1. An ability to insert relevant promotional ads and links at the foot of text messages written by sports stars.  Many of these ads will be for the athlete’s own merchandise.  For the sports marketing world, the ad system blocks ads that conflict with an athlete’s existing endorsements or the sales guidelines of leagues and players unions.
2. A new payment structure.
   1. Real Merchandise (off-field apparel and headwear): 72% of Net Profits to the players and 2% to their favorite charities or foundations.  MogoTXT will also pay an additional 6% to the athlete’s union or to other charities.
   2. Virtual Goods and Social Games: 50% of Net Profits (to be allocated between Athlete and his Union) and 2% to their favorite charities or foundations.
   3. Mobile Advertising: 20% of Adjusted Gross Revenues, 2% to their favorite charities or foundations, and 3$ to athlete’s union or other charities.
3. Free, professional graphic design services and e-commerce stores for athletes and celebrities on MogoTXT, on Facebook and on the athletes’ own websites to enable athletes to market attractive high-quality merchandise to their fans without any upfront costs, financial risks or hassles.

It seems like quite a few big name athletes have signed up for the MogoTXT service.  As long as it is something that an athlete and/or his team of advisors are getting behind, it could be a good option to promote one’s personal brand, entertain his fans, and earn some additional off field/court revenue.

MogoTXT Increases Services Offered To Athletes from Sports Agent Blog - Sports Business, Sports Law, Sports Negotiations, NCAA Rules

My company, Synrgy Sports Consulting, exists to fight for you. You don’t know me or my colleague, JD Nelson, so you may not pay attention to what I’m saying here, but if you care about your future, you’d be wise to read this article.

Got your attention? Good.

Over the past year, we’ve been asking your universities the questions you should be asking, talking to the people you should be talking to, and researching the issues you’re going to face to make sure you don’t fall victim to any of them.

We know you probably don’t realize it yet, but the world you’ll be facing once your college days are over is going to be crazy and complicated. As you transition from college to the pros, the stakes are higher than ever, and despite the rapidly evolving complexities of that process, most of you still aren’t being provided with the tools, resources or guidance necessary to make that transition successfully.

Need proof? Well, 78% of NFL athletes are financially distressed or bankrupt within 2 years of leaving the league. With the average career lasting 3 1/2 years, most of these players go from rags to riches and back again before they turn 30, and that, is a tragedy.

We’ve got good news for you though. In order to get the tools you need to succeed in choosing an awesome team of professionals who will represent your business interests wisely, all you have to do is ask your university for them. Yep, your university.

Why them? Well, NCAA bylaw 12.3.4 states that companies like ours can’t work for you unless you pay for our services on your own, but you have to pay fair market value and all payments must be made on a real-time basis. So, unless each of you pays thousands of dollars for our services yourself, your university is the only entity capable of providing you with them without jeopardizing your eligibility. Obviously, the vast majority of players can’t afford to pay fair market value for a team like ours to lead them through this process, so they end up using their family and friends to make their business decisions.

But Magic Johnson, who is reportedly worth $800 million and knows a little bit about big business said it best, “players lean on family and friends, not because of expertise but because they’re family and friends, and when they make business decisions like that, they’ll fail.”

The simple fact is, while family members often care as much as anybody ever could about your success, most of them don’t have the experience or knowledge to handle the high-stakes business side of the NFL.

What are universities doing for their young men right now?

I’m going to let you in on a secret: a few universities are relatively proactive when it comes to helping their kids through this daunting process, including, Oregon, Alabama, Northwestern, Georgia, USC, and Florida, but most of the others express little or no interest in helping their young men successfully make the transition.

The truth is, they don’t think they’ll profit off of services aimed at helping their young men succeed in the business of professional athletics, so, despite the steady stream of stories about athletes being taken advantage of and having their dreams crushed, they refuse to pay for them.

Don’t take my word for it though. Ask your coaches and administrators if they provide career specific transition services for their NFL-bound student-athletes. Ah, and make sure you ask what they consist of, too. If they tell you they have someone come in and talk to you once or twice a year, tactfully call them out. You don’t learn how to read complex defenses in an hour and you won’t learn how to choose your professional representation in an hour either. In the vast majority of cases, though, you’re going to get a lot of silence and a blank stare.

Some coaches may tell you that you don’t need to worry about agents, attorneys, accountants or marketing representatives until your eligibility is exhausted. Wait a minute – can you imagine your coach telling his stars to wait until the week before the bowl game to start studying the playbook? He would never say that to you when his job and life is on the line. Point blank, if they tell you to ignore your future until the final hour, they are giving you terrible business advice and you are doing yourself a disservice by taking it.

The truth of the matter is, hyper-successful businessmen don’t make multi-million dollar business decisions without the benefit of competent professional counsel, research and preparation. You shouldn’t either. Choosing an agent involves a complex process and it’s an incredibly important decision; Don’t let anyone convince you otherwise.

Is it really that complex and do we really need that much help?

Absolutely.

There’s an abundance of anecdotal evidence that players often make poor decisions when choosing their professional representation, but let us share some statistics with you to illustrate just how flawed those decisions have been. In the past 4 years alone:

• 18 players from a major ACC football program fired their agent
• 14 players from an SEC powerhouse fired their agent
• 14 players from another major ACC program fired their agent

Here’s the kicker: Despite the fact that those three schools are aware of their players’ struggles, none of them have taken legitimate steps to fix the problem. As a student-athlete, why would you attend a university like that when you could attend a university that has comprehensive services in place to support their student-athletes to the fullest?

You’re right. You wouldn’t.

What would you need to make this transition successfully? Well, for starters, you would need a competent team to conduct contract analysis on prospective agents, research agent firings and the reasons behind them from both the agent’s and the player’s perspective, and you’d want to thoroughly research agent disciplinary history. We have a comprehensive service that goes much further, but these are the bare essentials.

Ready to do that all yourself for the 20-40 agents who will be blowing up your phone, writing you constantly on Facebook, and showing up at your classes and apartment? Oh yeah, I’m sure you have plenty of time between treatment, practices, study hall, classes, and trying to graduate. And we haven’t even mentioned your personal life. If you care about your bread and engage in this process the right way, you better get used to your girl complaining (a lot more) that you don’t spend enough quality time with her.

Excessive agent firings may not mean much to an outsider, but you will understand this: When someone holds you and your family’s future in their hands – handling your finances, business dealings and brand – would you want to be so upset with the level of service they provide you that you had to fire them? No? Me neither.

Honestly, it’s alarming that so many of the players you depend on for information on agents are firing theirs in such a short time frame. It indicates that they aren’t choosing suitable representation the first time around, aka, they didn’t know what they were doing.

How dangerous is making the wrong decision? Ask Fred Taylor. He’ll tell you that choosing the wrong agent can lose you millions of dollars. For Fred, it was $3.6 million and much, much more.

Most of these poor decisions are due to a lack of education, preparation, research, and resources, but most importantly, they’re due to the lack of impartial and competent counsel. But if your university provides you with professionals who stand in your corner during the selection process, you’re a lot less likely to fall victim to the same pitfalls so many before you have fallen victim to. With as much money as they make off of your efforts while you’re on their team, it only seems fair that they fully support you when you finally get a chance to make some of your own.

Alright, to make it clear that we are more interested in your success than in being the ones to work for you, let me share this with you: There are a few other services out there who do similar work to the work that we do and they can be helpful to you. But be careful, not all of these guys have your best interests at heart. For instance, if they offer to work for you for free, they don’t really care that much about you because they’re jeopardizing your eligibility. No one’s going to suffer from that if the NCAA catches wind of it except you and your squad.

Until we meet, I wish you the best and hope that this article gave you some helpful information. In the mean time, always remember:

“In anything you do, quality is never an accident; it is always the result of high intention, sincere effort, intelligent direction and skillful execution; it represents the wise decision among many alternatives.”

Make sure you do what needs to be done to make wise decisions.

An Open Letter to Future NFL Athletes from Sports Agent Blog - Sports Business, Sports Law, Sports Negotiations, NCAA Rules

1. They never/rarely send tweets.
2. They send over 50 tweets a day, with extremely useless information.

Very few agents fall into either category, yet we know that there are well over 88 people who call themselves agents (and some of the accounts on the list are agency accounts – most likely run by interns).

If you think that it has taken an unreasonable amount of time for agents to embrace Twitter, their adoption of Facebook is even slower.  While I do not have a listing of all sports agency Fan Pages (you can find Dynasty’s Fan Page here), I believe that there are less agent/agency Fan Pages than there are agent/agency Twitter accounts.

Agents and agencies are missing out on a great opportunity to spread brand awareness, create relationships with fans of the agencies and their clients, and promote their knowledge on open platforms – all for free.  Yes, all of our favorite price.  There is no cost to have an active voice on Twitter or Facebook.  But there may be a cost to not having an active voice.

If Facebook Fans are worth $3.60 a piece, as discussed in this Mashable article, then sports agencies without a presence on Facebook are missing out on potential income.  Does the post have any credence in our industry, though?  Perhaps, as people who Fan a sports agency’s page are most likely people who will find the content relevant.  It’s not like Fan-ing a generic brand like Taco Bell or KFC.

The CEO of the company that ran the study is quoted as saying, “It’s no longer an option, it’s a necessity,” when discussing the importance of brands to have a strong Facebook presence.

Personally, I don’t like trying to assign a value to each Fan.  Whether it be $3.60, $1.00, or $7.00, there is value added to having your brand prominently displayed on Facebook.  And whether you believe it or not, your clients will end up benefiting from the increased exposure, as well.

Attaching Value To Your Social Media Presence from Sports Agent Blog - Sports Business, Sports Law, Sports Negotiations, NCAA Rules

One quick note – my bracket is busted. I was fairly confident that I could win Dynasty’s company pool since I was the only one who had Syracuse winning it all. But after last night, I am officially out of every bracket I produced. This has been one of the wildest tournaments in recent memory. Hopefully next year North Carolina will return to prominence and make everything right again in College Basketball.

I spent this past week working with Darren and two equipment companies finalizing deals for some of our clients. This involved emailing back and forth several times to get everything straight. The contracts needed to be signed and returned, the players needed to give information to get their equipment personalized, and we needed to ensure the products were sent to the right place so that the players receive their equipment to start the season. In regards to one company, we are getting some equipment sent to a client to try out. We didn’t want him to sign any sort of deal before we knew he was comfortable with the product. A player’s productivity could be severely impacted if they are not comfortable with what they are using.

I was extremely proud that the work I did led to some of our clients getting equipment deals. It also gave me great confidence that Darren allowed me to contact these companies and get a deal for our clients. While I had no final say on anything, it was still good to be relaying information to Darren and providing whatever input I could. This will help tremendously in any future sports related employment I might obtain.

In addition, Darren has started a new website and our job was to promote the site as much as possible.

I also spent some time contacting sports companies, and in some cases, recontacting sports companies. I was impressed by how quickly some companies responded. The companies that I contacted a second time were apologetic for not getting back to me quicker. While some of these companies couldn’t offer us a deal at the present time, most companies (including some major companies) knew of Dynasty and were following our clients. They seemed to indicate that in the near future they would be interested. This was good news. As Dynasty continues to grow and our clients progress, I am confident that major sports companies will want to sign with Dynasty clients.

I also conducted some research on an individual that was interested in having us as representation. From the information I compiled, I gave Darren an assessment of whether I thought it was a good idea to represent the individual. Finally I did my usual tasks. I worked on both college and high school player updates for Dynasty. Many of the players we’re watching had great weeks again.

That’s about it for this week. Until next week, I hope everyone has a great weekend.

An Intern(al) Look At Becoming A Sports Agent from Sports Agent Blog - Sports Business, Sports Law, Sports Negotiations, NCAA Rules

I am extremely honored to be amongst the highly intelligent and motivated contributors to Jason Peck’s 2010 Sports and Social Media Predictions, and I really wanted to publish a post about it earlier in the week when the predictions first came out, but I also wanted to thoroughly read through the entire docket before writing about it, and I could not do that until now.  I was very quiet about it, but this week were Final Exams, and in law school, studying and taking those exams consumes quite a bit of time.  Anyway, the tests are beyond me, and I can now return to focusing on my business and the business of sports.

So about Peck’s compilation of sports and social media predictions (an embedded downloadable copy may be found at the bottom of this post)…first of all, I love the cover page.  It is creative and aesthetically pleasing.  A few notes based on my readings are below:

• Brian Gainor mentions that 2010 will be defined by the rise of online video and photo sharing.  I personally believe that online video is going to expand tremendously.  From video calls on your phone, to video conferences on the computer, and especially the eventual ease of recording a video and instantly uploading it to social services.  He mentions Flip Video cameras.  I am actually about to unwrap one that I just received in order to do a special Holiday Product Review of it on the blog.  I have a feeling I am going to get good usage out of that little “toy”.
• Dan Beeman says that teams and leagues will attempt to build their own online communities.  I think they need to tread this water carefully.  If they do create unique communities, they will need to be heavily integrated with the big boys (Facebook, Twitter, YouTube).  The key is not trying to defeat them, but instead, how to work with them.
• I won’t comment on my own piece.  Instead, I ask that you leave your comments on this post.
• The Blogs With Balls guys see a consolidation of independent voices in the blogosphere.  I sure hope not.  This site has never become a part of a larger entity, even though there have been some pretty lucrative offers on the table.  Independent voices are needed…isn’t that the main reason why blogs started and became popular in the first place?
• I just really like this passage from Espree Devora: “Surf brand means you’re a surfer right? No, not necessarily. You must establish your brand to stand for something. A cause. Something bigger and selflLESS than selling a pair of board shorts.”
• Joe Favorito sees a shift to localization from the shotgun approach being applied today.  Perhaps that is the route for the lesser known public figures, but not the case for a LeBron James.
• J.W. Cannon sees more red tape coming in the future.  Athletes will be limited to what they can say and do by regulations and PR entities.  How does that affect what I said in my piece?
• Lewis Howes makes a good point: sports entities do not only need to be involved in social media in 2010, they need to find new, creative ways to be involved.
• Pat Coyle says there will be more buying and selling of inventory on social media by teams in 2010, but no crazy boy band money just yet.
• I like Peter Robert Casey‘s note that social media will be integrated into athletes’ marketing and sponsorship campaigns.  We are already seeing it done with entities like Danica Patrick.  I think it will only expand in the next year.
• Rob Katz makes a great reference to Geoffrey Moore’s argument in Crossing the Chasm.  The mainstream adopters have joined the early adopters on these social media networks.  Now it’s time to figure out how to make it a successful venture for all involved.
• Russell Scibetti notes that social media engagement is time consuming.  Thus, measurement is necessary to make sure that there is value behind that engagement.
• Ryan Stephens is brilliant when he says that strategies must include more than just slapping a sponsor’s logo on a Twitter page.  It’s all about creativity and integration.  What does the brand specifically like about the athlete it wants to sponsor?  How can that athlete use that particular “likeness” to benefit the brand?  Another good point – it’s not only about the number of Twitter followers you have.
• Steve Cobb discusses the power of contests.  Here is a good way to make an athlete sponsorship more fun than just slapping that logo on his page.  And the athletes can then promote the contest to their followings as well.  I disagree about Ustream’s growth among athletes, though.  This is one area where I think sports agents will wise up and tell their clients to stay away.  It takes a very particular athlete to be able to handle live streaming effectively.  Most athletes aren’t suited for it.
• Trevor Turnbull turns the discussion away from ROI and talks about people, relationships, and trust.  Maybe social media is not how you make the money, it’s how you develop the relationships that will make you money.
• Ty Ahman-Taylor talks about how tweets fall short of capturing the full experience of a game, but at least those updates are better than nothing (if you are not at the game or in front of a TV).

2010 Sports And Social Media Predictions from Sports Agent Blog - Sports Business, Sports Law, Sports Negotiations, NCAA Rules

You’ve landed a talented athlete as a new client. A professional contract is fast-approaching. When the contract is signed, will the athlete’s online presence be ready?

In sports, the athlete’s name is the brand. So it should come as no surprise the bad guys on the internet, known as cyber-squatters, may try to take advantage of your athlete’s name and brand.

An example: In California, a single cyber-squatter was recently convicted of registering the domain names of nearly 800 basketball players. Domain names are Web browser addresses, like SteveNash.com and ChrisBosh.com. The affected players ranged from NBA pros to top high school and college players. Because of this one squatter, hundred’s of athletes were unable to take the first step into online branding. This was just one squatter — there are thousands of squatters on the NET trying to make money from athletes’ brands.

As an agent, you need to start managing your client’s online brand early —before fame and success attract the cyber-squatters. It’s critical for agents to help athletes create a comprehensive online branding strategy.

Here are 5 simple tips to help agents prepare and protect a player’s online brand:

1. Register a Dot-Com Domain Name

Domain names are Web addresses, so they are the focus of your online branding plan. Having a domain name with your player’s first and/or last name in it, like RogerFederer.COM, is the Grand Slam of Internet branding. The domain is also part of the player’s main email address.

But, web domains are a scarce resource, and are registered on a first-come-first-serve basis —  so even RogerFederer.COM doesn’t own Federer.COM

Once you start searching for an available domain name, you’ll be surprised how hard it is to find an available domain name. If your client has an uncommon name, you may be lucky and still be able to acquire CLIENTNAME.COM. Other good domains to register are nicknames. Shorter domain names are usually better, dashes and digits in a domain name are not as easily remembered by site visitors.

The Dot-Com domain is the most memorable and upscale—it’s far better than the other top-level domains (.NET, .ORG, .INFO, .BIZ, .US, etc.).

To register a domain, visit a Domain Registrar like Godaddy.com (http://GoDaddy.com). If the client’s name is available, you can register it for about $8 a year – you’ll need to renew every year or you lose the name. There are also many websites, such as Afternic.com and Sedo.com, that help you buy and acquire domains that are already registered — though auction prices can be exorbitant.

As long as you’re able to get the athlete’s main domain, it’s not worth going overboard speculating on a bunch of domains when an athlete is just starting out. However, keep in mind that the squatters will try to take advantage of typos in web addresses, so you may consider acquiring common misspellings of your client’s name (for Tennis, think Nadall.com, Nedal.com).

Later in this article I have some tips for what to do if you can’t get the name you want.

2. Create Social Networking Accounts

When fans want to find out about an athlete, they’ll go to the social networking sites; MySpace and Facebook are the biggest. With MySpace, you’ve always been able to get a page like http://Myspace.com/CLIENTNAME, so, you’ll want to grab that. Facebook now has that feature, too. And you’ll want to start and take ownership of a Facebook Fan Club for your client.

What content do you put on all these social media sites? It doesn’t matter—you can leave them blank to start with. The main point is that you control the real estate for your brand.

If you or your client does create some content on a social media page, keep the site very professional. Don’t let the athlete use these accounts for gossiping with friends, uploading photos or video of last Saturday night’s party, or other unprofessional uses. Future sponsors and advertisers will be watching, so you need to keep the client’s content squeaky clean and  presentable. Once something is on the Internet, it’s nearly impossible to take it down.

But remember: The main point is to acquire these online properties, even if you don’t use them at first. It’s far better to have nothing on a Web pages than to have cyber-squatters fill the page with advertisements.

3. Create a Twitter Account

Twitter, an online Short Message Service (SMS) site, is extremely popular and growing so quickly that it gets a checklist item all to itself. When fame first strikes, Twitter is where the trendsetters will talk about your client. Beware: Twitter squatters are already grabbing up all the famous Twitter account names.

Signing up for a Twitter account is free, so sign-up for an account name that matches the client’s real name. You may want to update the Twitter status occasionally with things like recent victories and upcoming games. But again, the key is to own the Twitter account for later use and to prevent someone else from controlling the Twitter account.

4. Setup Email and Instant Messaging

Fans, sponsors, advertisers and other vendors will want to communicate with an athlete. When your client owns a COM domain, you can automatically receive all email sent to any address at @CLIENTNAME.COM.

But, as part of a comprehensive branding plan, create free accounts at Gmail, Yahoo Mail, and HotMail: CLIENTNAME@gmail.com, CLIENTNAME@yahoo.com, and CLIENTNAME@msn.com. Setup the accounts so that they invisibly forward email to a single address.

Additionally, try to get brandable accounts for AOL Instant Messenger and MSN Messenger.

5. Setup Voicemail

For a business phone number, you can set up a free GoogleVoice (http://voice.google.com) account, which comes with a free phone number in almost any area code. Configure GoogleVoice to automatically forward voice-mail to your email accounts as an audio/text attachment. Or you can forward all GoogleVoice calls to your cell phone (the forwarding will be invisible to the caller).

If your client needs to speak with the press by phone, he or she can easily make phone calls through the GoogleVoice account using their existing cell phone. Have the client use the GoogleVoice as a business phone number for all sports-related activities to prevent the athlete’s personal phone information from becoming mixed with the athlete’s career info. Keeping an athlete’s professional life and personal life separate will also help protect the athlete’s privacy.

Troubleshooting Your Brand

What do you do if you can’t get all of the above items? Well, if your athlete’s name is very common like Joe Smith, then he’s a little late to the Internet party. But you can still try for domains like “JoeSmithHockey.com”.

What if fame has already struck and the athlete’s brand is already cyber-squatted? There are laws to protect an athlete’s name and brand. Contact an intellectual property attorney who specializes in trademarks. If the athlete’s name is fairly unique, having a lawyer send a letter to the various social media sites can often get them transferred to the player. Gaining control of a squatted domain is a little more complicated, but an attorney can definitely help to acquire it. Solving cyber-squatting problems through the legal system will cost you a lot more time and effort than doing it right the first time.

Be Ready for Fame…

Most importantly, it’s critical to be a few steps ahead of the cyber-squatters. With the first whiff of fame, squatters will notice an up-and-coming player and grab up all the prime Internet real estate related to that player. You can reduce future legal costs by keeping up with online trends and by beating the squatters to the prime Internet real estate. Your client’s future sponsors will appreciate a clean online-brand that isn’t full of Internet spam.

Remember: Your job as an agent is to help plan for the athlete’s entire career. It’s never too early to get a player’s brand ready. By spending a little effort up front, you can make future success that much sweeter.

Managing An Athlete’s Online Brand: A 5-Step Getting Started Guide For Agents from Sports Agent Blog - Sports Business, Sports Law, Sports Negotiations, NCAA Rules

Over the past week, I have received many calls and messages from friends, colleagues, family, and clients, asking me who Jay Hairston (on the left, wearing the cap) is and why he was sending them “friend requests” on Facebook.  Originally, I thought it was just a coincidence that I was the only “mutual friend” on these peoples friend lists.  After the fifth call/message, I started to get curious.

On Monday evening, I decided to finally do something about it.  I did a search for “Jay Hairston” on Facebook and was greeted with a profile picture displaying Athletes Premier International‘s logo.  I also noticed that we had over 150 friends in common, yet Jay never friended me on Facebook.  Did we just know a lot of the same people and had never met?  Again, his friends included former roommates, fraternity brothers, and family of mine (who have less than 50 friends total on Facebook).  Most concerning was that this guy I had never met nor heard of was sending friend requests to all of my clients.

Since I was not friends with Jay Hairston, I could not read his profile.  I went to API’s website, and found that his name was completely omitted.  This is where I started to get really concerned.  I sent a few tweets to API’s twitter account, asking for an explanation.  The only response I received was Jay Hairston changing his Facebook privacy settings to restrict me from finding him in a Facebook search results page.

I had one of my friends who had accepted Jay’s friendship request pull up his profile, and that friend let me know that Jay lists himself as the Vice President of Player Relations and Recruiting.  At this point, I knew something very shady was going on.  What business does a rival agency have in reaching out to my entire network?  There is nothing illegal about making friend requests to people you have never met, but it sure does make you and your company look very shady.

This is an interesting and silly tactic for a brand new agency.  Athletes Premier International has one baseball client, and it is a big one: Aroldis Chapman.  First of all, I have given the agency no reason to solicit my friends, family, or clients.  Second of all, the company has received good press thus far in its shopping of Chapman to various MLB teams, does it need to now resort to dirty tactics to grow further?  Third, why is Jay Hairston not listed on the company’s website?  And of all employees, I have most concern about a VP of Player Relations and Recruiting contacting my clients.

I reached out to Jay and he was nice enough to respond in a timely manner.  Additionally, he was pleasant in his responses, but I think I was more upset that he was lying to my face than anything else.  I would have been happier if he was blatantly honest and told me to go screw myself.  Here is what he said to me in our conversation thread.  Let me know if you think he is being genuine.

Mr Heitner.  By no means am I attempting to do anything shady as you put it.  I am simply networking!  I do appologize if I offended you in anyway.  This was not my intentions.

My response:

You are telling me the truth that you friended former roommates and fraternity brothers of mine in an effort to network?  What value do they bring to the table?

What networking did you hope to do by friending my clients that I have listed on my agency’s website?

I am not out to hurt your company or anyone elses company.  I am more than happy with representing the clients I currently have and using those gentlemen to provide solid referrals.  I truly hope that you have no cruel intentions.  I believe that most men are honest, and I will take you at your word, even though your actions (including preventing me from pulling your name up on a search) should lead me to believe otherwise.

I have documented everything thus far and encourage you to stay away from my friends and clients.  You guys just picked up a superstar; I firmly believe that continuing to “network” with my friends and clients will not be worth your while.

I accept your apology and hope that we can put this entire matter behind us.

His last response was very nice, but I believe that it was entirely mocking the situation at hand.

Mr Heitner, as for friending former roommates and fraternity brothers of yours, yes it is random!  I am NOT in the practice of stealing or attempting to steal anyones clients!  Its not who I am as a person or who API is as a company.  I am simply trying to get our name out there!  That is all!  In my expierience the more people that know who you are and what it is you do. The better off a business will be.  As you know, people do talk.  So whether that’s the gas attendant at your local gas station or an athlete at a university.  You never know who will be the link to that next big client!  Once again I do appologize for the simple misunderstanding!

You are simply trying to get your company’s name out to my friends, family, and clients?  Create a blog, send out tweets, contact athletes that are not already represented, but solicit my friends list on Facebook?  I doubt my step-father is going to be the link to your next big client.  There is no misunderstanding about what transpired.

And as for Jay Hairston’s Facebook status as of yesterday, it read: “we must be doing something right…”  I agree, if that something is “getting your name out there” in an unethical manner.

Aroldis Chapman’s Agency Up To Shady Business? from Sports Agent Blog - Sports Business, Sports Law, Sports Negotiations, NCAA Rules

My colleague Douglas Sanders with The Sports Link introduced me to the new service, which strives to make it easier for athletes to connect with their fans by providing “text only once, but update fans everywhere” convenience.  If an athlete sends a text message to MogoTXT, MogoTXT can automatically forward that message to the athlete’s fans on MogoTXT, Twitter, Facebook, MySpace and all other websites.

Terrell Owens, Shane Battier, Chris “Beanie” Wells, Santonio Holmes, Jordan Farmar, and even Mr. Holdout, Michael Crabtree, are on board, along with many more athletes and rising journalists.  Some entities use the service more than others.  T.O. is updating the world on his life almost every second of the day…Beanie Wells, not so much.

In addition to providing ease and convenience to athletes, MogoTXT is able to aggregate the fans of an athlete that are located on several different websites into a single large audience to enable the athlete to achieve critical mass much faster for purposes of fan relations, marketing, advertising, etc.  The theory is that the service will empower athletes and their agents to strike better endorsement deals by enhancing athletes’ reach and providing marketing data.

MogoTXT can also facilitate revenue generation for athletes and their selected charities by working with athletes and their agents to feature desirable ads and clickable links to additional content and ads at the bottom of the athletes’ text messages before these messages are displayed on MogoTXT and also distributed to fans on all of the major social networks.

And for the Yao Mings and Kobe Bryants with huge international appeal, MogoTXT can also translate the messages into foreign languages on a near real-time basis.

Best of all, the service is free for its clients and their fans.

Reach Everybody With One Text from Sports Agent Blog - Sports Business, Sports Law, Sports Negotiations, NCAA Rules

The result = {Rules of PR no. 13} Sports and Social Media: A Case Study

Case Study On Sports And Social Media from Sports Agent Blog - Sports Business, Sports Law, Sports Negotiations, NCAA Rules

Social media can create leverage for a sports agent in a ton of ways.  For one, it can separate a sports agent from his competition by offering a new PR, advertising, branding medium for his clients.  Social media also can create valuable connections for a sports agent to tap into when needed.  But what about using social media to create leverage in a contractual negotiation?  Emmett Jones believes that players can use social media platforms to reveal private figures and make the fans (who Jones says truly pays the contracts) make the decision by making their opinions known to ownership.

Let me say right now that this is a really bad idea for athletes and/or their agents.  There might not be anything illegal about revealing proposed terms while in negotiation (unless the parties agree to secrecy), but there is more for the athlete and agent to lose than gain.  A negotiation is not a war, it is supposed to be an amicable debate where both parties come out as winners.  By alienating ownership and getting the fans involved through a social media tactic, the athlete/agent is making it more of a battle between the player and management.  This could have bad implications for the athlete and agent in the long term.  Also, sponsors will be hesitant to come forth and many deals to the athlete.  Why take the chance when the athlete could go behind the sponsor’s back and post something derogatory on a social network, which can spread like wildfire?

So to answer Emmett’s question, no, I cannot see agents like Scott Boras or Drew Rosenhaus utilizing social media in this way.  Instead, you can continue to count on Rosenhaus to send about ten tweets a day, all at the same time, talking about how amazing each of his clients is and how they are each the best on their respective teams.  I may not be very interested in it, but at least he isn’t pissing any owners off.

As far as what Owen Daniels recently did, with updating his Facebook status about not showing up to practice…it is not all that smart, but it’s not as bad as some have made it out to be.  I think it would have been worse if his agent wrote the same thing on his own Facebook wall.  As agents, we have a higher standard to uphold.  We call ourselves professionals, so let’s act like it.  P.S. – Daniels signed an RFA tender with the Texans.

Keep The Contract Terms Away From Social Media from Sports Agent Blog - Sports Business, Sports Law, Sports Negotiations, NCAA Rules