Why Michigan Basketball Won on Twitter

Last night the Louisville men’s basketball team and Michigan men’s basketball team played on the biggest stage college basketball has to offer; millions of people tuned in to watch the top-notch programs compete for the NCAA men’s basketball title.

Since the programs had a captive audience last night, I was interested to see how they would capitalize on the excitement throughout social media. So, I decided to pay close attention to how the programs handled themselves on Twitter.

If the programs were judged by their Twitter game alone, Michigan won. Below are my thoughts on how each program handled coverage on Twitter during the championship game and why Michigan stole the Twitter show.

Louisville’s Coverage:
Louisville men’s basketball does not have a solo Twitter account, so there were two places they pushed out information: @UofLSports (main athletic department account) and @ULFlyingCard (social media director account).

The bulk of their championship game content was shared from the @ULFlyingCard account and it consisted mainly of on the court photos, student-athletes taking the court, etc. It wasn’t until the time clock was at zero and Louisville had sealed the deal that a tweet even emerged from their main account (@UofLSports) of the championship game.  While the content from @ULFlyingCard was great, I had no idea this account even existed until after the game. I watched the entire game thinking U of L had simply neglected men’s basketball on Twitter.

The bottom line:

• While the @ULFlyingCard account sent out some great, branded content, few people actually saw it. The @ULFlyingCard account has 3,900 followers, while the @UofLSports account has more than 30,000. Why not put your best content where your audience is?
• It’s great when companies have employee accounts to humanize their organization, but those accounts shouldn’t trump the main accounts. For an athletic department the bulk of content should come from the sport account or main athletic department account, not from the account of a SID, administrator or social media manager.
• If Louisville’s strategy is to use the @ULFlyingCard account for pictures and behind-the-scenes photos, and they aren’t willing to stray from that, then they need to be sure to cross-promote on their main @UofLSports account once or twice. I’m sure I’m not the only one who had no idea @ULFlyingCard existed. 
• Louisville understands good content. I love the graphics they put out- they’re professional, consistent and a great brand enhancer. I simply wish Louisville would see the value of their main account (or the value of creating a basketball account) to get the most eyes possible on their content and story.

Michigan’s Coverage:
Michigan does not have an athletic department account; instead, they tap into niche audiences with accounts for each sport. So, because of that, all of their content on Twitter was pushed out from their men’s basketball account (@umichbball).  The account has 64,000+ followers, so their account strategy seems to be working.

Michigan’s coverage was the complete opposite of Louisville’s- they tweeted photos, behind-the-scenes content, game stats, play-by-play, Vines, commentary… you name it, they probably tweeted it.

The bottom line:

• Michigan got it right with the bulk of their content.  After following them last night, it seems very clear the person handling the social media account has inside access to the team. Exactly what you want.
• Variety is always good and Michigan had a great mix of content from photos to Vines to stats.
• Their pre-game content was top-notch. They counted down the hours the game began with great graphics, they showed the student-athletes eating their “championship meal” before the game, they gave fans a peek inside the locker room, etc.
• The one thing I feel like Michigan could have stayed away from was the play-by-play. When you are on a national stage like like the NCAA Men’s Final Four, there are too many outlets for fans to follow along. With a national televised event, you should find a way to enhance the TV viewing experience, not compete with it.
• If you are going to do play-by-play, you need to add some color commentary; talk about how a big play shook the house, a coache’s reaction, etc. This will add more value to your fans.
• Finally, Michigan handled their loss with grace. They congratulated Louisville on a great game (which got 1140 RTs by the way), thanked the players, fans and coaches for a great season and ended the night with a tweet that said “Forever Go Blue”. Seamless.

The Stats Say It All:
In the end, Louisville’s tweets from both accounts received close to 1,200 total retweets (from 51 tweets), while Michigan’s tweets received more than 24,800 retweets (from 97 tweets). I’d say the numbers speak for themselves.

What do you guys think? What kind of Twitter coverage would you like to see from schools during big games and championship events? 

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