360DigitalInfluence

This weekend saw the New York Knicks host what they billed as the first ever fan #tweetup, at their home court, the legendary Madison Square Garden here in New York City. They put together a very impressive panel to chat social media and catch a game, and really pulled out all the stops: three big screens broadcasting tweets, official #tweetup t-shirts and those cute little tweetup nametag stickers.  The event was sponsored by Discount Tire: definitely a little different than your run of the mill ‘few folks in a bar’ #tweetup.

The panel featured Amy Jo Martin, head honcho of @digitalroyalty (the folks who did, among other things Random Acts of Shaqness),  Peter Robert Casey ( the first ever media accredited micro-blogger, he covers St John’s basketball here: @Peter_R_Casey), Jim DeLorenzo (a VP at Octagon, the guys who have developed Twackle, a sports tweet aggregator), and Jack Dorsey* (founder of Twitter and Square).  Three sports/marketing folks, and one guy who hand in inventing (or popularizing, depending on how you look at it) micro-blogging. A serious panel indeed.

After some opening words from Howard Jacobs, Sr VP Marketing & Ticket Sales for MSG Sports**, things kicked off with intros and powerpoints from the panelists.  Somewhat of an unusual start, and one that I didn’t personally care much for in truth (I would have preferred that they get straight to the discussion), but the assembled peeps were certainly left in no doubt as to the credentials of those on the panel.  With that out of the way we got into the meat of the event: a spirited and lively discussion on the state of social media in sports and beyond, and the Knicks’ plans for the future.  Although I was a little critical of the first half (it felt like a missed opportunity to me to have that expertise without maximizing the audience’s interaction with them), it was pretty cool to see how engaged everyone was once the panelists got chatting.

Jordan (he of @thenyknicks) did a really good job moderating the event, and there were some great and varied questions from the audience.  It’s very clear that the sports industry is starting to embrace social media, and the Knicks are without a doubt one of the teams leading the charge. Kudos to the organization for having the guts both put on such an event, and to embrace change with such gusto. Nobody has all the answers just yet, but the Knicks and the folks on their panel at #NYKTweetup are certainly helping get us there. It’s going to be interesting to see how it continues to develop in this most unique of areas: sports fans are like no other audience. We know everything, are rarely happy, and are never short of opinions.

My 2 cents on where things are going in this space: social is in no small part about empowering individuals and any brand that chooses to engage needs to be prepared to relinquish a certain amount of control, so it will be particularly fascinating to see how an industry that is perceived to so much about control (ticket prices, contracts, restricted free agency, broadcast rights and so on) adapts to this new world. Fans are going to require more than behind the scenes access, we’re going to want to be heard, and to be given a meaningful stake in the team we support.

Congrats to the NYKnicks for having the guts to dive headlong into it, and on hosting a great event. Looking forward to the next one

@PhilCatelinet’s pics from the event here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/catelinp/sets/72157623523695882/

@amandarykoff‘s pics from the event here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/amandarykoff/sets/72157623399427947/

Panel discussion ustream here: http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/5061506

*As a sidenote: I also got to see Jack’s new venture, @square in action, and it’s absolutely mind-blowing. Effortless & elegant, it’s a real game changer imo.  More on that here.

** ‘lil edit/correction thanks to @digitalroyalty.  Thanks Amy