NCAA Tournament Basketball Marketing: What we can learn from #7 Seed Richmond

This fun ride continues. We're in search of inspiration- things that all of us can take and apply into our worlds. Then we will apply a "Plus One" method to make each inspiring thing even better.

Let's rejoin our coverage of the NCAA Tourney's South Region. Thus far, we've looked at top seeded Duke, #2Villanova, #3 Baylor, #4 Purdue, #5 Texas A&M, and #6 Notre Dame.

Let's go.

South Region #7 Seed Richmond

What's Inspiring about Richmond's Athletics Marketing? (Link here)


We've broken down Richmond's marketing before, here. But I was excited to hit the site again to see what's new and inspiring...

1. Pumping new signees through YouTube

The Spiders kill it on YouTube, linked here and shown below. They post early and often and it is with content that provides real value if you are a Spider fan. As you'll see below, they even compiled a highlight reel of incoming recruits. That's hot stuff, and it's exciting to find here!

This highlight reel is also accessible via a link that is pasted in the men's basketball section.

Plus One: The challenge is that the Spiders only have 112 subscribers on their YouTube channel. So they need to think of how they can maximize viewership and not simply rely on having an action packed YouTube channel. A couple suggestions I have are to:

• Take these YouTube clips and embed them into Facebook (as you'll see in a minute they do a nice job here) and the Spiders site.
• Lead with this content. What if we could have the same recruiting highlight video on the site on signing day? And what if the highlight package was the way we revealed this to the world? Great content that's timely builds loyalty in a BIG way!

2. Spiders Toolbar earns you PreyGround points

I was a little hesitant on this at first. Click in here, and you can see that the Spiders have a system to download a Richmond-customized search bar to your web browser. People already have my standard web search browser and to offer your own version of something like that felt a little bit forced. But then I checked it out.

The copy says it well: "Here's your chance to prove you are the #1 Spiders fan. Download the toolbar and every time you search, not only will you earn points but you will raise money for Richmond athletics."

Hmm. I like the idea of enabling fans to earn money for the program by doing something they already do (searching). It made me look a little deeper. What are these points?

Preyground points. The leaderboard of who's the biggest fan. You can earn points from downloading the toolbar and points for attending events (different values for conference games and non-conference games). The most passionate fans win Richmond gear (see the list below) Nice.

Plus One: I'd love to see the most passionate fans get elevated even further. Maybe the current leader (from the student list) wins a chance to sit on the bench for a game? Kind of like the Yellow jersey in cycling, it could be a status of who is leading at any given moment.

3. Mooney's Looneys on Facebook

Linked here, Richmond sets up a passionate fan base with a 1,100+ Facebook fan nation. The title has me going -- rather than calling this Richmond Basketball, it is entitled "Mooney's Looneys". Nice. That keeps us in the aspirational frame of mind that is no doubt why fans love going to games. And as you can tell from the image below, they are active on Facebook, drilling us with relevant stories on the program that just connect us even closer with the Spiders. In short, they brand the page well and then hit you with relevant information that keeps you coming back.

Plus One: Elevate the fan here. Why not post the Preyground point leaderboard and photo gallery right here, in a tab on the Facebook page? That could be contagious - as more and more fans go to check out who is the most passionate. And those images would support the Mooney's Looneys brand we all want to see!

That's it.

What's next?

We'll be back to Friday with a breakdown of #8 seed California. As always, you can follow along on Twitter - I'm @pawlow34.

Andy