Social and the Super Bowl. It is something that has been around for a couple of years, in fact the first hashtag that was featured in a Super Bowl ad was Audi back in 2011. However, everyone in thinks back to the big play, Oreo at the super bowl in 2013. You remember, the lights went out in part of the stadium in New Orleans and the internet blew up and Oreo tweeted out this little gem that has the ENTIRE world buzzing.

Brilliant. Quick. Witty.

What followed (and is still happening) is the BARAGE of brand attempting to cash in on live events with funny, witty comments. People jumping in to get in on the latest meme (Dead Nationwide Kid, anyone?) and there are brands and people doing this well. There are also some that are not really doing it well at all.What i have below are some tips on what you should be thinking about when doing social around live events and how to stop from failing.

Dont pull and St. Nick. Be around more often.

Here is the thing, most brands will only be active on social, faving and RTing on the day of the big game. Sunday night was the Super Bowl and in my fit of joy I called Tom Brady and ‘chisled, @UggAustralis wearing, beaut.” and mentioned I was “crushing 18 @MillerLite beers and #Totinos pizza rolls.” Now in about 10 minutes of each tweet I had favs from Uggs and Miller. Awesome right? Not. I had mentioned Miller about 10 other times in the last year. Nothing ever came of it and as much as I love Tommy B…I am not psyched when Uggs gives me a fav. Im not buying Uggs. The issue is that these brands put up teams, they have squads that will RT of fav posts mentioning them and not do anything else all year. If you REALLY want to do social well for an event it starts the day AFTER the event. You are learning, planning, listening for NEXT years event. That way you will be able to game plan and have a history built up. So when that new person comes across you during the second half of Super Bowl 50, you have a culture of engagement built up. While other brands are just faving all the tweets, you are building relationships and going for it.

Don’t try too hard

The worst relationship I had was completely my fault. Haley A. in the 6th grade. It wasnt even really a relationship. I liked this girl and wow did I make sure she knew it. I was trying to get her attention by doing all the things the cool kids were doing. I would make jokes I thought we cool to get her to laugh. I would ride my bike up and down her street to get her to see me. While I ended that summer with a finer taste of comedy and some beefy bike legs I did not have a girl friend. One day as I rode past for the 9th time she came out to talk to me and she told me one thing. “You try too hard. Be you.”

That stuck with me and while I never did get the girl (don’t worry I did get a kiss from her in a play senior year) I did learn that being you and just playing at your own speed it just fine. People try too hard when tweeting and responding to events. Everyone wants to be the “next Oreo” and catch that lightning in a bottle but when you don’t, and you are trying to be something you are not you look desperate. And no one like desperate.

To be seen, be seen

Images are so darn important. When you think of the Oreo tweet, what do ou think of? I just showed it to you a few minutes ago, you should remember. It is not the copy at the bottom or the logo in the corner is it? Nope. It is the Oreo, with the darkness. It is the image that pops into your head. Take this most recent Super Bowl. I sent out quite a few tweets and I would look at them in two separate categories, with and without images. Not just so you know the best tweet I had WITHOUT an image was this one.

How ever I had three tweets out perform that one on total engagement like crazy. You know what those had in common? Images.Same amount of snark, same basic writing principles, however when you look at these two tweets you will see those number skyrocket.

That second tweet got some eyes and even got picked up by E!News in an article. It had the three things you need. It was well-timed, it was to the point and witty, and it had an image people could relate to. When we are trying to grab attention in a time where we had millions of tweets a minute rolling in you need a way to grab attention and the images help to do that. Image dont trump the copy, but when working together this is incredibly important.


These are just a few tips, but ones that I know that when employed, they will bring big change and growth to your brand on these awesome tweetable days.