How should teams handle negative fan feedback in social media?

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Permalink Reply by Robert K Sebbale on June 18, 2011 at 9:47am

Hi Tim,

 

There is very little choice for teams in the modern world. Social Media is here with us and teams have to leave with it. The teams therefore have to be proactive and deal with negative information that is being put out about them. I can see you referring to them as teams as opposed to clubs. In football for example a team is what you watch and you are not part of, and a club is what you are part of. In a club you belong. You are part of the day to day activities though indirectly, through constant communication from the management. A team would therefore suffer more than a club, when bad information is put out about it. This is because more often than not people who flame the team are those who actually support it but they are unhappy about what is going on. A club would avoid this situation by engaging these disgruntled members. They would be told that they are in it together and they help the club best when they deal with the issues internally.

 

There are many organizations - brands that have teams of people that are paid on a full time basis to deal with bad posts on the internet. They wake up in the morning and search the net for all the bad posts about the brand and answer to it in the most convincing way possible. They often do this by pretending to offer independent views as though they are normal customers with a differing experience. This also true with governments. Teams can employ this strategy as well.

 

I hope this helps.

 

Robert K Sebbale

Fan Relationship Expert

Football Marketing Specialist

www.footballmarketing.biz

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Permalink Reply by E.P. (Eric) Rhodes on June 23, 2011 at 1:58pm

The NBA's social media war room model is one that all sports teams should use. I don’t think it can be said any better than this:

Don't join the conversation. Create the conversation.

Sports are about two things: cheering your team, and ridiculing your opponent. Twitter is especially heavy on the latter. That's why trending topics are often negative: "Dirk NoRingski" was big during Game 1, making fun of Mavs star Dirk Nowitzki for his lack of championship hardware. Some of the top trending topics during Game 2 included unkind words for The Heat.

This puts the NBA in a tricky position. "Our objective is to engage basketball fans globally on a digital conversation," Brenner said. But it doesn't promise to jump in on every fan comment or trending topic, lest it risk being accused of ignoring thornier moments (like a player scandal or a ref's bad call) that the league would prefer to handle more diplomatically.

The social media team's solution: Only engage fans in conversations that the NBA starts.

Before the game, one of the guys tweeted, "The key for the Dallas #Mavs in tonight's #NBAFinals Game 2 is________?" The predictable responses roll in. One fan tweets, "don't show up." The NBA guy likes @sirleemason15's response--"their bench"--and retweets it. Now the conversation is self-contained: The NBA asked for a response, got it, and engaged fans. The league stays above the fray.

After the game, as we sat in a room full of computers, one of the social media guys received an email with a list of current trending topics. It included the usual scuff, and then this name: Brian Cardinal. He's a benchwarmer on the Mavs who got a rare, single minute of gametime, which was exciting enough for fans to cheer him with keyboards.

"That's the most useful one in this email," the social media guy told me.

Again, the NBA won't engage this directly: It doesn't want to be in the habit of responding to trending topics. But he'll likely slip Cardinal's name into a tweet soon enough, just to play into the conversation.

 

Excerpted from “Rules Of Engagement, From The NBA Social Media War Room” -Fast Company, by Jason Feifer

Originally posted on LinkedIn.

 

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Permalink Reply by Tim McGarry on June 23, 2011 at 4:13pm

Great find Eric.  

 

It's inevitable that some fans will post negative comments.  It simply comes with the territory.  However, by "only engaging fans in the converstions that the NBA starts," these comments are effectively silenced without explicity deleting them.

 

I would expect more teams (and businesses, for that matter) to adopt a similar policy.

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Permalink Reply by E.P. (Eric) Rhodes on June 24, 2011 at 10:32am

Thanks Tim. I agree that more teams will adopt this approach, but I don't think it's an approach that silences a fans comments in an way.

 

The fans voice plays an integral role in the social media landscape and with this approach the fans can continue to make their comments, having an impact on the global conversation. However, a team might choose to engage negative comments on their own terms. It doesn't mean their actively choosing to silence negative comments, just that they are creating a self-contained conversation in which they can respond to them. I use this example of a fictional baseball team on LinkedIn. I think it also applies here:

One person complaining about their kid falling down steep steps at a venue isn't an issue that necessarily needs an immediate social media response. It could be something that's handled discretely between the team and the parent. But, if the steep stairs is a trending topic for months with thousands of people talking about it, and it's continues to gain momentum, then there might actually be a serious issue with the steps. So what do you do?

A baseball team might announce a press conference regarding the steep steps and possible solutions to fix it. They could live tweet from the press conference. Then after the press conference they can start a conversation by asking "What did you think about the team's possible solutions?"

So, the team has turned negative fan feedback about the venue into a self-contained conversation in which they can respond on their own terms.

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Permalink Reply by Steve Harbula on June 23, 2011 at 5:03pm

I've believed for a long time that the return on participating in discussions where you're trying to change opinions is minimal.  Yes, it's valuable for a club to know if everyone hates the head coach or thinks the beer prices at the stadium are too high.  But it's going to be hard to change minds.  Where I think teams have more opportunity is in correcting misinformation.  If someone's misstating facts, having an official representative chime in with, "Actually, blah blah blah" lets people know you're engaged and keeps the team in a position that's hard to challenge.

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Permalink Reply by E.P. (Eric) Rhodes on June 24, 2011 at 10:54am

Hi Steve, these are great points you bring up. I agree that social media is a great place for correcting misinformation. But, do professional teams really attempt engage negative fan comments with the specific intention to change minds through social media? If this is their current approach, then I think they can learn a thing or two from the NBA's approach. What do you think?

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Permalink Reply by Steve Harbula on July 14, 2011 at 1:51pm

Agreed, Eric.  If you want to influence opinion, leading the discussion rather than following it is a better way to go.

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