The Right Way to Celebrate a Birthday

Birthdays are a big moment in anyone's life. Friends and family come together to celebrate the special day. Unless you are an athlete, in which case you also celebrate with the multitude of fans you have on social media. Most fans will wish 'Happy Birthday' via a post or tweet and never hear back from the athlete personally.

Of course, it is unreasonable to assume an athlete has the time to look through or respond to each birthday wish. So how can athletes use their birthday to help build their online brand with their fans?

Take a look at soccer/fútbol star Ricardo Kakà for inspiration.

The athlete celebrated his 32nd birthday earlier this week, and of course the birthday wishes came rolling in from all corners of the globe. But, someone on his social media team came up with a genius idea: have fans create birthday cards and submit them to be posted on Facebook to surprise the star with.

The idea was spread on his Facebook, Twitter and Instagram accounts and photos were posted in a Facebook album within minutes. As of this posting, there were more than 185 birthday cards wishing Kaka a happy birthday, varying from handwritten letters to various pieces of art.

Social media specialists can learn plenty from what the '#KKTeam' did. 

First off, post as many responses as possible. The more people involved in something like this, the greater the success. 

Second, and most importantly, make sure to monitor the responses before posting. As Mark Emmert and his team learned, such social media experiments can go downhill quickly. You need to make sure that you do not post anything negative and (preferably) avoid as many grammatical errors as possible. 

Finally, advertise as much as possible on as many venues as possible. Even if the event takes place on Facebook, try to find ways to spread the word on other social media sites as well. Talk about it on Twitter, Instagram, Google+, Reddit and everything in between. 

So, to summarize: monitor your responses, post or highlight as many as possible and advertise the event as much as you can. Thanks #KKTeam for the lesson. And a belated happy birthday to you Kakà.

Social Sitdown with: Devils Illustrated and Mountaineers Illustrated's Brian McLawhorn

In the first in the 'Social Sitdown' series on the The Social Sideline, Brian McLawhorn of DevilsIllustrated.com and MountaineersIllustrated.com sat down to talk about how social media has changed the sporting world.

Russell Varner: First, tell us a little bit about yourself and what you do.

Brian McLawhorn: My name is Brian McLawhorn, and I am the publisher for DevilsIllustrated.com and MountaineerIllustrated.com, affiliate websites of Yahoo! Sports and Rivals.com. I have been with Rivals.com for 11 years.

RV: How has social media changed your job/what you do?

BM: Social media has changed the sports industry in a huge way. For me, it has changed how we have to report the news and events surrounding Duke and Appalachian State sports. When I first began with Rivals.com and Yahoo! Sports, social media was not what it is today. Athletes were not heavily involved with social media, at least as a form to put out information about their recruitment, games, etc. Fans looked to us as journalists to provide that information through interviews and evaluations. When a recruit announced his decision to attend a particular school, fans would hang on to every word we said - we could truly use the news as a marketing component and increase subscription numbers significantly if a recruit had a high enough profile.

Once social media began to gain popularity, recruits started using it as a tool to update fans themselves, on their time. Subscriptions began to steadily decline because fans no longer needed to rely on us for the information - it was coming straight from the horses mouth and for free.

That forced us to reevaluate how we approach our business, and ultimately had to shift our business model from breaking news and updating statuses to evaluating and offering analysis. This approach helped slow the decline, but it certainly has not allowed us to recover as an industry and enjoy the level of success we did previously.

RV: How has social media changed the sporting world (in your mind)?

BM:It has closed the gap between the celebrity athlete and the regular, ordinary fan. Everyone has the opportunity to feel like their voice is being heard, and that there's an ability to interact directly with their favorite athletes.

When I was growing up, the only way you could connect with a professional athlete was to write a letter, send it to the organization and hope it made it into his hands. Now, fans can go directly to the source. It's really created a community that never existed before.

RV: What are the greatest strengths of social media?

BM: It depends on what lens you are looking through when answering this question. From a journalistic point of view it makes for tracking information a lot easier in some cases. The stories fall into your lap - you really don't have to dig quite as much for the stories. Certainly you have to in regards of getting the full details, but the stories themselves are right in front of you.

From a fans point of view, it's brilliant. The diehards can interact with one another. They can draw a closer connection with their favorite teams. It has really opened a whole new aspect of sport that I personally would never have imagined. Fans have an endless supply of information coming their way.

I think from an athlete's prospective, they have the ability to control their image a lot more than they could in the past. That's huge for athletes that feel as though they are misinterpreted through the media. It is a valuable tool for them to brand themselves how they want to. It also allows them to be as involved with their fan base as they want.

RV: What are the greatest dangers of social media?

BM: Again, I think it depends on the perspective you are looking at things through. From my viewpoint as a journalist, I think there are many dangers. It allows any random person to proclaim themselves to be a sports journalist, insider or expert. And as sad as it is to say, much of the general public is very naive and don't check the source in which they are getting their information. The next thing you know, rumors are spreading and true journalists are left cleaning up messes.

Thanks to social media, an extremely high percentage of what is being put out there is false information. I think that is very dangerous. It has the potential to ruin images and reputations.

It also allows for people to attack others and hide behind the anonymity of a username and never take accountability for things that are said. 

I could really go on forever with my thoughts on the dangers of social media from the angle of a journalist. Unfortunately, I don't think there's much of a way to regulate it and control the types of content that is put out.

RV: Talk about your favorite and least favorite aspects of social media.

BM: My favorite part of social media is the ability to interact with other fans and have real-time connections. I am also a big fan of the opportunity to get updated information instantly. I think there are a lot of benefits to be had with social media if it's used responsibly and I think it's a thing of beauty when it is used in that manner.

My least favorite aspect of it is the freedom to say whatever with no real consequences. I think it's a dangerous thing when people are not held accountable for what they say.

RV: What is the biggest piece of advice you would give fans on social media?

BM: The biggest piece of advice I can give fans using social media is to be smart about how you use it. Watch what you say. Make sure you have facts before making accusations and be aware of how what you say can impact others. I would also tell them not to blindly trust what they read without checking the source of the material and using some commonsense.

RV: What is the biggest piece of advice you would give athletes on social media?

BM: Be careful with what you say. It's out there and it can come back to haunt you if you're not careful. I personally feel like athletes, particularly college athletes, should steer clear of it. If you're a professional athlete, that's a different story. But college athletes play to a very passionate fanbase - particularly football and basketball. Opposing fans will try to bait you and set you up at times. If you feel the need to be on social media, ignore them. Don't respond. Be smart about how you use it and understand that people are watching and waiting for you to make a mistake.

RV: Where do you see the future of social media and sports going?

BM: That's a good question. I think the future will simply continue to grow the connection between fans and athletes. I don't see anything changing in regards to how social media is used. It's a forward moving industry, and I feel like athletes and fans will continue to embrace the control that is given to them through social media. I do fear, however, that fans will continue to grow more bold in how they use it and hope there are some ways of deterring such usage of social media. 

Follow Brian on Twitter at @DevilsIllust.

New Media Means New Interactions between Fans and Athletes

Miami Heat star poses with fans at an Ohio State game in a photo he posted on his Instagram account.

Obviously, social media has brought fans closer to their favorite athletes and teams than ever before. This also means that athletes are now able to connect with their fans (and those who are not such big fans of theirs) in ways that were never possible before. Some athletes use the new technologies to let fans know what is going on in their daily lives. Others still interact directly with their fans, engaging in everything from Reddit 'Ask Me Anything' sessions to spontaneously taking Twitter followers to dinner.

A screenshot of the top of Ricardo Kakà's Facebook page

Facebook could be called one of the originators of the social media. Taking notes from MySpace, Facebook is now one of, if not the, most popular websites in the world. Athletes will often have private Facebook profiles so that they are not bombarded daily by fans. For that, some players have created their own Facebook pages, such as Brazilian fútbol star Ricardo Kakà. As a worldwide star, Kakà has to cater to a fan base of more than 26 million fans on Facebook, and he does as fine a job as any catering to those fans. The page will often post "Words of Wisdom" or Bible passages because he is a very religious person. It provides photos of Kakà training and playing with his club, AC Milan, as well as gameday infographics and shots of him off the field with his family. In addition to all of this, the page includes links to other social media pages belonging to the soccer star and almost every post is in multiple languages to welcome fans from all over the world.

Though it is one of the newer social medias, athletes have taken to Instagram in full force, giving fans fancy filtered views into their lives (even if the posts have gotten slightly predictable). NBA players in particular seem to love the application, which took off during the 2012 Summer Olympics as the US Olympic team used Instagram to chronicle their time in London. Since that time, the league's two biggest stars, LeBron James and Kevin Durant, have embraced the site and frequently post to it, even though both are in the middle of playoff runs with their respective teams. Want to know if it is working? Then consider this: LeBron James posted a photo of his breakfast along the waterside, a basic photo on Instagram. As of this posting, the photo has more than 101,000 likes.

While social media has indeed brought players and fans closer than ever before, it has also given "trolls" and people who are not fans of a certain player a new avenue in which to communicate. This can often lead to some bad situations, such as players receiving death threats from fans due to one play in a game. Twitter is one of the worst when it comes to this, though most players will just ignore the "haters." Every now and then though, athletes will respond to this people and when they do, it usually ends poorly for the fan talking trash. Take Seattle Seahawks cornerback Richard Sherman. Remember him?

Well, following the Seahawks' victory over the Denver Broncos in the most recent Super Bowl (a game in which Sherman got injured), a fan decided he would voice his opinion on how Sherman deserved what he got (Warning: Includes NSFW language). Sherman went through all of his Twitter mentions after the Super Bowl win and thanked everyone, though he had something special for the fan who spoke ill of him.

If there was ever a textbook on how to deal with "trolls" online, this would surely make the book.

To summarize, athletes are still learning how exactly to use the various social medias available. And while much of what makes the news may be negative, there are still plenty of good seeds out there to outweigh and counter the bad seeds.

Sideline Scoop: First Take

So begins the first of a new installment called the 'Sideline Scoop,' highlighting multiple stories, graphics and everything in between from all corners of the Internet.

This week, we'll be taking a look at a previously mentioned article on fans' influence on the college recruiting process, athletes taking to social media to make major announcements and a look at how fans engage in social media.

1. Social distortion: Twitter has given fans direct access to recruits, for better or worse

 ESPN.com posted this article around a month ago, which talks about what athletes on Twitter currently deal when Signing Day approaches. The article gives readers a good idea of what it is like to be a recruit today and how they deal with all of the voices they hear on social media sites such as Twitter.

2. Richie Incognito returns to Twitter/Jeter announces retirement on Facebook

Two of the bigger stories in sports recently have been the Wells report on the interactions between Miami Dolphins teammates Richie Incognito and Jonathan Martin and Yankees captain and shortstop Derek Jeter announcing his retirement. The ESPN article looks at Incognito's final tweets before he quit the social media site and his first tweets when he returned to the site three days later. Meanwhile, Jeter's retirement alone would be a big story, but it became a big social media story when he made the announcement via his Facebook page. Who needs journalists to tell a story when you can do it yourself?

3. How Sports Fans Engage With Social Media

A PR firm called Catalyst put together an infographic on how sports fan engage with social media, showing that Google+ and YouTube are the fastest-growing social medias for sports fans. Find out more in this infographic via Mashable.