Why I'm Thankful for Coach Cal.com

This week is Thanksgiving Week.

I'll be taking the week to look at 5 sites who aren't "Official" School sites but who make following a program more dynamic. These sites play a critical role in building an athletics brand, and should not be ignored for the roll they play in cultivating a fan base... and inspiring a (prospective) recruit.

Tune in on this blog, or you can follow me on Twitter (I'm @pawlow34) or on Facebook, here.

Up today, the University of Kentucky Basketball, told through the eyes of Coach Cal.com, linked here and shown below.


As you all probably know by now, I'm a college hoops junkie who consumes a LOT of digital content. But what you may not know is that I get more excitement out of my visits to Coach Cal.com than most if not all other sites. Why? As you'll see in my breakdown below, Coach Cal is a digital innovator. While he gets credit for being a part of a large institution with a big marketing budget, it's how he tries new things and gets the most out of what he has that impresses me as a digital guy. Here's a few of my favorites!

Authentic Photography

This site proves that you don't need a professional photographer documenting your every move to make an impact. And, not just that, they show that you can accomplish a lot by embracing the fact that you don't! In the new section dubbed "No caption needed, iPhone outtakes", Coach Cal creates a section where they can create galleries of the randomness and unpredictability that comes in a typical week with Coach Cal. Check it for yourself, here.

And, as you can see in the image below, emotion can strike you when you least expect it!

How can this be better? I love where they are going. I'd love to see social embedding here. It could be via simple sharing through Facebook or Twitter built into each picture. Or it could be the ability to easily take each picture and send it to your own profile (or Twitter skin). Authenticity is king.

Location Based

I've been lukewarm on Location-based marketing in general, as it has felt like it was a little bit of a privacy thing for a lot of people. (And, according to reports only 4% of people are using them) That said, I was taken aback in a good way by the integration of Coach Cal on Foursquare, which you can check out here or see below. Right in the center of the home page is a graphic that tells us where Coach Cal has last checked in. Cool, huh? Especially if he's active and lets you know when he's at the gym/team hotel/on the road, etc.

How could this be better? I'd love to see contests folded into this. Follow Coach Cal and have a chance to get game tickets, home or road. Simple but cool.

Post Game Mashups

Never has there been a more prime example of making the most of what you have than you'll see here, in the Post Game Mashup. Editor David Scott mixes Game Play-by-Play with Coach Cal's press conference with photography, stats, audio, or whatever he comes across to give you a recap of what you missed. It's simple (the example I found was only text and a couple authentic iPhone pictures) but it gives you the full read of things, in the order they happened. I love this because it is an example of something every program could do and it creates real value for a fan!

How could this be better? Could you pull in comments from fans on Twitter? Let people use a hashtag and then add them into this description, as they unfolded (selected ones, of course). It adds to the drama and subtly connects fans to Coach and the Program in a deeper way!

That's it. And, THANK YOU to Coach Cal.com for giving us a reason to love sites like this.

Come back tomorrow as we break down yet another site to be Thankful for! Don't forget, Tune in on this blog, or you can follow me on Twitter (I'm @pawlow34) or on Facebook,here.