5 Local Golf Influencers to Follow During the US Open

The U.S. Open is arguably the biggest golf tournament of the year; the Super Bowl for many avid golf fans. The first round of this second major tournament of the professional golf season begins this Thursday, June 18th!

Texas bred Masters Tournament winner, Jordan Spieth (source: Reuters)

While many fans will be following the likes of Tim Rosaforte, Brandel Chamblee or any number of known golf reporters from the big outlets like the Golf Channel, Golf Digest or Sports Illustrated to learn the latest updates, there are some lesser-known, but possibly more influential locals who can also provide you with some valuable insights.

Maybe you’re a golf fan looking for more local insights into the tournament. Or maybe you’re one of the lucky golf fans traveling to Washington to watch the Open and you want to play a round yourself while you’re in town, but aren’t able to get onto Chambers Bay– so could use some suggestions on recommended courses. If you want to learn the ins and outs of the Washington golf scene from people who are more local than Rosaforte or Chamblee, then we’ve got you covered.

Along the same lines, many brands who will be marketing to golf fans this week should have their eyes and ears on these local influencers. While well-known golf influencers with tons of followers have their advantages in regards to reach, establishing relationships with a handful of under-the-radar influencers can provide many marketing advantages to brands. For instance, maybe a local sporting goods company is looking to increase market share in Washington during the tournament. Building relationships with these local influencers would be a worthwhile and more affordable marketing endeavor than trying to make headway with mega-influencers.

So without further adieu, here are five local golf influencers to follow or reach out to during the Open.

Shon Crewe – a local ESPN radio personality who hosts a golf show –https://twitter.com/ShonCrewe

Stephanie Wei – based on NYC, but formerly a Seattle resident, a sports freelancer who contributes to a number of sites and has her own site, cleverly named Wei Under Parhttps://twitter.com/StephanieWei

Aaron Levine – Q13 Fox Sports Director in Seattle – https://twitter.com/AaronQ13Fox

Jim Moore – co-host of Danny, Dave & Moore on ESPN radio in Seattle –https://twitter.com/cougsgo

Hailee Codiga – a Washington State student majoring in PR and Sports Management who’s serving as a USGA intern during the Open at Chambers Bay – https://twitter.com/hcodiga

We hope you enjoy the tournament, and the chatter on social media! We’ll be rooting for our fellow Texan, Jordan Spieth!

Sports Influencers to Follow During 2015 #NBAFinals

With Game 1 of the NBA Finals under our belt, we know all you basketball fans can’t get enough news about the game. Using the Mattr app, we found these under-the-radar sports reporters and media outlets who are watching, commenting, and tweeting about the #NBAFinals as close, if not closer, than you are. Make sure to follow them on Twitter!

(graphic source: @NBA)

WARRIORS

Golden Gate Sports – A Bay Area sports site covering Warriors, Niners, Raiders, Giants, A’s, Sharks, Kings, NCAA, preps and more: https://twitter.com/goldenbaysports

Sam Laird – Senior Sports Reporter for Mashable: https://twitter.com/samcmlaird

Ryan Field – Anchor and Host for FOX Sports 1 and FOX Sports Radio: https://twitter.com/ryanfieldfs1

Marcus Thompson – Sports Columnist for Bay Area News Group: https://twitter.com/thompsonscribe

CAVALIERS

Tony Zarrella – Sports Director for CBS 19 (Cleveland): https://twitter.com/TonyZ19

Daryl Ruiter – Browns writer for 923TheFan.com (Sports Radio): https://twitter.com/RuiterWrongFAN

Tom Withers – Sports writer for the Associated Press. Covering Cavaliers, Indians, and Browns: https://twitter.com/twithersAP

Chris Fedor – Cavaliers and NBA Reporter and Sports Producer for Northeast Ohio Media Group: https://twitter.com/ChrisFedor

MEDIA REPORTING ON THE NBA

Kurt Helin – Blogger-in-Chief of ProBasketBallTalk on NBCSports.com: https://twitter.com/basketballtalk

Fletcher Mackel – Emmy-Nominated Sports Anchor for WDSU (NBC New Orleans): https://twitter.com/fletchermackel

NBA Free TVhttps://twitter.com/NBALiveTv1

Coy Wire – Sports Anchor and Correspondent for CNN: https://twitter.com/coywire

Yahoo Sports NBAhttps://twitter.com/YahooSportsNBA

New at Mattr: Social Search and Sentiment

After another impressive feature push from the Mattr developers this week, we thought it was an ideal time to share some of our most exciting platform updates over the last month (all suggested by YOU) in more detail.  Here’s the latest:

Social Search

On the ‘Navigation Bar’, you will now notice a new tab called ‘Social Search’.  This feature allows you to search live across social networks to identify influencers outside of our influencer pool. Although we currently have over 22 million influencers, you may sometimes come across certain content or topics that need more hashing out to identify more influencers. Or, someone new to a social network has grown their audience very quickly and has a high relevance score for content around your brand, and therefore, needs to be added as an influencer.

Anybody we’ve missed that you would like to add to the pool, simply click the favorite button and they are in.

 

Filter by Sentiment

A search feature that we briefly removed, and realized we needed back! You can once again filter by sentiment to keep track of how positive, negative or neutral influencers tend to be regarding a certain search term. This is helpful to track content and influencers for your own brand or your competitors.

Thanks for all of the feedback regarding new features — it’s what motivates us to improve each week!

The Best Metrics for Influencer Success

As a marketer, you’ve likely been through the exhausting experience of trying to explain the value of online engagement to a client or stakeholder. It’s especially hard to communicate this message: It’s not all about the numbers.

In fact, number blindness is a big problem in marketing. Execs want metrics and a solid ROI to back up their programs, and that’s understandable. It’s your job to help them see how online metrics can be measured. It’s also your job to convey the value of the relationships you form with your audience along the way.

This is especially important when developing an influencer marketing strategy for your brand. Engagement is the key metric behind influencer marketing, and unfortunately, it’s also one of the most difficult marketing outcomes to quantify. To identify influencers and measure your program’s success, it’s important to first understand the environment surrounding your influencer marketing efforts.

 

How Metrics Fit Into the Storymaking Landscape

There’s a reason that 76 percent of marketers are already using influencers to tell their brands’ stories during product launches. In the digital age of two-way communication, your brand strategy should be just as much about storymaking as it is about storytelling.

“Stories are often used as crutches that cast light on some trait or moment, rather than opening up a path to understand people more deeply,” David Berkowitz, CMO at MRY, told Advertising Age. “It’s the story that gets in the way of the relationship.”

Your brand perception is influenced just as much — if not more — by what others say about it as it is by what you do. Sure, the old adage of “define yourself, or be defined” holds true, but in the digital landscape, you must also be willing to form a relationship with your customers and tweak your brand positioning based on their unique stories.

Influencers play into the storymaking space because they have the power to steer a customer’s story one way or another. As much as you like to think you’re in control of your brand’s story, you’re still at the mercy of those people forming opinions of your brand or product and posting those opinions on various media platforms.

If you commit to focusing on relationships with brand influencers to help steer your customers’ storymaking, you need to look toward some key metrics to quantify your program’s success, including:

  • Conversion rate. This is the number of audience comments or replies per post. It’s measured fairly consistently across social platforms.
  • Amplification rate. This metric reflects how effectively a post is shared with users’ broader networks. On Twitter, it refers to the number of retweets per tweet. On Facebook and Google+, it refers to the number of shares per post. And on a blog or YouTube channel, it equals the number of share clicks per post or video.
  • Applause rate. This measures how favorably (or unfavorably) your target audience views a post. On Twitter, the applause rate equals the number of favorite clicks per post. On Facebook, Google+, blogs, and YouTube, it refers to the number of likes or +1s per post.
  • Economic value. This metric delves into the world of board reports — right alongside ROI discussions. To calculate economic value, add the sum of the short- and long-term revenue and cost savings.

First, Build Your Tribe of Influencers

Metrics are an integral part of any influencer engagement strategy, but first, you must seek the appropriate influencers for your brand. Here are four ways you can identify and engage with influencers.

1. Scroll Through Your Address Book

Your best influencers may be hiding in your current contact list. Look for people you’ve already built relationships with through social networking, emailing, blogging, or old-fashioned networking.

Ask yourself whether they could sway a large audience’s opinion in your particular industry. If so, they’re probably influencers. People with this kind of power can provide valuable feedback about your product through their audience; because you know them, you’ve likely already established solid rapport.

2. Leverage Your Data

Determine where your customers get their news and how they form opinions. Who are they following? Which celebrities or thought leaders do they engage with the most? Which subject matter experts sway their personal opinions and preferences? Use these customer insights to discover new influencers.

For instance, you could tailor product offers based on the blogs you’re using to promote them or incentivize influencers to partner with your brand using products or services that would be of interest to their target audience. A YouTube beauty blogger may be the perfect person for your company’s new eye shadow palette if it’s something she can review for her fans through a series of fun videos. She’ll help steer your brand’s story through genuine, creative content.

3. Remember That You Get What You Give

It’s inappropriate to ever ask influencers to provide value if you’re not willing to do the same. If you’re striving for a mutually beneficial relationship — as you should be — you need to set that standard from day one. Once you’ve forged a trusting relationship with one another, influencers will be delighted to associate with your brand.

4. Keep It Real

Connect with both current and potential influencers by being genuine and providing value. It’s important that you work to gain their trust before you dive in and make a request. However, once you do gain the feedback or information you’re seeking, keep the relationship going. You never know when you might need their help in the future (or when they might need yours).

By identifying the appropriate metrics and influencers for your brand and using them in sync with each other, you can provide stakeholders with the ROI they need while building your brand.

(Originally posted in The Marketing Scope)