Devoted to branding and building and protecting brands

It’s no secret that pro sports leagues such as the NBA, NHL, Nascar and the PGA Tour are getting web-wiser by the month.  One sure signal:  they’re opening up their sites to enable fans to post comments on message boards and create interest groups.   Is it a coincidence that the value of each league’s brand is at an all time high?  Team sites have passion -- exactly what every brand covets.  Now, individual athletes as well as teams are, in the words of Business Week, “taking social networking a step further.”  Guys like ski champ Bode Miller launched SkiSpace recently and saw membership swell to 10,000 in just a month.  “There’s a distinction between a social network that’s simply a social network and one that provides tools for people who are already involved in an…industry,” Miller told Business week. Could your own outfit profit by enabling and encouraging a higher number of higher-qualified prospects?  If you don’t think your market has the passion shared among hockey fans and skiers, you might be surprised.  Much emotion goes into almost any purchase, especially when the pricetags and risks are high.  Your competitors may be thinking about sharing some of that passion with those same customers.  Don’t taker a header down that hill!  Become more familiar with how easy it is to get your web site to work harder.  Yeah, we do that here, but only with people who are serious about revenue growth.  Theirs, not ours.