Paul Brown Media continues its new editorial interview series called Creative Sparks, featuring some of the top talent in our industry with Gez Mulholland, Social Media Officer at West Bromwich Albion Football Club.
YOUR BACKGROUND
Name
Gez Mulholland
Position
Social Media Officer
Work for
West Bromwich Albion
Previous companies
None
Your first role in the industry
Media Support Officer at West Bromwich Albion
YOUR ROLE
Describe your role in on sentence…
My job is to run the social media channels at West Bromwich Albion Football Club, ensuring creative and engaging Albion-related content and information is delivered through Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.
What’s the most important personal quality for working in social media?
I would say humour. The best social media accounts are the ones that are able to combine the important messages which simply have to be delivered, yet still have a personal sense of humour about them. There’s nothing worse than a boring, straight and dull social media account – especially in sport. Social media plays an important role in delivering news and creative content to millions of sport fans, but I think it’s also really important to remember that social channels are not official websites. Use them to be creative and fun.
What do you love most about working in social?
Ask anyone who works in social media and I’d expect most of them to give you a similar answer. When your posts “bangs” and hits an unbelievable number in terms of engagements, interactions, likes, RTs etc. It’s a great professional feeling and it can attract plenty of positive attention for your brand/company.
Favourite channel personally and professionally?
Professionally, I would say Twitter. West Bromwich Albion’s Twitter account recently hit 1m followers and that was a very proud moment. I’d had my eye on that figure for months and I’d been predicting when we would hit the mark. It’s one of my proudest achievements working in football – being part of a team which propelled the club’s audience to over 1m.
Personally, I like Instagram. It’s the account a number of my friends use most frequently. I find Instagram a lot more informal and fun than Twitter and Facebook so after coming home from a day where I’ve given plenty of attention to those two accounts, it’s nice to sit back and have a scroll through a less formal platform.
YOUR THOUGHTS
What’s your proudest piece of content or campaign on social?
As I said earlier, one of my proudest achievements is helping the club Twitter account hit 1m followers earlier in 2020. In terms of specific content pieces, I was really pleased with how a feature of ours called “Getting Shirty” was received and the engagement figures it attracted. It was a short video of Albion players guessing as many football shirts as they could manage in 30 seconds. The shirts were a mix of old and new, home and away and club and country. The engagement levels were a lot higher than we had predicted, so when something like that comes off, it’s a great professional feeling.
Best piece of content/campaign you’ve seen on social in terms of sport?
I think AS Roma’s signing announcements on Twitter are absolutely superb. They use each new signing announcement as an opportunity to highlight missing children around the world. The video/picture is split in two. On one side is the new player and on the other is information on missing children and numbers which people can call should they have information. It’s incredibly clever and incredibly thoughtful.
Best social media campaign/content you’ve seen – non-sport?
I saw a video on Facebook which involved a young guy filming how he says good morning to his deaf and blind dog. The world is a dark place at the moment and it certainly helped put a smile on my face. The guy approached the dog in a very calm and controlled manner and gently petted the dog until it realised who he was. The dog then went crazy and returned the fuss. I’m a huge animal lover so I love seeing things like that.
Which team/organisation/individual is doing it best on social?
Peter Crouch has to be up there for me. He’s hilarious. His Twitter account, which has close to 1m followers I should add, is one which always raises a smile at the very least. He uses it very informally and likes to take the Michael out of himself which shows a humility not often associated with footballers. He also uses it to promote his work and podcasts for the BBC.
Three social media accounts you check daily?
West Bromwich Albion on Twitter, Facebook and Insta. I keep a check on how posts are performing and to make sure I’ve not made a typo!
I also check BBC Sport on Twitter – I like the weird and unusual features which they post links to from the BBC Sport website. The kind of stories where players who’ve played no higher than the National League North are flying off to play for American Samoa in a World Cup Qualifier. I love a weird one like that.
There’s an account called ArchBishopOfBanterbury on Instagram which often posts funny content. My best friend and I send each other at least 3/4 of their posts each day over DM.
In terms of industry peers in social, who do you most admire?
I enjoy checking out the content from the big boys in world football. The clubs where money in no object and they can afford to throw plenty of dosh at their social media. It’s really interesting to see what kind of content they can create and what type of campaigns they choose to run. I’m talking Barcelona, AS Roma, the English accounts of the German clubs etc. It’s also really interesting to see how social changes in terms of location. I enjoy scrolling through Spanish and South American Club accounts. I love their passion, because it’s a passion that would have to be delivered in a different way to a different audience.
YOUR PREDICTIONS
Channel to look out for in 2020?
TikTok seems to have burst onto the scene. It reminds me of Vine about 5/6 years ago. It’s very fun, very snappy and something which I expect to get bigger and bigger throughout the year. It will be interesting to see how football clubs use it.
What do you expect to be hot social in 2020?
Given the current climate, in terms of COVID-19, I think a lot of hot social this year will be videos and pictures of people having emotional reunions, big parties and being happy once more with friends and family. There will be so much of it and so many of those reunions will be posted across social. I think it will be a big positive for people to share in the joy of being reunited with loved ones after what has been an incredibly tough time.
Paul Brown 