I've always prided myself on being open-minded. I will admit, however, that when I started work at USATH I was not signed up nor a potential candidate to join Face book nor Twitter. A few months into the job, our GM, Steve Pastorino, called me and said "Hey, did you know that there are tons of handball teams in your regions listed on Facebook don't you?"  I said "Oh yes"...the pause was curiously uncomfortable and long.. hm.. I knew what it meant. It meant, "You'd better sign up and get rolling, misses!" So with one huge roll of the eyes and a loud sigh, I remember saying, “Okay, I'll handle it.” I hung up and started thinking about it all. It was like I was in a space capsule or something, some weird form of mental disorientation. I couldn't help but think, and please, this isn't to sound elitist in any way, but, I spent 6 years in university to have to market our product on a site where college students announce how many beers they've had last weekend? I mean, hello? I was discouraged and mainly I felt as though I was embarking on the biggest waste of time ever.  I suppose some people would be thrilled to have social media as part of their marketing armor, but, wow, I seriously questioned where this was headed.

So, there I went, clicked the Sign Up button, create my nth password, looked five hours for a decent photo of myself to post on my profile, got upset at the illogical act of listing my hobbies to people who are supposed to be my friends, type in the word handball in the search box, became a fan left and right. Ok, breathe, give it a chance. So I did. Days went by and I followed some handball clubs' activities and then, there it was, "the epiphany.” I finally discovered the holly grail of social media. The "why" had been answered. I finally saw how this area of the web filled a huge gap which most of us did not realize existed. And frankly, until you use it effectively, most have no idea what was missing in the first place.

I've realized that this form of communication binds groups with common interests, easily and quickly. The true objectives which you've sought out to reach had now been achieved simply by using this tool which most people use for self proclamation and utter non-nonsensical chatter.  I finally saw how once you open your mind to it, there are tons of very useful applications. And I'm not talking about mafia wars here. There is value to this and especially for all of us working diligently to build our handball culture and expose our sport to the masses.  Let's face it, I can post one line and get a whole team's attention? Are you kidding? I can market to new athletes without sending impersonal and template e-mails? I can post photos of a recent tournament without having to e-mail it to our whole master database? Eureka!

Now, of course there are the abusers, the ones who just define that’s "too much information.” Just like the Atkins diet where people generalized that you HAD to eat fat to lose weight, Facebook nay-sayers jumped on TMI-er's pages and decided to fault all of social networking for being plain stupid and useless. Well, even today, I fight off those who fault it and concentrate on encouraging our clubs and members to use it. We Regional Directors, and of course our colleagues at the Mothership (a term of affection for our Utah home office) encourage it too. We promote the use of it, why, because the biggest problem in developing our sport is getting people together, communicating and getting organized. Facebook allows this in one swoop and it allows for unlimited growth. Not four physical walls of course, but a forum to meet each other, share ideas and plans of action on the subject in common.  Once athletes participate in this multi-directional forum, they quickly gain momentum.  Anything that helps club communication and development is a plus in our business. And yes, of course we know it's still difficult to get players to practice, but can you imagine how much easier it is to have at one click of a button, the attention of your team? Sure you can use e-mail, but keeping a valid distribution list is near impossible and getting in front of those searching for you is impossible without means of financing. TRUST ME. I use both and I look forward to the day when I don't need to e-mail groups.

So today I have posted my cat's face adorned by a court jester's hat as my profile photo.  Perhaps silly (don't tell my cat) but it prompted communication. I received quick hellos but I also received "oh cute, hey, will you be at practice tomorrow?" Mission accomplished.  You might ask me, am I hooked? Well, no I'm not. What I can say is that, for work, it's effective; for my personal life, it's fun and interesting. I've been recently approached by my grade school classmates and keep in touch with people that I never would have been reunited with otherwise. They ask what I'm up to, they learn about handball...who knows, they might tell others. I'm even in touch regularly with a few players and wives from the Olympic winning French team. Some international handballers all over the world pop up on my chat to find out what we're up to and how they can help build handball here in the USA. Why not? It's all good, isn't it? The more visible we are to handballers worldwide, the better it is for all of us. Same applies to Clubs.

The point of this post was simply to say, give it a try and those already on it, use it effectively to help reach your club's objectives.  Who doesn't like saving time?  Post your announcements, practice times, events coming up and oh yes, you should even allow the natural and unfortunate "Can I get a ride to practice?" requests to be posted. Last but not least, post what your club is in need of, post videos of your practice, photos, comments - have fun with it! You never know when a potential sponsor will visit your page and want to join in or help out with a gym connection.  In the end we do what we have to do to grow our handball community.  Just don't poke me and tell me you need fertilizer for your lawn, please.   

Those in the East, here are the clubs on Facebook already:  Miami, New York City, DC, UNC, Carolina, Atlanta, Tampa, Boston, Philadelphia.  Check them out, join them, start your own club and your own club page.  By the way, it's better to start a group I'm told. Then we can all link together! 

As for Twitter, Lauren, our PR Manager handles this. She's the USATH workhorse who stands by her smart phone all weekend and does the official Tweeting to our followers! Do I feel bad texting her scores at 9 a.m. on a Sunday morning? You betcha, but now at tournaments, I get faulted if we don't tweet the scores immediately! Hey, if our members want scores, we'll Tweet away and give you scores happily! Apparently athletes tell their friends and parents to receive Tweets and whilst they are away competing, everyone knows what is going on in the gym! I think it's great and even if it's a little extra work for us, we're happy to oblige and thrilled that people are interested.

So 2010, who would have thought marketing and communications would have evolved this way? One day forced to use social media, and another, proud to see how useful it can be for all of us.

Keep our handball family growing!

Questions or comments, please email me at dominique@usateamhandball.org