Up today, Duke University's Duke Blue Planet.com, linked here and shown below. Duke Blue Planet is a masterpiece of content, with some of the best and most personal insider videos you'll find anywhere. But we can go deeper into the magic which I feel makes this such an inspiring example into connecting that we can all learn from!
Blue Planet Live
If Blue Planet Live had a mission statement, it might be this: Take the best and latest content from anywhere and deliver it to you wherever you are. Sounds good, huh? Linked here, and shown below, BPL takes all the latest expert posts and tweets about the Blue Devils, lays them out in a beautiful fashion alongside those of fans (like you), and then makes them available for anyone to take via a Widget.
Here's a glimpse at the latest news... (I love how it isn't just a long list of text tweets!)
And here's how Fan comments come in... Love how fans get the feeling of connecting with Duke "just" by tweeting about it. Nice.
And here's how Fan comments come in... Love how fans get the feeling of connecting with Duke "just" by tweeting about it. Nice.
And, finally, you'll see how experts in the media who write about the program and its alums show up in this same spot. Also note that Widget in the upper right-hand corner of this image -- it's all set to take with you!
How could this be better? The idea is great. Now they just need to drive more Fans to join in the fun. And think about how this area can be activated come game time. What does Blue Planet Live look (or feel) like during a big game?
Playing for Coach K
It's emotional. As you'd expect, the idea of playing for a legend is powerful. Check out this quote from NBA star Elton Brand:
"Coach K's a great coach, a great teacher and a great person. I trust him. I trust him like no other. He knows the game. I haven't doubted him one time. He's always 100 percent right in what he says. He's been a mentor to me. He tells me what's going to happen before it ever happens. He has been the best, and I don't think I would have gotten that anywhere besides Duke. Duke was the greatest experience of my life."
Now imagine that emotion into an almost never-ending list of athletes and coaches. Linked here, and pictured below we see a sliver of the impact Coach K has had on Duke University -- through the lens of people.
Wow. Not everyone has a Coach K. But everyone has a coach who is impacting young athletes. How can you build a log of the impact your coaches make in shaping the next generation? It's a critical thing and it's easy to do.
How could this be better? I'd love to see the tag cloud of this. What does it all add up to? If we saw the consistencies in the words and made this equally about who said it and what they said, it would be even more magical!
Partner with key blogs
Here's an interesting one to finish on. Duke Blue Planet elevates BLOGS into their main navigation, shown below. And if you hover over it, you'll see that it isn't just columns they write. This is a source of all the content they have found in the web. I love this for many reasons, most specifically because it elevates their peers. They aren't threatened that someone might leave Duke Blue Planet, but rather they are pumped you are interested in Duke. Who are the peers for your program? And how can you elevate them for recruits (or fans) to find?
How could this be better? I'd love to see these bloggers involved deeper in Blue Planet Live, which we broke down above. Their stories might impact the latest links, but it feels like this connection could be even deeper. Imagine if they could bring this collective blog content from the world into that widget? That'd be the most complete Duke widget one could imagine!
That's it. And, THANK YOU to Duke Blue Planet for giving us a reason to love sites like this.
Come back next week as we shift back to our looks into individual conferences in search of best practices!
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