Reflection Post #1: Well Played

In the spirit of Super Bowl Sunday and Patriots’ Greatest of All Time, I thought my reflection post would feature Tom Brady’s new Facebook Watch series, Tom vs. Time. This six-part reality web series, welcomes fans and curiosity-seekers into his home and personal life. These 15-minute intimate vignettes provide a window into his life from his training regimen, role as a husband, dad and family
man to a friend who enjoys downtime and fun with his teammates.

Is timing everything? The first episode aired on January 25, 2018 just a few days after New England clinched another AFC Championship Title. In Groundswell, we learn about the strategies and four-step planning process of social media – people, objectives, strategy, and technology. So, why Facebook Watch vs. YouTube? You have to give the producers credit that they selected one medium to showcase this documentary. Facebook has a large, varied demographic audience but why wouldn’t they have selected multiple platforms to enlist more spectators and conversationalists? I applaud them for being so confident from a marketing and social media perspective. Then again, he’s Tom Brady and he’s married to Gisele Bündchen. Both of them combined have extremely strong brands with thousands and thousands of followers and millions of likes.

The series was created by Gotham Chopra who directs and executive produces the show. Not every scene is professionally produced in the documentary style of Chopra. Footage from Tom’s smartphone is spliced in throughout, proving that real and raw footage can tell a story just as well, especially on social media platforms. It gives the user what they crave.

This week, we learned about the consumer groups that fall on Groundwell’s social technologies ladder. I think this series tapped into many of the consumer groups that fall on the social technologies ladder from creators and joiners to inactives. Because Facebook was the platform of choice, I imagine that the largest group it reached were the joiners. Conversationalists also seem to play a big part of the dynamic — they engage, post comments, and share through their feeds. Even spectators who don’t have Facebook accounts can enjoy the show if they have a friend willing to share or simply finding it through a news source on Google — ah, the power of the Groundswell.

I hear the last episode will air after the big game. Unfortunately, it wasn’t the ending Patriots Nation hoped for.