I admit it. I’m one of the millions of sports industry professionals who’s jumped on the Twitter bandwagon with both feet. In a previous blog post, I gushed over the unique reach Twitter offers sports PR and marketing pros and went on about the fabulous new ways athletes and sports organizations can connect with fans thanks to the new micro blog.
Not that I still don’t recognize and appreciate the immense impact of Twitter, but a couple of recent events in the world of sports, involving Twitter, has made me step back and reevaluate some things.
What makes Twitter such a powerful tool is its easy use and access coupled with its tremendous reach – a public relations practitioner’s dream.
But it can just as easily become a nightmare if Twitter falls into the wrong hands.
Two recent examples of this involve St. Louis Cardinals manager Tony La Russa and new University of Tennessee football head coach Lane Kiffin.
You may have read about La Russa and his recent lawsuit with Twitter. The case stems from a Twitter account setup impersonating the manager with the sole purpose of embarrassing him. The imposter made inappropriate posts on the account and passed them off as La Russa’s opinions and thoughts.
One of the malicious Tweets was: “Lost 2 out of 3, but we made it out of Chicago without one drunk driving incident or dead pitcher.” (referring to La Russa’s previous drunk driving arrest and the death of Cardinals pitcher Josh Hancock, who died in a drunk driving accident in 2007).
La Russa is not the first sports celebrity victimized by a phony Twitter account. Shaquille O’Neal also had an unauthorized account setup in his name before he countered the bogus Tweets by setting up his own account and then openly promoting himself on Twitter.
Ironically, Shaq is now praised as one of the first sports personalities to embrace Twitter.
The second example of “Twitter Gone Wrong” is a case where the powerful PR tool fell into the hands of a person who has no business operating a communications instrument of any kind.
Lane Kiffin, an outspoken and controversial character, took over the Vols’ football program in December and has been taking verbal swings at everyone within a 500-mile radius of Knoxville ever since.
Kiffin’s already committed numerous NCAA (minor) violations with his brash style, one them resulting from Kiffin bragging via Twitter.
A few weeks ago Kiffin tweeted about a recruit who had verbally committed to his program. It turns out college coaches are prohibited from publicly discussing, in any fashion, a recruit that hasn’t officially signed a letter-of-intent. So, as a result, UT violated an NCAA rule and the program will now face the consequences.
I’m sure the repercussions from the NCAA and the subsequent negative PR won’t matter much to Kiffin, but it does hurt the University and its athletic department.
UT’s sports information office most likely media trains its coaches and athletes and keeps strong tabs on all media communications involving its sports programs. But Twitter is a whole different animal to control, and SID offices and PR departments have to recognize this and adjust accordingly.
With La Russa’s situation, it might not be fair to say he or the Cardinals should of prevented the phony Twitter account. But a big part of PR is the continuous research and pursuit of knowledge of emerging media technologies and preparing accordingly.
Basically, you have to know your industry and be prepared.
The PR people with the Cardinals and UT athletics were not, and it hurt them.
Twitter is absolutely a fantastic PR tool and, when leveraged properly, can really bolster your PR efforts. But at the same time, because of the very same reasons that makes it so great, Twitter can sneak up and bite you when you’re not prepared.
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