Friday, October 15, 2010

The Social Media Case For A Shorter MLB Season

The October classic as it is widely known may be a bad idea strategically. This season especially there has been a growing contingent of baseball fans calling for the sport to start their playoffs in August Rather than October. We have had a more than few conversations around the office about this topic, and it seems like we aren't the only ones.

After having, hearing, and engaging in these conversations I decided to do some Social Research. Using just the MLB, NHL, NBA and NFL as keywords I decided to do a comparison test. The objective was to determine weather a strategic advantage from a Social standpoint actually exists in having Playoff games start in october.

This chart represents conversations from the past 30 Days

mlbnhlnfl-last-30-days

This chart represents conversations in August

mlbnhlnfl-august

During August (a non-playoff month) MLB has a 4% edge in the percentage of Social conversations occurring. The volume of conversations are down significantly during August which suggests the ability of the MLB to grow their share of voice by generating conversations. Strategically from a Social Stand-point the shift would make sense.

(Repost of my work from Nostrum Inc.)