Catalyst PR

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We've moved!

Catalyst is pleased to announce our new website, CatalystPublicRelations.com! Our blog is now available through the main navigation, The Catalog. We will no longer be posting through Tumblr. Thanks for following us!

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Bret Werner Introduces 2011 Catalyst Fan Engagement Study

Yesterday, we introduced the 2011 Fan Engagement Study. Today, Catalyst Managing Partner Bret Werner introduced the study’s main findings and brand implications. Check it out.

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Athlete Influencers Driving Purchase for Consumer Brands through Social Channels

For consumer brands seeking to drive purchase through social media engagement, the solution may be simple: have an athlete mention it.

According to our 2011 Catalyst Fan Engagement Study, sports fans who follow their favorite athletes on social media are 55% more likely to purchase a brand if an athlete mentions it on Facebook or Twitter. Additionally, athlete mentions of brands on social media can have an even bigger impact on young (18-34), non-white fans (75% more likely to purchase) and those with kids at home (62%).  Catalyst Public Relations commissioned Vision Critical to develop its second annual Catalyst Fan Engagement Study, exploring the growing convergence of sports and social media.   Conducted in May 2011, more than 2,000 fans nationwide participated in the survey, which focused on the social media attitudes and usage habits of NFL, NBA, MLB, and college football and basketball fans.

Read more on our press release page.

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Want to Increase Your Twitter Followers?

By Ray Rahmati

Catalyst Public Relations

Go out and win a major golf tournament! That's just what 22-year-old Rory McIlroy did yesterday after dominating the field at Congressional Country Club to become the second youngest player to win a major championship.

Young Rory, an active Twitter user with over 300,000 followers to his account prior to the U.S. Open, rounded up nearly 60,000 new followers on Saturday and Sunday of the tournament, an increase of nearly 19%--upon last count his account was at 409,398 followers.

Following a fourth round collapse at the Masters that was painful to watch, Twitter and Facebook were buzzing this weekend as fans showed their support for the young golfer, trying to help erase the disappointment of the April loss.

And it's easy to see why the Twitterverse and the world has embraced the young golfer from North Ireland. The son of a bartender and former factory worker, McIlroy is humble, yet confident when he needs to be. But Rory also possesses another attribute that I believe lends itself well to his personal brand: Authenticity.

Authenticity in both personal and business brands is respected now more than ever--just ask all the people who jumped off the Tiger Woods bandwagon. And while damage to a brand can be remedied over time, being consistent in your values and true to your brand from the outset can help mitigate against issues that may crop up.

Listening to Rory's myriad interviews from the Masters through to the U.S. Open, and following his Twitter stream has shown that he is not only mature beyond his years, but also a savvy marketer and manager of his own personal brand. Social media provides the wonderful opportunity for real people to connect with other real people and brands. Consumers want to feel a part of a brand and when that interaction is authentic and real, it only works to build additional brand equity.

Case in point. In what may likely be the most shared picture of this past weekend, Rory provides an inside look for his fans and followers into his celebration following his win:

While I'm not suggesting that you start tweeting pictures of your office holiday party, I do think that there are a number of things you can do to build an authentic brand including:

be consistent - if your actions are erratic, it will completely undermine all of your efforts

admit when you have done something wrong and work to rectify the issue IMMEDIATELY

engage your network - ask your community for feedback and listen to what they are saying about you and your brand

update, but don't promote - provide your networks and communities with relevant and regular content and updates, but be careful not to sound promotional

So while you may not be one of the top-rated pro athletes in the world, ensuring that you are consistent and authentic will not only help to grow your social presence, but your brand as well.

What are your tips for building your brand?

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Vancouver Stanley Cup Riots: Aftermath on Twitter & Facebook

A massive riot occurred in Vancouver after their 4-0 loss in game 7 of the Stanley Cup Finals to the Boston Bruins last night. Mashable collected real-time pictures, showcasing the massive rioting that occurred in the streets. 

Why the violence?

Well, first, the Bruins' win marks the first Stanley Cup Title in 39 years. The team proudly brought home the championship win to a passionate city with incredible pride for their successful sports teams. 

While the Bruins had a lot to gain, the Vancouver Canucks had a lot to lose. Coming on the heels of an incredibly strong season and a 2-0 lead into the final, they lost in game 7, and even worse - to Boston, a long-time rival, on their home turf. 

As the rioting after the game intensified, so did the volume on Facebook and Twitter, most notably with the hashtag #canucksriot, which continues to trend on Twitter this morning.

On the positive side, over 11,000 people have accepted an invitation to clean up the aftermath left on the streets of Vancouver this morning, evidenced by this Facebook event which started last night, and is supported by the Vancouver police department. 

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Fast Company’s 100 Most Creative People in Business

By Cassie Eberle

Catalyst Public Relations

A synthetic-biologist, a brew master and a White House chef walk into a wine bar… no this isn’t the start of another Beer Summit joke – it’s the beginning of Fast Company’s 100 Most Creative People in Business 2011 event and proof that, in any industry, creativity is not just an element of success, but at the root of it.

While every speaker had a uniquely inspiring story, I tried to pull out a few common threads that seemed woven into each – the Cliff Notes version, if you will, to a captivating 4 hour discussion.

Find Your Voice, But Don’t Be Confined By It

As marketers, we talk a lot about finding our “Brand voice.” For The Onion, that means always staying in the character of “REAL fake news.” For ESPN, that means never forgetting their mission as sports fans serving sports fans.

What that doesn’t mean is squashing an idea just because it doesn’t seem like an obvious fit. What makes perfect sense in hindsight might have actually started out as a risky move.

If you’re Dogfish Head Craft Brewery and you want to brew a delicious craft beer, the seemingly logical decision would have been to find a new way to mix the old favorites - water, barley and hops. What Dogfish Head did instead was go against tradition and mix in unique, local ingredients such as honey, saffron and melon to create an off-center niche of endless possibilities.

Solve a Problem, Serve a Need

Even if we’re not curing cancer, ideas should serve some sort of purpose – and no, “media coverage” is not a purpose. Reshman Shetty of Ginkgo BioWorks wanted her lab to smell less like a latrine, so she engineered a strain of E.coli that smelled minty fresh (instead of like poo). Alex Kipman of Xbox wanted to create a gaming system that removed the technology and felt more like life. Thus, Kinect was born.

People (and yes, media people too) gravitate towards and respond to products and ideas that help make life easier and more enjoyable. This is not a new concept, just one that can all too often get pushed to the side by sexier buzz words like “social media” and “gamification.”   

Love Your Idea

Loving every idea that pops into your head is ridiculous, however if you don’t love the idea you decide to evolve, how do you expect anyone else to? Leila Janah was told by colleagues and potential investors alike that her idea for a non-profit social business where people in developing countries do data work for blue-chip companies would never get off the ground. But she kept pushing and made it a reality in Samasource, which is now successfully competing against major for-profit players. 

Every idea, good or bad, pretty much has the same genesis story – it’s up to us to grow it in the right direction.

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Catalyst Employees Volunteer at Prospect Park Field Day

Today, some of the Catalyst crew volunteered with the Prospect Park Alliance, manning a field day for summer school kids at Prospect Park, in a children's area that consists of a Historic House, a Carousel, as well as a large open field.

The day consisted of organized outdoor games for middle-school NYC kids. We had a great time encouraging them to be physically active! Check out some pictures below. 

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MLB vs. Stephen Colbert: Beat the Streak

For the next three days, Major League Baseball (MLB) and Stephen Colbert are engaged in a Beat the Streak baseball knowledge competition. 

What's at steak? If the MLB loses, they will grant Colbert full access to their Twitter account, which has over 1.2 million fans, for 24 hours.

As part of the challenge, which begins today, Colbert and MLB will each make one Beat the Streak pick per day and whoever posts the longest streak of correct picks within the three-day span will win the challenge.

Read an official update here: http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20110609&content_id=20260334&vkey=news_mlb&c_id=mlb

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ESPN 3D Marks One Year Anniversary With Plans For Continued Growth

Check out the Cynopsis Sports interview with Bryan Burns, ESPN's VP of Strategic Business Planning and Development, about ESPN 3D and the role of sports in consumer adaption to technology and ESPN's role in that process.

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Big Lead Sports Hires Barry Janoff To Expand Sports Business Offerings

The Big Lead added Bary Janoff, a talented sports business editor, to its roster, in its new, dedicated Sports Business section. Read more about this news over at SportsBusiness Journal. 

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Indians Win Fans With Social Suite

Great article in SportsBusinessDaily today about the Indians finding new ways to make fans feel special using social media at the games.  

Last season, Indians created something called the "Social Media Suite," where bloggers and Twitter-friendly fans share about messages about their ballpark experiences and connect with one another - it existed in the outfield bleachers. 

Over the season, the media team realized one key issue - the sun was making it hard for fans to read their screens.

This year, they were given air conditioning, televisions, and padded seats in the third row of loges down the left field line. It's totally free, but only open to about a dozen people. 

Read more about the Indians and their Social Media Suite on SportsBusinessDaily. 

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NBCUniversal Gains Rights to Olympics: Sports Programming Growing

By: Bill Holtz Managing Partner 

The news that Comcast’s NBCUniversal has been awarded the television rights to the next four Olympic Games – to the tune of 4.4 billon dollars – was fascinating on many levels.

First, full disclosure: our agency currently works with both ESPN Audio and ESPN3.com, and the VERSUS Network, an all-sports channel owned by Comcast, is a past client of Catalyst.

Back to the Olympics.  Let’s put the dollars aside for just a minute; I thought that the recent departure of Dick Ebersol, a legend in the broadcast and Olympic communities, from NBC Sports was a signal that he felt the company was not as committed to securing the Olympic rights as it had been in years past.  There was also the very real factor of the relationships and equity that Ebersol had built with Olympic leadership and how that would impact the International Olympic Committee’s decision. 

While ESPN and FOX both made aggressive bids for the rights, clearly Comcast and NBC still highly valued the Olympic Games and what it could mean for the company, particularly in increasing the exposure for VERSUS and its other outlets.  It was also interesting to me that NBC locked into four Games rather than two, especially since the Olympic Winter Games in 2018 and the Olympic Summer Games in 2020 have yet to even been awarded to host cities, which depending on those locations, will present multiple variables.  Not to mention, of course, what the economic, political and media landscapes might be like at that time.

The $4.4 billion price tag was very significant and again shows that the Olympic Games, for any number of reasons – national pride, a chance to see athletes from all over the world compete, the compelling stories, the fact that the Games are contested only every two years – are still a highly valuable television property.

And it’s not just the Olympic Games; it’s sports in general.  The Olympic deal caps a recent string of rights deal within the sports industry: the NHL renewing with NBC and VERSUS for a significant increase; the newly expanded Pac 12 Conference entered into an agreement with FOX and ESPN for $3 billion over 12 years, more than industry observers had anticipated; the Big 12 Conference also received new television commitments for more than $1 billion, and its flagship member, the University of Texas, is partnering with ESPN on a new network.  This doesn’t even include the current multi-billion dollar deals for the NFL and the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament.

Sports programming is more attractive than ever, and it will be very interesting to see in the coming years how the media entities will leverage the sports properties, adapt to evolving mediums, present the content to their audiences, and, most importantly, how many of us will be watching.   That will determine if the $4.4 billion was worth it.  

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The Rules of Engagement: The NBA and Social Media

Great article recently published in Fast Company about the NBA's strategy to engage social media followers. This is a terrific read and a good reminder to brands as they engage consumers in this medium. 

Rules of Engagement, from the NBA Social Media War Room

While bored traditional sports reporters wait for quotes from the megastars, the NBA's elite social media team finds images, videos, and moments that take followers up close and behind the scenes of the Finals. We follow--literally--the social media masters during before, during, and after the action to watch how it all works. Read more at Fast Company. 

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Bill Holtz in PRWeek: Wilpon's statements strike out with the public

By: Bill Holtz, Managing Partner

The Mets have been a big story in New York the last couple of weeks, again for the wrong reasons. My thoughts on Fred Wilpon’s troubles with media - published on PRWeek today...

  Wilpon's statements strike out with the public

Bill Holtz, Catalyst Public Relations

That said, the last couple of weeks have been more interesting than usual for the Mets and their fans. Mets owner Fred Wilpon has been the subject of stories in the New Yorker and Sports Illustrated, where he has, among other things, criticized the performance of his team, questioned the value of high profile players like David Wright, Jose Reyes, and Carlos Beltran, and talked openly about the Mets losing up to $70 million this season. Of course, this is on top of Wilpon's association with the disgraced Bernie Madoff, which has caused him personal pain and embarrassment, financial losses, the need to sell a piece of the Mets for an infusion of cash, and a $1 billion lawsuit by Irving Picard, the trustee seeking to recover restitution for those who lost money with Madoff.Full disclosure: I am a Phillies fan, so it doesn't bother me when the Mets are embroiled in controversy.

My first thought – not as a baseball fan, but as a PR professional – was why? Why would Wilpon even agree to participate in these stories?

Perhaps it was to try and gain sympathy as one of the people victimized by the Madoff travesty. Well, for those who lost their life savings, they probably don't identify that closely with Wilpon, who lost millions but whose ultimate recourse may be having to sell the Mets, as opposed to the people who have had to come out of, or postpone, retirement and scramble to make a living. Furthermore, a central point of the lawsuit is that, as experienced investors, Wilpon and his partners had knowledge, or should have, of what Madoff was doing. No matter how many times Wilpon says that he was duped like everyone else, there is going to be a part of the population who won't believe him. By continuing to talk about it, it is doubtful he will change many minds, and can only open himself up to further criticism.

Looking at it from a baseball perspective, maybe, in his critique of the team and its key players, Wilpon wanted to light a fire under the Mets and show the fans how much he cares, and that he's not happy with the team's record in recent years. He may have gone a little overboard with his comments of the players, but ultimately that is within his right. However, it was very much out of character for Wilpon, who has never publicly criticized players in his 30 years as owner.

It is also striking that, with several high player salaries scheduled to come off the Mets' books after this season, there are no plans to use that money to re-invest in the team for next year. So, while you may be trying to show the fans that you get frustrated with the performance just like they do, in the same instance you don't give them much hope that ownership will do whatever it can to improve the product on the field. Why should they stick with the team, then?

Ultimately, Wilpon hadn't very much to gain by doing the interviews and should have been advised against it. Whatever points he may have been trying to convey – ‘I was deceived by Madoff,' ‘I am angry about the Mets' performance too' – they were lost in his comments about the players, the team's financial situation, and by the fact that it didn't mesh with the public image that Wilpon has crafted for years. If someone in his position is going to engage the media, he should at least stay in character and not try to reinvent himself.

In Wilpon's bid to play offense with his message, foster goodwill, and change some opinions, he struck out.

Bill Holtz is a Managing Partner at Catalyst Public Relations, a consumer firm specializing in sports, entertainment and active lifestyle. Bill has directed marketing communications programs for a number of brands, including leveraging sponsorships surrounding the Olympic Games, Major League Baseball, NASCAR, college football, tennis, and golf.

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Twitter's Latest Upgrades: Follow Button, Photo and Video

Twitter recently rolled out a few new changes to its platform, incorporating a new FOLLOW button, as well as enriching photo and video services. It's important brands pay attention to these changes, as these provide opportunities for creative campaigns.

Twitter launched a new FOLLOW button - one of the most shared stores on Mashable this week. The button functions similarly to Facebook's LIKE button. It can be easily embedded into websites so consumers can easily follow brands without ever leaving the page. Those who are interested in adding the button to their own sites can set one up here.

Another new change to Twitter is the launch of a photo and video sharing service, where videos and photos will be directly connected to tweets. You can read the full story here.

As many know, a key differentiator for Twitter is the sense of immediacy it provides users, with access to real-time information. With this new change, consumers will not only be able to read real-time news, but also see it through photos and videos. We believe this new change provides a unique opportunity for some very creative photo and video campaigns.

See the video below for Twitter's introduction to the new service.