Richard Sherman: The Impact of One, Thirty-Second Interview
Does the name ‘Richard Sherman’ ring a bell to you? If you follow sports, or have been on social media in the last 72 hours, you’ve more than likely had a chance to see the post-game interview with Seattle Seahawks Cornerback, Richard Sherman. If not, take a look before you read any further:
What was the impact on social media?
Within the first 24 hours after the interview, Sherman managed to gain over 300,000 new, active followers on Twitter. 300,000. That’s over 208 followers per minute. Can you imagine gaining over 208 followers per minute on your own social media account? Let’s be honest, you’re jacked that you have over 200 followers total.
Followers {before the interview}: 259,163
Digital influence value {before the interview}: $1,784 per tweet
Followers {after the interview}: 655,777
Digital influence value {after the interview}: $4,733 per tweet
The thing is, it’s not just about gaining followers because of something Sherman said after he made the game-winning play (while his adrenaline was extremely high). It’s also about engaging with those thousands of followers by displaying his personality out of competition and the values he exercises on a daily basis. If you’re like a lot of people, the initial thoughts about the interview were negative in one way or the other. After watching this video, this video, and reading this article, those initial thoughts could change for the better and quickly disappear.
If you scroll through Sherman’s social media accounts on Twitter and Facebook, you will notice that engaging with his fans through giveaways is of utmost importance to him, as well.
Want 2 tickets to SB48+Hotel+Flights? All orders from my website are automatically entered. http://t.co/e1jxQdYvAm pic.twitter.com/pUr23837NB
— Richard Sherman (@RSherman_25) January 22, 2014
Super Bowl bound! First 5 to use at checkout gets it – SB142T http://t.co/x5gUcEOgL5<https://t.co/tgG03tP2v3> pic.twitter.com/Vx22VJYPOm
— Richard Sherman (@RSherman_25) January 21, 2014
What did this teach us?
As you can imagine, the media was all over this ‘opportunity’. Article after article was written and published about Sherman’s actions, and probably rightfully so. But his actions proved something about Americans. We are too quick to judge. What you probably didn’t know was that this 25-year-old grew up in the streets of Compton, graduated second in his high school class with a 4.2 GPA and earned a scholarship from Stanford University. From Sherman’s actions on Sunday night (which may or may not be excusable), most people wouldn’t have guessed he came from that background. Oh, and did we forget to mention he started his own charitable non-profit called Blanket Coverage.
Richard Sherman, on-the-field trash talker or not, just might go from one of the least liked players in the NFL, to one of America’s favorites.
