How Social Media helped the NBA.

Ever since I was a child, I’ve heard many professional basketball players express how the NBA is a "business". How a simple sport could be perceived as anything greater often confused me. However, as I gotten older and did an extensive amount of research on the corporation, I can confirm and understand how the National Basketball Association is one of the biggest businesses in the world. This comes with tremendous responsibility and causes them to continuously find new strategies to interact with its consumers. Every staff memeber involoved in this compnay, players included, work hard to communicate and satisfy their audience. The most effective way they do so is with the use of their social media platforms. As of 2023, the NBA has the most followers of any pro-sports league account on Instagram, Twitter, and Tiktok. Whether its players are making the latest Tik-Tok dances in the locker-room after a win, or posting a link on Facebook to the post-game press conference; every day the NBA converses with its consumers via Social Media to make them feel closer to their favorite players.

But when did all of this begin? The NBA opened its initial Youtube account in 2007, becoming the first sports organization to participate in the social media movement. Initially, they only had a few hundred followers at first, but suddenly, it seemed as though they gained millions of fans overnight. This provided the NBA the confidence to not just expand to other social media platforms, like Twitter, Facebook and Instagram, but to supply more footage on YouTube for their fans. They began to post game highlights and created a trend for every other sports league, where if fans didn’t feel like watching the entire game, they would still be able to see the most important moments through short highlights. They also began to upload post-game interviews so fans could get their star players' perspectives right after the game. The NBA even took it a step further by creating live Q & A'S with the top MVPS of the league, so fans all over the world could feel like they're having their own conversation with the players. Once YouTube started monetizing its videos and including more ads, tons of revenue was accessed for the NBA, as well as fan support.

Without fan support, there would be no articles, no highlights and most importantly, no profit or revenue. Players have even taken upon themselves to routinely use Twitter to engage with their fans. Whether its showing off their pre-game outfit via Instagram, to tweeting their excitement right before tip-off, this method of interaction has gotten the business more fans, more exposure and most of all more money. They have established brand-new trends and inventive techniques for pleasing the audience that other sports businesses haven't even considered. Social media is seen negatively, but it appears to be having a beneficial impact on the NBA and is showing no signs of slowing down.