There’s a lot to learn from the NHL’s 2015 content marketing hits. Our top five insights dive into how to make compelling content.
Last week, we looked at which hockey teams were driving the most web traffic from their social media channels.
Hockey teams are already the most social U.S. sports teams on Twitter, tweeting 25% more than the runner-up, basketball. Social media brings the game closer to fans than ever before.
“The ability for [fans] to connect with us and with each other through social media has, I believe, helped grow not only the NHL, but the game of hockey,” said NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman.
The hockey teams with a steady stream of content create more opportunities to engage and share. But that content has to be of a quality that catches fans’ attention and inspires them to like, click, and comment.
So how do teams do it?
We take a look at the top five tactics that NHL teams use on social to produce enjoyable and share-worthy content for their fans.
Use Stunning Visuals
All of the sports franchises are suited to producing visual content, but hockey is an especially fast-paced, action-packed game. The NHL’s product is their content, from coverage of games, to recaps and commentary pieces. Visuals capturing the emotion of the game keep the fans buzzing even after the game.
Rich media works across all the big platforms. As an added bonus, many need no captions. This is especially convenient for teams like the Montreal Canadiens. The French/English team even bridges their audience’s language gap through emojis.
For those who play fantasy hockey, or are just data buffs, having shareable stats visuals is another way to engage them.
[fb_pe url=”https://www.facebook.com/canadiensmtl/posts/987191698004841:0″ bottom=”30″]
Visual content doesn’t only have to be about the game. The Chicago Blackhawks Pinterest has over 15.5k followers. Pinterest has been a surprising success for the NHL. Going off of what’s already popular on Pinterest, two of the team’s boards include Blackhawks Weddings and Hockey Watching Snacks.
Get off the Ice
This leads into our next winning tactic. Successful, engaging content goes beyond the game. Social media is 24/7 and there is no off-time. Fans expect to get updates about their teams anytime they want.
Again one of our prime examples, the Montreal Canadiens regularly engage in philanthropy. The Canadiens host charity events such as blood drives, visit children’s’ hospitals, and donate holiday gifts to underserved children. These acts, supporting the local community, all are promoted on social media.
[bctt tweet=”Social media never sleeps. @NHL teams keep up by showing their team’s action off the ice”]
Even content as casual as showing athletes hanging out in the locker rooms gives fans a view into what their favorite players are like off the ice.
Responding to current events is another way the teams can interact outside of the game.
In November, the Canadiens’ biggest social content on Facebook was updating the team profile picture to the colors of the French flag following the terrorist attacks in Paris. The photo received over 66,000 engagements on Facebook. Likewise, the team’s biggest content on Instagram was a photo of a rink made of red, white, and blue ice, the colors of the French flag. The photo received over 18,000 likes. This data comes from our Spike platform.
Going beyond game content humanizes the team’s brand and transforms them from an impersonal entity to something fans feel they have a relationship with.
Flaunt Your Personality
Social media gives teams the chance to establish a unique voice, one that resonates with fans and further builds a connection to the team.
Like we talked about in our NHL traffic breakdown, the Los Angeles Kings are champions at this. Their snarky and toeing-the-line posts provide entertaining interactions between fans and the team.
One of their hottest posts on Instagram in the past month was a provocative post with the caption, “If you look closely you can actually pinpoint the exact moment his heart breaks in two.”
They amp up that sass with their rivalry with the Edmonton Oilers. The smack talk on Twitter is embellished with gifs, videos, and as always, cheeky captions.
Not only do the Los Angeles Kings build a reputation of being confident and boisterous, but this attitude hypes up their fans for the game. The entertainment and tantalizing nature of the posts also ups the likelihood of sharing.
Let the Players Engage
Giving the team a voice is one thing, but letting the players themselves use their voice is even more personal. Fans crave inside scoops and access to players. No longer are players kept as entities only existing during game time.
For players whose heads are usually kept inside helmets, they can now interact with their fans. As we saw on Reddit, the personal Q&A with Red Wings Darren McCarty was one of the most engaging pieces in the team’s subreddit.
Twitter remains the most popular place for players to engage with fans, and often uncensored. Roberto Luongo of the Florida Panthers runs the twitter handle @strombone1, where he provides some very entertaining tweets that can’t be shared on this blog in good conscience.
Luongo has over 580,000 followers on his Twitter account. With hashtags, emojis, and bawdy content, he’s on top of the Twitter game
Some of these player interactions can used for good. In 2013, after getting hit in the face with a puck, Chicago Blackhawks center Andrew Shaw decided to auction off his stitches. The sale fetched $6,500 dollars, all donated to cancer research. Shaw regularly tweets about causes and retweets his fans’ own philanthropic efforts.
[bctt tweet=”Shoutout to @shawz15er and @strombone1 for engaging with their @NHL fans! #doingitright”]
Make Fans Part of the Team
Twitter’s a great way to engage with fans, but it’s not the only way. Remember those Pinterest boards we were talking about earlier? They source content from users on Pinterest and fans from around the web. It’s an amazing thrill for fans to be featured by their favorite team.
Though not specific to any team, the NHL ran a successful campaign using the #myplayoffmoments, where viewers were encouraged to share video of their own experience while watching the game. Included are reactions, footage of impassioned crowds, and even a triumphant baby fist-pumping.
Social also allows fans to find a broader community than ever before. The NHL team websites incorporate Facebook’s comment plugin, meaning that fans can discuss content with their fellow zealots right on the page.
Meanwhile on Snapchat, users have the chance of their videos and images being included in the curated official NHL snap story.
All of this deepens fan engagement, as it builds community and strengthens personal investment in the team. Fans are actively spending time creating content and sharing their opinions.
What to Know
All of that social engagement doesn’t just come down to the teams. The NHL itself does a lot of social media campaigning. Their Clincher Cards campaign, which is now a case study on Hootsuite, saw a 116% increase in Facebook referral traffic to the NHL’s website during the campaign. The campaign took the appeal of hockey trading cards and turned it into a social spree of shareable, collectible graphics.
When it comes to sports, there is value in each layer producing content: the franchise, the teams, the players, and the fans. The more impassioned the fans, the more of a self-sustaining cycle emerges, where emboldened fans get inspired by content, and like, share, and create even more content.
[bctt tweet=”NHL teams score on social by rewarding fans for their passion #sportsmarketing”]
In an increasingly mobile-first world, fans expect to be able to instantly engage. Instead of being sated by the already abundant social content, fans hunger for more and more interaction with teams. The NHL recognizes that through staying abreast the evolving social landscape. Earlier this year, the league partnered with GoPro to provide first-person views right from the action of the game.
The top hockey teams know their fans and what they want. The fans then feast on their content.
Next time, we’ll crunch the numbers and rank NHL teams by total social engagement on their content.
What’s Next:
1) See what your team’s fastest trending content is with a free trial of Spike
2)
