cases in which damage was done to a sports organization’s reputation as a
consequence of an athletes improper use of social media. To avoid liability,
sports organizations should be proactive and implement strict policies that
directly relate to and address these potentially damaging statements. A written
social media policy along with expectations and guidelines should be included
into an athletes and coaches (along with all employees) contracts; these
policies should be strictly enforced and actively implemented on a consistent
basis.
Social media crises can get even more complex when legal
issues affect more then just the sorts organization itself. There are many
things that a sports organization can do in order to be proactive in managing/handling
these types of situations in the future. Organizations should waste no time in
developing and implementing social media crisis management plans. These plans
should be developed with the worst and most common situations to arise; be sure
to implement a plan that’s suitable for almost any situation. Things to
consider within this plan could and should be:
- - Management of cross-brand internal and external communications
- - Identify a trained spokesperson or people
- - Crisis management teams (how many? and who should be involved?)
- - Global crisis team vs. regional crisis team roles and actions.
Social media crisis are a real threat and this
threat is amplified each and every day with the growing popularity of social
media. Protecting and preparing your organization and other brands that could
be directly affected through a meticulously developed crisis management plan
helps to protect a brand’s lively hood and the online risks they face each and
every day.
