A Giant Step

First and foremost, I'm back.

I can't believe I haven't blogged since January 2009. I thought about deleting that entry after reading it over, but I figured that would be wrong.

Why did I stop blogging? Many reasons. My father passed away in March of 2009 and I went into a funk. When I'm at work, ideas come to me without much problem, but at home, the few times I tried to blog, I just couldn't come up with anything to say.

Then it hit me - I'm overthinking.

Some of my friends (@carrieimpactpr, @agustinap) challenged me to get it going once again. One of my friends (@jarret23) started his blog a week ago and has cranked out about one entry a day and is doing great coming up with ideas.

So I decided it's important for me to do this for myself and not get hung up on whether I have the perfect topic.

Which brings me to the San Francisco Giants and their April 30 Tweetup.

Surfing the internet this past weekend, I stumbled across the ad to the right. For $20 on April 30 in San Francisco, a fan would receive:

• Panel discussion with social media experts (which, it turns out, one of whom is one of the Twitter co-founders)
• First 1,000 fans receive official "Follow Us" Tweetup T-Shirt
• Private pre-game Tweetup Party
• Seats in the special Tweetup section
• Partial Proceeds go to a local non-profit

When I saw this, the first thought that came to mind: BRILLIANT.

Finally, a sports team came up with a way to marry two things that benefit them in the long run: Putting a fair value on a package that would cause them to make money, and reaching out to a community of passionate fans who probably follow the Giants online, like I do with the #Rays.

The full details: http://sanfrancisco.giants.mlb.com/sf/ticketing/special_events/tweetup.jsp

What struck me as interesting about this is that Sarah Talalay, the talented Sports Business Writer from the South Florida Sun-Sentinel writer, wrote a front-page sports story about our four local South Florida sports teams in March 2009, and the only team at that time with any true social media presence was the Miami Heat.

It's 13 months later, and when I reached out to all four sports teams (@MHEAT, @Marlins411, @MiamiDolphins, @FlaPanthers), three of them were kind enough to let me know they are researching ways to continue increasing their social media activities with their fans.

The bottom line: Anything that makes people feel part of a community and creates goodwill between a sports team and its fans is greatly appreciated.

The race is on - which South Florida team will be the first to take advantage?