Top 5 Most Entertaining NHL Twitter Accounts

Hockey players are known across the sports world as being the most cliché and boring in interviews and such. It is the "Canadian way" of being politically correct and not drawing any conflict to your team. You can say this about any sport, but you just don't see the Richard Sherman's, ranting calling out the other team, or the A Rod's that are constantly engaged in controversy with NHL players. Hockey players are known to be the most giving and down to earth, but social media has changed this perception. The players themselves are still as robotic and cliché in interviews as ever, but the team accounts on social media is a different story.

Social media has changed the way these team twitter accounts interact with fans. Some have different strategies than others. Some of these accounts are still the same monotonous, boring, informative text over and over though. This blog is mostly going to focus on how these players/team build their brand up by presenting themselves as humorous, yet also with a strong fixture on fan engagement.



5). Paul Bissonnette (@BizNasty2point0)

Bissonnette is what we call a "goon" in the hockey world. The man is not a skilled hockey player at all, and is just out there to fight. He's there to protect his teammates if the opposing team throws a questionable hit or if momentum needs to change during the game. Bissonnette's brand is simple: he's a goon and he knows it. The amount of tweets he has put out there making fun of himself for being a terrible hockey player is what makes him known. You don't have over 500,000 followers if you are terrible, you have to at least be funny. His most famous tweet came on this past Christmas, where he's implying wants more time on the ice than the bench.

Like I said, his brand is to crack jokes on himself about being an awful hockey player, and he is funny. He also enjoys tweeting at others, including this tweet at the arguable best goalie in the world, Henrik Lundqvist.

The other part of social media he's known for is fan engagement. He is constantly getting tweeted at by fans telling him how awful he is, yet he doesn't want to hear this from anybody else but himself.

 

 4). Jakub Voracek (Philadelphia Flyers @jachobe) 

Voracek is one of the best wingers in the NHL, so his persona on Twitter is much different than that of BizNatsy's. I picked Voracek because I find him extremely entertaining. He doesn't tweet much, but when he does, they are pretty hysterical. Seeing as he's from the Czech Republic, his English is shoddy and his tweeting is even worse. I consider his personality on Twitter to be that of one that is funny/entertaining. He loves to just tweet whatever is on his mind and has no filter at all. Here's an example of one of his funniest tweets right above, though kind of grotesque.

 Here's another gem, notice how awful his English and hashtags are. This was obviously right after the controversial SuperBowl ending in February.

There is a much more serious side to the man they call Jake though, he is very charity/community oriented. Every home game in Philadelphia he buys an entire suite for underprivileged kids and calls it Voracek's Vault. He promotes this often on twitter after games, like this tweet below.

3). Dallas Stars Team Twitter Account (@DallasStars)

The Stars are considered a "small market" team. They recently have came to the forefront of the NHL by pretty much stealing NHL superstar Tyler Seguin from the Boston Bruins in a blockbuster trade that Boston is deeply regretting. This had led to an emergence of the Stars in the hockey community. The Stars twitter account has taken a very controversial route in social media. They aren't as controversial as one of the teams I will mention later on, but they do put things up on their twitter and on the big screen that some teams would not dare. A common theme here with the stars is they love to make fun of fans of the opposing team when they come to Dallas. Below are some examples, and though it's not exactly through social media (it's on the big screen), they are incorporating social trends in these. The first picture is ragging on Blackhawk fans who have been known to have a huge bandwagon following since their first cup in 50 years in 2010. The second photo is Justin Bieber's mugshot, who is a Maple Leaf fan, and the Leafs just so happened to be in town that night.

The most famous tweet that comes from the Stars though, is one that was a major hit on twitter. Everybody loves to hate on the Cowboys and Tony Romo, and the Stars got their chance after being provoked by the Cowboys. Somebody "hacked" into the Cowboys twitter account and tweeted about how nobody cares that hockey season is starting. The Stars responded with a shot at the Cowboys, with a picture of the franchise's greatest player ever, #9, Mike Modano, lifting the Stanley Cup.

2). Columbus Blue Jackets twitter account (@BlueJacketsNHL)

The Columbus Blue Jackets are a relatively new franchise, only 16 years old. They are one of the smallest fan bases, but you wouldn't know it by their Twitter account. They have a huge following on twitter, and are often referred to as "Lumbus". Lumbus really received a huge following after dissing ESPN for their lack of hockey coverage, in the tweet below.

Columbus is also very well known for interacting with other team accounts, most notably the Los Angeles Kings. These two accounts started out constantly bickering at each other due to a lot of trades between the 2 teams and the Kings becoming so successful from former Blue Jacket players, so there's a history. Now, you would assume that if these 2 accounts were human beings, they'd be inseparable.

1). Los Angeles Kings Twitter Account (@LAKings)

The LA Kings twitter account, there is not much more to say. They are rude, stuck up, controversial, offensive, yet they are perfect. This twitter account is notorious for being those aforementioned qualities. The amount of tweets I could post would take all day. The Kings brand is being extremely condescending, and the hockey world has taken notice. They are notorious for doing a question and answer series during the intermissions of games, and here are some notables.

The tweet that really put the Kings on the social media map was when they eliminated the Vancouver Canucks in the 2012 playoffs en route to their 1st Stanley Cup. Vancouver is one of the most detested franchises in the sport outside of BC (British Columbia province), so the Kings gained a huge following after this gem of a tweet.

The Kings account has been seriously criticized for 1 certain tweet. The tweet below was one of the Q&A's during an intermission game that bothered a lot of people.

 It sent a shock among the hockey world, especially because a week earlier one of the Blackhawk's medical trainers did in fact commit suicide. The Kings issued a lengthy apology on twitter the next day. The apology read: "During our games we make it a priority to answer questions from our fans via Twitter feed to create conversation and drive engagement through our fan base. Unfortunately, in the midst of answering questions during the second intermission, one of those replies was insensitive and inappropriate. We recognize this and apologize for our reply. We have removed the comment and have taken action to make sure this does not happen moving forward".


These accounts are not all perfect and we love them for different reasons. Social media is still a relatively new asset at our disposal, even the professionals are still learning it. We've all seen things from people in a higher position that still put ridiculous things on Twitter. Each of these accounts has a set goal that they are trying to accomplish. Bissonnette wants to be known as a human first, then a hockey player with his sense of humor. Jakub Voracek likes to promote his #VoraceksVault campaign on twitter. The Dallas Stars want to put fear into opposing fans, knowing that they may well be made fun of publicly on their scoreboard. Columbus loves to interact with other teams and has created a friendly vibe with most team accounts. The Kings, well, they have just pretty much pissed everyone off besides Columbus. The point stands though, they all have their agendas. I am excited to see what new brand personalities these accounts take on next season, it'll be a whole nother off season to plan ahead. 

Final Four Athlete

I am not into basketball at all, let alone college. It has always been a disinterest to me, and I don't watch any of the March Madness tournament. As a big sports fan though, I am very in sync with upcoming stars in each of the four major sports. This led to me choosing to do my blog on the likely 1st overall pick in June, Jahlil Okafor. Okafor came into this season with a lot of fanfare and was the consensus first overall pick, and he did nothing but improve his status since then. He won a national championship last week with Duke. You would think that with this much recognition as a freshman he would be very interested in endorsement deals and such.

Being such a young star brings a lot of criticism, not only to his game on the court but his brand off the court. Many young players with a lot of fanfare cannot handle this well and are immature, but Okafor is an exception. The young man is very family oriented and this is the main sticking point to his brand. If you follow him on twitter and instagram a common theme with him is the importance of family. His whole brand is to try to come off as a respectable young man who understands how vital family is. He is not one to boast or brag about his amazing performances on the court. This kid dominated the NCAA and his stats blow away the rest of the competition. It is hard to keep a level head at that point, but Okafor understands how crucial it is to his game on the court to stay level headed. It is all part of his brand, and it makes the public have an affection for him.

The young man's play on the court is very similar. He is complete opposite of a selfish player is the definition of a team player. Okafor hardly ever even handles the ball outside the paint, which shows how he is a team player. He opens up so much room for his teammates. It is kind of ironic how little he touches the ball yet he puts up excellent numbers, he has a huge impact on the game by just being there. He doesn't have the same impact in his own end though, he is known as a liability in his own zone. He is obviously monstrous, standing at 6'10" 270 pounds. He is far from a Charles Barkley type player though. Okafor could be looked at as "soft" for a big man, comparable to Dwight Howard.

If I was Okafor's brand manager, the first brand I would target is simple: Nike. They pay the most money to endorsers, and that is the be all end all for athletes. I think that his persona would fit well with that brand. Nike is known for being a brand that employs high class athletes and ones that avoid controversy. My second brand would be Red Bull. Red Bull is my favorite drink and I think that they do a great job in the sport industry. They have a lot of extreme sport endorsements and they love to give fans an in depth look at their athletes. These mostly include GoPro views, which really show what the athletes are looking at while performing their respective sports.

MLB The Show

I'm sure that we are all familiar with the Chicago Cubs and their futility as a professional sport franchise. It has been over 100 years since they last won a World Series. It has even gone back so far that the reason for this futility can be traced to the "Curse of the Billy Goat". Legend has it that in 1945 during a World Series game against the Tigers, a man named Billy Sianis, was asked to leave the game due to his billy goat smelling horrific and distracting fans. Sianis then went on to sending a telegraph to the team owner after and condemned them with the distinction of never even hosting another World Series game at Wrigley. Now, this is very superstitious and far fetched, but it has gotten this agonizing for fans of Chicago that they put the blame for their failures on this. It might just have more to do with awful personnel decisions than a far fetched story about a goat, but that is just one man's opinion. Never mind the whole Steve Bartman story which was another catastrophe.

The whole point I am getting at here is how teams market themselves to fans. Sure, as a fan I love the personalities of the players on my favorite team and the history of the franchise. At the end of the day though, it all comes down to winning. One of my favorite video games that I buy annually and hands down the best baseball video game is MLB The Show. The video game industry is obviously huge and MLB The Show is one of the best selling sport games year in and out. The marketing campaign I wanted to base my blog on is a distinct commercial for MLB 12 The Show.

I found this commercial to be extremely entertaining. I can relate to the premise as a hardcore fan of the Yankees and other various professional teams. There is nothing like seeing your favorite team win a championship, and ultimately that is why we watch the games. The ironic part about this campaign is the fact that they are indeed marketing winning, something that is a big no-no in the sport marketing industry. The obvious part of this yearly installment of the The Show's campaign was to really drive home the fact that you control the game. If even the dreadful Cubs can win a World Series in this game, than anybody can. It really tries to show how in control you are as a gamer in The Show and how it makes you actually feel like you are part of the team/tradition. Below is another commercial for the same game, but the 2010 version.

Again here, the driving force is to make the gamer feel like they are actually a baseball player or have some type of impact on the game. It stresses how even "an ordinary guy like you or me" can play and have the realistic feel of an MLB game. This commercial is very cheesy including Joe Mauer, but the premise remains the same. If you search all The Show's commercial year in and out it's about incorporating the fans/gamers and giving them a realistic feel. These two videos are just a few examples. This is an actual game shot of the game releasing next week, it is so realistic that it's scary.

Though it can clearly be recognized what the motives here are, there are of course positives and negatives of the campaign. The positives are that they are thinking of the customer and making them feel like part of the team. Nothing gets a fan more excited than actually having the feeling of contributing to a team. These games are built to be so realistic that it gives fans that feeling. It also makes for a friendly banter between friends online. The negatives here in these campaigns in my opinion are the redundancy. As I said, the commercials every year are repetitive. I would like to see the game incorporate a different method to marketing next season. Baseball is a dying breed and the league has become very pitching/defensive oriented. I think the games could do a better job of marketing certain players to try to increase fandom. I don't think choosing the enigmatic Yasiel Puig as the cover athlete this year was a coincidence, the MLB recognizes this. They are very successful with their marketing and selling though. It is one of the top selling video games year in and out. That makes it even more impressive because baseball is dying here in America. The bottom line here is the game is trying to sell more video games to a target market of not only MLB fans, but to a new generation. There is no better way to do that than to include one of the rising stars in baseball on the cover.

Warrior Hockey

There are many different brands to choose from in the sport of hockey. The most popular ones consist of Bauer, Easton, Reebok, CCM, Vapor and Warrior. The one that has always stood out to me was Warrior. Warrior is mostly known for their lacrosse gear and they are top of the line in that regard, but Warrior is growing has become one of the go to brands for hockey equipment/apparel. In the last 5 years their product has grown exponentially in the hockey world and has begun being used by NHLers. Ten years ago you never saw a NHL player using Warrior gear, but it is growing now. The million dollar question is how did they start becoming appealing to people and what is their brand?

I consider myself a very big hockey fan so when I think of Warrior I think of certain NHLers that I know that use the brand. There is not many people that are too deep into hockey and the NHL that can think that way though, so Warrior has taken on a different branding scheme. They had to do something to stand out from the rest of the older hockey brands. Warrior introduced hockey relatively recent so they had to come up with a brand that would be appealing, with their main piece of equipment being sticks and gloves. They took on the idea of adding more designs and colors to their equipment, most notably their hockey sticks themselves. Anybody who is familiar with hockey equipment will tell you Warrior is known for their peculiar designs and high frequency of colors on their equipment. They really have taken on the identity of standing out from the rest of the hockey world with their designs. It helps that they have very high quality equipment also, but the fact is that their equipment appeals to many because of its appearance. This stick is just one example of many of their florescent, new style sticks. Hockey is an old school sport and if you compare all other brands equipment they do indeed look old school compared to Warrior's new look attitude.

On top of taking on the ability to stand out through colors/designs, they have taken on the image of certain NHL players. When I think of Warrior, the player that comes to my mind is Ilya Kovalchuk. Kovalchuk is one of the best pure goal scorers, if not the best, of my generation. You can bet that Warrior sought out to find players like him that everybody knows can shoot the puck with ease and make it look simple. Kovalchuk is a Russian and I think the whole European facet of his game fits the identity of Warrior to a tee. Though Kovalchuk recently retired from the NHL at the age of 29 to return home and play in Russia, I still associate the brand with him today. Warrior is very flamboyant from what you can tell, and that describes the game Kovalchuk and most Europeans play. When I was first buying Warrior sticks I was thinking to myself how much I want to shoot the puck like Kovalchuk. I mean who wouldn't want to shoot the puck like this.  

The branding pyramid is crucial to keep in mind here. The 5 categories are presence, relevance, performance, advantage and bonding which are apparent in this branding scheme. I think a lot of it comes down to having star NHL players using their product like Ilya Kovalchuk, Henrik Zetterberg, Patrick Marleau, former Tampa Bay Lightning captain Martin St. Louis, and Zdeno Chara. The one thing all these players have in common also is that they all have been captain of one team in the NHL at one point. That is leadership, and shows how Warrior wants to be perceived. Those right there are formidable presences with the company and their performance as stars in the best league in the world shows how good of a brand Warrior is. Those are all future Hall of Fame players and having that type of player use your brand shows how much of advantage you can have if you use Warrior. Bonding with the customers can be shown through their color and design schemes, it can appeal to the customer and make them feel like the brand is making the equipment for you personally.

I started using Warrior because I always liked the way their sticks looked and because of players who endorsed the company like Kovalchuk. The brand hasn't disappointed when I play and use their equipment. If you ask anybody who plays hockey and ask them what comes to mind when they think of Warrior in one word, I bet most would say appearance. That is how you build a brand and stand out from the rest of your competition.

My favorite Superbowl Commercial

In a long list of rather disappointing commercials, there was one that aired during Superbowl 49 that really stood out to me. The commercial above was aired by Budweiser and showed the special bond between a man and his dog. The commercial didn't really market the product of the company itself, it just tried to show the importance/strength of a relationship that most people in this country have with their dogs. The Clydesdale horses are also a reoccurring animal in Budweiser commercial during Christmas and the Superbowl. Most people already know what they are getting when they buy Budweiser, so the plan here I think is to show the "soft" side of the company and try to relate to everyday people. They obviously have a lot of competitors so keeping a good relation with people and trying to show that the people who run the company "are also human" is a decent marketing campaign. 

The Broad Street Bullies

     The Philadelphia Flyers have a very notorious mantra. They are known as the "bad boys" of the NHL, as noted goons. The Flyers entered the NHL in 1967 along with 5 other teams as part of the NHL's first expansion period. The man who brought the team to fruition was a Philadelphia businessman named Ed Snider. Snider was the driving force behind the construction of their first arena also, The Spectrum, located on South Broad Street. Snider's first job was simple; market the team enough for Philadelphia fans would attend games. There had been hockey in Philadelphia prior to the Flyers, the Philadelphia Quakers, and they failed miserably. He chose to market his team in an extremely eccentric way. The first year of their existence, the team was beaten up physically and knocked out of the playoffs by the also new expansion franchise the St. Louis Blues. Snider vowed to the small fan group that the Flyers will never be "bullied" on the ice ever again.

      He created the company "Spectacor" to run the team itself and the spectrum. The Flyers first marketing scheme was built on toughness, and they have never looked back since. The Flyers bullied their way to back-to-back Stanley Cups in 1975-76 by outplaying the other team by not only scoring goals, but by actually beating them up and constant line brawls. The team was known as the "animals" of the NHL and the league has never really forgotten the name. Aside from the obvious winning of back to back championships, the Flyers great fan base as we know it today was built by these marketing schemes. Philadelphia is known as a blue collar city, and they expect their teams to play that way. The Flyers were marketed and accepted by the Philadelphia faithful because of their toughness and on ice antics of pure savagery. The marketing scheme hasn't changed much since due to a few reasons. The Flyers are one of the most successful NHL franchises since their inception (2nd highest winning percentage, though only two cups to show for that), and people love hockey because of it's physicality and fighting, two things the Flyers embraced. They used these as actually tactics to win games, and as a marketing scheme it was genius. Marketing for this team was extremely important because they had virtually no fans show up to games until they started playing as "bullies" and Philadelphia was an already failed hockey town. The NHL was against putting a team there in the first place. The team had to find a way to put fans in the seats right away, and they did that with their marketing strategies (actually naming themselves the "Broad Street Bullies").

     The most crucial part of the Flyers marketing strategy came in 1976, at the height of the Cold War. The Soviets, as we all know, had the greatest hockey team on earth at the time and were unbeatable. The Soviet Union had a special tour with the NHL and the national team took on multiple NHL teams that year and dismantled all of them, they even destroyed the NHL All Star team. The last game of their 1976 tour was at the Spectrum vs. the Flyers, the only time in history the rest of America has rooted for the Flyers. This game put the franchise on the map and is a gigantic turning point of USA hockey. The Flyers beat the Soviets so bad that mid game they stood up and left the ice because the Flyers were playing "too aggressive". This was the first time the Soviets lost a national game in 13 seasons, and to a team that wasn't even around a decade earlier. The Flyers are synonymous around the hockey world for this game. You can bet that this drew them a large demographic of fans and was crucial to their marketing plan and finding a franchise identity.

    Of course now things have changed, the Flyers have taken on a different marketing strategy. They are very business oriented now. In 1996, Ed Snider joined forces with Comcast and created the huge conglomerate Comcast Spectacor. Ever since the joint, all Flyers games are shown on Comcast Sports Net Philadelphia. Snider today holds the position of the chairman of Comcast Spectacor, the regional network Comcast Sportsnet and Global Spectrum. It becomes much easier to market your team when you own an entire sports network. The Flyers have also implemented an industry changing program titled "How you Doin'"? Whenever you walk into the Wells Fargo Center, a Comcast Spectacor associate will ask you this question. It's the companies policy of interacting with the fans and engaging in conversation and making their experience at the arena enjoyable. The company makes sure to receive feedback from fans on this and reward the employees who participate greatly.

     The Flyers marketing strategy has not changed much since their inception, as the old adage says, "if it ain't broke don't fix it". The Flyers have never had a problem filling their arena to capacity year in and out. They have hosted events that contained special marketing at the same time though, like the 2012 Winter Classic. The game was played at Citizen's Bank Park, the Phillies' stadium, across the parking lot, and they incorporated a lot of Philadelphia's history with that game. The emblem for the game was non other than a rendition of the Liberty Bell in nearby Old City, Philadelphia, while also introducing a new jersey for the game.