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By now nearly every team at every level has a Facebook Fan Page. Hopefully ( if you are your team’s administrator) you’ve set up a “Fan” page and not a “Group” page—because group pages are meant for more personal interactions. Facebook only allows up to 5,000 members for group pages, and even teams in the smallest markets seem quite able to reach that threshold.

Minor league teams were at the forefront of businesses utilizing social networks for many reasons:

• They typically have young front office staffs, and therefore are social network-savvy.
• They typically are run with very challenged budgets, so social networks’ ease of setup, free cost, and use as a marketing tool is especially appealing.
• Teams already have “fans” in the truest sense of the word…so getting those fans to come together in an online setting is a natural progression.
• Fans love to talk, and love to express their opinions about everything from who should be playing third to how much salt should be on the stadium popcorn.

But even though every team has a fan page, not every team knows what they’re trying to do with their page.

Some quick advice:

• Thomas Boswell once said, “All baseball fans can be divided into two groups: those who come to batting practice, and the others.” Just like every other relationship you have, if you smother your fans you’ll lose them. Be reasonable about how often you update. You might think the entire fan base shares your enthusiasm for those little details, but your default setting should be, “no more than one update per day, unless there’s a no-hitter.”
• Use lots of photos and links. One of the toughest marketing challenges for any minor league team is getting its fans to actually relate to its players. Facebook is a great way to get a player’s photo and story in front of your fans, giving them a chance to care about the human, not just the statistics.
• Don’t continually keep asking for money. You’re building a community. You need to be seen as a source of “inside-information” for the team, not as just one more company using the internet to sell more stuff. Get them interested in what you say—every day—before you try to turn your Facebook page into a sales pitch.
• Nobody cares how many fans you have, so don’t ever make it the subject of a post. Treating your fans right doesn’t mean continually telling them how great you are…it makes you sound like you care more about how popular you are than you do about providing good information.
• Let your fans vent. It might make your team owner or manager/coach squirm the first few times they see complaints posted on your page, but in most cases you’ll have other loyal fans that will downplay the complaints, or even defend you. But if you don’t ever get anything but complaints, maybe it’s time to start listening? It also gives you the chance to respond…if you want to.

Social Networks will continue to play a role in marketing sports teams at every level. Fans expect the same from your page that they do from your radio guy—be loyal to the team, be a great source of information, but don’t be a “homer.”