It’s all about timing. Understanding the market and timing.
Right now the sports world is focused on LeBron. (Well, American sports world, in Holland they are focused on other things.) He has never been more watched -- even in the finals -- and if you are going to launch a new marketing initiative, now is the time.
LeBron James is a championship marketer.
LeBron James has a new twitter account (@KingJames). He has had one tweet as of this writing.
And you wonder why we are hooked on twitter -- it’s the insight into the soul.
But LeBron had passed 135,000 followers in less than one day. He is hot. Maybe Chris Paul pushed him to do it, but no harder than James’ PR people had been pushing him forever. James is not a social media guy, he has not been into Facebook or Twitter. Even his official Website has been non-existent for over a year.
But the site is now live (and linked to a Facebook page). He has a twitter account. Right at the time he is going to announce where he will play the next few years in a flurry of publicity. The time when so many eyes are on him.
I’m not a big believer in coincidence. This is all part of the planned new marketing of James (wherever he lands). It’s about building the brand, and launching these things when everyone is watching so you get the most bang for the buck. So he has a twitter account now. No way he announces his choice on twitter. (Chris Bosh on the other hand... wouldn’t shock me.)
When he gets as interesting as Kevin Durant or Ron Artest on twitter, then I’ll be really interested.