This is interesting stuff from The Athletic’s Sean Shapiro:
When the NHL looks to future of fandom, it looks at Lucas Raymond.
Or at least, players like the Detroit Red Wings rookie forward.
Raymond is a 19-year-old that grew up in a social media world. He was four years old when the first Tweet was sent, and eight when Instagram was launched.
Connecting with others in that age demographic is vital for the league as it tries to build new fandom, which is why the league is hoping players like Raymond can help expand the audience through their social following.
“We’ve been talking about this for years, and the importance of social media as a connection point to younger fans,” said Heidi Browning, the executive vice president and chief marketing officer of the NHL. “So you start to think about where are the next generation of fans spending the most time, then you look at the global trends, right? Young fans around the world are following athletes first, then teams and then leagues, and they’re following athletes before sports, they might even watch just because they’re interesting humans.”
It’s why the league partnered with Greenfly this season to better coordinate and share content on social media. Greenfly is a content management system that operates on the back end, and is intended to help streamline the league’s use of social media across team, league, and player accounts.
Continued (paywall); here’s a picture that Raymond shared via the NHL’s new Greenfly system:
