NCSA College Athletic Scholarships Blog

Is your program using every social networking tool available?  If you’re not on the cutting edge, you’re missing out.  Just like text-messaging became an essential tool 5 years ago, social media tools like Facebook and Twitter are becoming indespensible tools today.  In a survey of over 10,000 student athletes NCSA found that 52.6% would like to follow college coaches on Facebook. 

One coach who clearly understands the potential power of Social Media is Southern California Head Football Coach Pete Carroll.  USC has a blog, Facebook page, and a Twitter account.  He uses all of the services to promote all things Southern Cal Football and his pitch to recruits, “Win Forever.” They give him the ability to leverage technology to quickly reach a huge audience, yet communicate in an authentic voice.  Rather than subjecting himself to a 30 second sound bite on ESPN, he controls the message of his program.

 

While most coaches have heard of Facebook, another tool that is emerging as a potentially great tool for college coaches is Twitter.  So what exactly is Twitter?

Twitter is a mass messaging service that allows you to send short 140 character or less updates to the web.  Those “tweets” form over time to create what looks like a series of short blog posts.  People on the web can choose to follow your updates and they will see them on their home screen.

Still don’t get it?

What makes Twitter special is its unique simplicity.   Combined with its mobile phone compatibility it allows coaches the opportunity to update quickly and frequently.  Fans, alumni and most importantly recruits will feel more connected to your program.

Another unique feature of Twitter that could be extremely beneficial to coaches is the ability to reply to other “tweets.”  A recruit could ask a coach a question and the coach could respond either directly via message or by tagging a reply in their next post.

If this sounds too difficult consider the fact that many schools as well as the NCAA are already on Twitter.  The Michigan Golf, Tennis, and Rowing teams joined just this week!  Can your program afford to not join in?

This entry was posted on Friday, February 22nd, 2008 at 5:55 pm and is filed under Athletic Scholarships. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.