Mike Hill (@RMikeHill) was active on social media when he was Univ. of Florida Exec Associate AD/External Affairs, and since becoming Charlotte AD earlier this year, he has continued using Twitter to interact with fans and highlight plans for the school's athletic department. Hill: “Fans want to know you are not sitting in some ivory tower, that you are a real person and will engage with them.” An example of social media’s effectiveness came when Hill and his wife went on their honeymoon earlier this year. Hill calls it "Exhibit A of not taking yourself too seriously.” A fan commented that Hill should keep the beard he had grown. Hill: “My wife is as good of a fundraiser as you’ll be around. She said, 'If you guys pony up, he’ll keep the beard.'” Hill said he would keep the beard one day for every person who donated $49 to the athletic department’s official booster fund. His 62-day facial growth is nearing its expiration.
SOCIAL SNAPSHOT
Must-follows: I love following Jay Bilas. His stuff is always entertaining, compelling and insightful. Truth be told, if you are not following Wendy’s, come on. Someone is having a good time with that account. @edsbs. If you don’t follow him, you need to add him!
Favorite apps: Waze or Uber. Those are the two I use the most.
Average time per day on social media: That scares me to think. I don’t know if I want to add it up. In a typical day, a good hour a day if you add it up over the course of the day.
Lessons learned from AD Scott Stricklin while at Florida:
I was already a pretty heavy user of social media before Scott became our AD, but to watch him in that role use it as a great tool to communicate with Gator fans was enlightening. I try to take a lot of what I observed from Scott and apply it here.
On being more active on social media than his predecessor:
Our fans -- particularly our students and our young alums -- are excited to have an AD active on social media. That’s just the reality in today’s world. That is no slight on Judy Rose, who wasn’t active on social, or my previous boss at Florida, Jeremy Foley, who also was not active on social. There are a lot of different ways to do the job. From my perspective, I felt our fans were hungry for direct engagement, so the way to do that was to communicate with them. Have some fun. But social media still doesn't give a full portrayal of who someone is. There is still a filter there. It does provide a glimpse of who you are and what you are about. That might be what is most valuable about interacting with our fans.
Balancing promotion of the university itself and the athletic department:
Like with any medium, tone is important. It can really depend on what you are trying to portray to the public -- whether it is athletics or the university as a whole. There are certainly some times and areas when the two intersect and you can have a lighthearted, fun tone. There are other times when it’s more serious; you might be addressing a crisis. There are all sorts of key messages that require a more serious tone. Athletics lends itself more naturally to a conversational, fun tone, because sports provide an outlet. It’s a pastime for people.
Improving Charlotte's social media presence:
I give a lot of credit to our staff. They understood when I arrived that social media was going to be a key part of our strategy and were already working on creative ways to engage fans before I had to ask for that. From really fun and creative uniform reveals for our football program to some entertaining videos, we’ve taken a more lighthearted approach. People don’t just want to read stats and read news feeds. They are on social because they want to interact with the brand. They want to have fun with it. Our team has done a fantastic job in just the six months since I arrived in ramping up that effort. They have worked really hard to inject some life and energy into our social media accounts.
Handling critics on social media:
It’s hard, because there is a fine line you walk between being responsive and being obsessed with feedback. You cannot possibly respond to every single tweet or every single post. I can do that 24 hours a day and never get to the meat of my job. You learn if there is misinformation that’s being pushed out there, you have the opportunity to address the situation and shut it down appropriately -- and I am in favor of that and will do that. Fans are allowed to have opinions. That’s the beauty of sports. They can go on Twitter and not like something we do or a decision we made. As long as it’s not inappropriate or disrespectful, I have no issue with that at all. I do try on occasion when I see something that is fairly egregious or dead wrong to really educate people on the truth. People really appreciate that. Also, to acknowledge if we’ve failed in an area, because no business is perfect.
Student-athletes using social media:
While I’m not a fan of it, I understand some coaches who shut down social media accounts during the season. But student-athletes are like everyone else. They have a voice. They have an opinion. Maybe they are not on Twitter. Maybe they are on Instagram or Snapchat and want to post pictures and have fun telling stories that way. They should be entitled to do that. But it can be a dangerous tool and all students need to understand that what you put out there on social media lives on. That’s something we try to educate our student-athletes about.
If you know anyone who should be featured for their use of social media, send their name to us at jperez@sportsbusinessdaily.com.
