We’ve been doing a lot of work around crisis and how crises are accelerated by social media, at immediate future recently. You might say it’s a passion for us, and it’s also a major worry for many brands who want to protect their reputation online.

However, it seems that one particular industry in the UK feel that they are above negative criticism and don’t worry about alienating their support base. Namely, Premier League football clubs.

Monday saw Mohammed Al Fayed (no stranger to controversy) unveil his much talked about statue of Michael Jackson outside Craven Cottage.

Image by Getty Images via @daylife

He put it here because he can no longer put it in Harrods, completely oblivious to the fact that there is no correlation at all between his team and Michael Jackson.

As anyone with even a cursory knowledge of football could have predicted the backlash from Fulham fans was not exactly positive. Apparently it was a surprise for Al Fayed. His response beggars belief:

“If some stupid fans don’t understand and appreciate such a gift this guy gave to the world they can go to hell. I don’t want them to be fans. If they don’t understand and don’t believe in things I believe in they can go to Chelsea, they can go to anywhere else”.

Can you imagine this response from anyone else in any other industry in the world? The news coverage is littered with quotes from Fulham fans complaining that they are going to be a ‘laughing stock’ because of the statue. Al Fayed and the Fulham board are completely ignoring the customer base and actively telling them to defect to a competitor. Of course, because of the nature of football, they know most people won’t defect – but it is still staggering for a club who aren’t exactly full to capacity every week.

No brand could get away with this, or the various other fails that have affected most Premier League clubs over the years. Even Sky Sports were forced to react during the Andy Gray/Richard Keys crisis, conscious that the Premier League could throw their toys out of the pram and defect to a competitor. Unlikely, but a serious enough threat to Sky’s cash cow to force them into action.

I struggled to think of any brands who could treat their customers in this way and not have their revenue and image irreversibly tarnished. The only one I think who comes close is Apple – there are plenty of documented issues with their products, but their position of pre-eminence within the world of consumer tech is pretty much secure. For now at least.

I wonder how long Premier League clubs can go on in this protected bubble outside of the real business world. All things come to an end, eventually.

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Last week saw the announcement in the press of the Indian Premier League’s plan to stream the whole of the 2010 tournament live via YouTube. As many commentators have noted over the past week, this calls into question the whole notion of TV rights. With the focus of entertainment shifting more and more towards online video (recent statistics in the UK prove that services like iPlayer are showing no signs of slowing their popularity), how long will it be before we see more of these type of deals being agreed?

This announcement will probably not raise too many eyebrows in Europe. Cricket is popular in England, yes, but only when England are taking part. The absence of Andrew Flintoff and Kevin Pietersen from this year’s IPL means there is little focus on the tournament in the mainstream media. But what would happen if a similar deal was announced for something much more coveted by the masses? For example, the clamour has always been to make the Ashes free to air again. What could be more open to view than a tournament streamed online?

The main benefit of streaming online is obvious – the ability for advertising to pervade the consciousness on an ongoing basis (banner ads, in-game advertising), rather than being restricted to 30 second ad breaks. This is particularly useful during football (soccer, for any US readers), where the game does not have the same natural breaks as other sports. The issue of quality is no longer an issue either, with YouTube able to host content in Full HD 1080p. More and more TVs now come with widgets and internet video capability, so mass participation can be achieved without everyone having to crowd round a small computer screen. You can watch YouTube anywhere and everywhere; lunchtime kick offs and major differences in time zones become less of an issue.

Measuring consumption on YouTube (and other online video platforms) is easier too. Do broadcasters really know how many people are ACTUALLY watching their flagship sports coverage? Google and YouTube know at a glance. What kinds of people are watching? If you’re a registered user, Google and YouTube know all about you and your habits (for better or worse, but that’s another debate for another day). Plus, we all know the pattern that the adoption of new ideas takes – get the sports fans and the music fans in first (the live stream of U2’s gig on YouTube received 10 million views last year). Everyone’s talking about online video this year.

However, as with most landmarks and advances in online and social media, it is unlikely that there will be an instant spate of these deals being agreed in the short term. What normally happens is there is a wait and see mentality. Let’s see if this pilot programme works out; if it falls flat, everyone will say ‘well, it was never going to work was it?’ If it takes off, well then the sky’s the limit. Many people already use illegal streams to watch English Premier League games not shown on Sky and ESPN. Niche sports only covered in passing by major broadcasters could be given a new lease of life through a YouTube stream. Broadcast rights negotiations are going to be much more interesting in future. How many other companies have competed against the power of Google and come out victorious?

Related articles by Zemanta

• YouTube Dabbles in Live Sports With IPL Matches (mashable.com)
• YouTube To Live-Stream Sports With Multicam – Howzat?! [YouTube] (gizmodo.com)

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