Super Bowl XLVI is a Social Media Event
I’ve been writing about the role of social media in the Super Bowl for several years. It has included interesting tie-ins with advertising, mostly a lot of contests which have seemed to work for customer engagement even if they’ve produced some less-than-stellar ads (aren’t most of them anyway?). Then last year there was the advent of the brand social media control center. But this year is different.
Social media has become an integral part of sports. ’ve heard, for example, that players were be able to tweet from the sidelines of the Probowl. They couldn't bring their mobiles, but was a computer for their use on the sideline. Hope they remembered their passwords!
But there are some significant additions to the lineup that should work. The two things that seem most significant are:
• Live streaming of the event. Ad CPMs are high for this audience and only a few major advertisers seem to be taking the plunge. As many as 300 thousand viewers have watched streamed NFL games this season, so the size of the final audience will be interesting.
• The integrated use of social media by the host committee in Indianapolis. This is their “Get Connected” page. Take a look at the home page also. Its style is rather frenetic, but it makes the point they want the visitor to have an excellent game experience. According to Lisa Arthur writing in the Forbes blog the activities of the host committee include:
- Integration of on- and off-line experiences. The home page offers event info. If you can’t be there, you might enjoy the live web cams.
- A social media control center where they can listen to fan chatter and respond in real time. With almost 21 thousand Twitter followers and over 15 thousand Facebook likes as of Tuesday morning, they could be quite busy!
- Collaborated with the NFL on a single mobile app for the event
- Reached out to influential Indiana bloggers to promote the event activities and build the social network in advance of game day.
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