Golden Goals and Bad Bands: Social Media Chronicles the Olympics
Posted by Craig · 2 Comments
February 28, 2010 – final day of the Winter Olympics in Vancouver…
Gold medal semifinal in men’s hockey between Team Canada and Team USA…
Seven minutes into overtime, Jarome Iginla is knocked down in the corner. On his knees, he passes the puck to Sidney Crosby, who deftly, with Gretzky-like instincts, shoots the puck from an angle, past Team USA’s goalie and into the net.
The Golden Goal…
And with that, Team Canada wins its 14th gold medal in these 2010 Olympic games and its first gold medal in hockey since the Salt Lake City Olympics in 2002.
Throughout the streets of Vancouver, a loud roar went up as crowds cheered and celebrated. Car horns honked, ship horns blared and, according to one Vancouver resident, the noise continued for hours.
The cheering also continued on Social Networks like Twitter and Facebook. Within minutes of the Golden Goal, jubilant Tweets and Facebook status updates appeared. Within two hours, the newly created “Crosby’s Olympic Goal <3” Facebook Fan Page had 95,000 fans.
After the Closing Ceremonies, a Facebook Fan Page called “2010 Olympic Closing Ceremonies were REALLY BAD” was also created, but it wasn’t nearly as popular. As of this writing, only 23 fans have joined this page and embraced the description: “Bad bands, and awful floating beavers.”
Actually, throughout the Olympics, Social Media played a huge role in recording people’s reactions to events and athletes. The athletes themselves even participated.
According to the blog post “So long to 2010 Olympics, we’ll tweet ya later,” American short track speed skater @ApoloOhno “shared his ever infectious and magnetic positivity to stand tall and be proud of who you are and your accomplishments.”
Alternatively, @JuliaMancuso, alpine ski racer for Team USA, fueled the fire of an alleged rivalry with lifelong competitor @LindseyVonn by posting and quickly removing comments after her first run on the giant slalom.
The Sysomos blog reports that the Vancouver Olympics attracted four million tweets and 300,000 blog posts and had a 91% positive sentiment rating according to Sysomos MAP.
That’s great news for Olympic organizers, who may have been concerned about how this unprecedented Social Media activity would affect their personal branding and online reputation.
This is a new age, where Social Media activity will continue to grow, even as the roar of the crowd fades and the streets of Vancouver return to normal. Online Reputation Management for Virtual Assistants and their clients will be key in the years to come, and certified Social Marketing Specialists are the ones who will be armed and ready to face the challenges of this new Social Media landscape.
This is something Olympic organizers might also want to think about as they look towards the 2012 Summer Olympics in London.
Regardless of how people viewed the event, it certainly highlighted the new use of social media. I too saw the fan page within a few minutes of the goal and was amazed by the growing number of fans in such a short time. I think it highlights a way we can all connect and share, whatever the subject.
As for the excitement of that golden moment, this is a great video taken from outside Vancouver, listen to at least 1:25 in and hear the reaction:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8VMxt-MqTiI
.-= Christina Greenway´s last blog ..Top 10 Tools Going Into Twenty-Ten (2010) =-.
This is great Christina – Thanks for Sharing! It was a timeless moment for the ages indeed!