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A few weeks ago I shared a peek behind the curtain at the launch of Stories. People seemed to like it so I thought I would try something new and give a peek behind the scenes at a product most of you probably DONT know about.
Time for a lesson about the legendary "Twackle"
Time for a lesson about the legendary "Twackle"
My 1st job at @Octagon was to serve as the Product Manager for Twackle. Many people know of my role there as it relates to athletes, but really it started off with a proprietary Twitter Sports Engine created by @jdelorenzo.
Want to find all things Twitter + Sports? Go to Twackle
Want to find all things Twitter + Sports? Go to Twackle
You may ask, why not go to Twitter? Well at that time Twitter was really hard to navigate. There wasn't a useful search tool and finding accounts relevant to you was really hard. We plugged into their API and applied a massive library of search terms to bring you all things sport
In addition to our flagship website, we also wanted to make Twackle portable. We did this with Twackle widgets. This allowed mainstream sports entities to capture the top Tweets and links about a sports topic and put it directly on their website.
At one point we had Mini-Twackles implemented across hundreds of blogs, team and sports news sites.
In that era it made a lot of sense as publishers were obsessed with driving more eyeballs to their owned and operated sites. It solved for the Fomo risk of not checking social.
In that era it made a lot of sense as publishers were obsessed with driving more eyeballs to their owned and operated sites. It solved for the Fomo risk of not checking social.
This was REALLY fascinating as it gave us tons of insight in terms of traffic patterns on the sports web. We had a glimpse not only into what was trending on Twitter with our engine, but also which widgets were getting the most traffic and in turn, which sports sites were popping
We also customized Twackle units for premium partners who then sold that integration to sponsors...helping them drive revenue. There was a Suns Twackle, Sports Illustrated Twackle, etc.
One of my favorites was that @WashingtonNFL had a Twackle promoted in games and on air.
One of my favorites was that @WashingtonNFL had a Twackle promoted in games and on air.
The biggest integration we probably ever did was to turn a widget into an ad unit for ESPN/Geico. The unit ran on the Fantasy Football team management page for http://ESPN.com for the entire season. This was pre-mobile app so if you played FFB that year, you saw it.
The amount of traffic it saw was astounding but it also had really great click through rate! In retrospect, that is unsurprising...it was essentially serving up really engaging and relevant content right there for users when they want to learn more about fantasy football.
In some ways, we were monetizing tweets before Twitter even was. Which in retrospect, it should have been no surprise that this type of activity soon went against Twitter's TOS. Twitter quickly improved its search, limited it's API, and cracked down on how tweets were displayed.
At that point Twackle portability was no longer viable and our flagship site was less desirable...but this wasn't the end...
We still had a LOT of Tweets we were processing each month and knew a ton about the sports publishing space. This is actually where things got very fun..
We still had a LOT of Tweets we were processing each month and knew a ton about the sports publishing space. This is actually where things got very fun..
News was now to breaking on Twitter, not on websites. We had that data in our system and publishers time had no way to corral it then. We realized this opportunity and pivoted our efforts to "Twackle Now" which essentially scowered Twitter to predict what stories woud go viral.
It actually worked pretty well! It also played to my strengths as a former journalism student who had gotten into tech by blogging.
As a proof of concept we created our own mini-blog on Twackle where myself and an army of interns wrote articles based on the engine's predictions
As a proof of concept we created our own mini-blog on Twackle where myself and an army of interns wrote articles based on the engine's predictions
We found very quickly that Twackle Now helped us get stories out faster, which gave us a HUGE bump in Googles search ranking. We were constantly listed ahead of major sports publishers in Google and were getting tons of traffic!
Licensing the tech quickly became the new business
Licensing the tech quickly became the new business
We soon reached an agreement with @SInow (<-- ever wonder where that handle name came from?).
They would license the technology and task us to hire a team of writers to write breaking news for http://SI.com . At that time they were essentially just surfacing AP stories
They would license the technology and task us to hire a team of writers to write breaking news for http://SI.com . At that time they were essentially just surfacing AP stories
So the integration made a ton of sense for them.
For me? I was 23 and leading a team of writers publishing on behalf of Sports Illustrated. That was my dream when I was 12 and I was in heaven. We covered some crazy stories and I learned a ton about their business.
For me? I was 23 and leading a team of writers publishing on behalf of Sports Illustrated. That was my dream when I was 12 and I was in heaven. We covered some crazy stories and I learned a ton about their business.
Eventually when SI and Turner split, the deal was voided and the integration ceased. The articles still live on SI's website today and SI Wire actually became a big part of their publishing efforts over time. I still have bylines on their website.
Twackle had a few more big moments in her. An acquisition opportunity with a major news network, a few more big time integrations with teams/leagues, but those are stories for another day. Eventually the tech became too much to keep up with and it got left behind.
That being said, I look back at that time as one of the most exciting moments of my career. I was helping to build something, from scratch, that was being used by the biggest entities in sports. I learned more about how sports orgs were thinking about tech, and most importantly..
The biggest weaknesses out there for legacy sports businesses at the time adapting to the new digital world. It helped shape my sports tech business worldview and I have used those learnings to this day.
