Conducting unobtrusive research can be as simple as typing a desired subject into Google and viewing the content of the results given to you. It’s done almost every day for any subject type whether it’s done for a specific reason or just to find answers for our own satisfaction. Sports public relations professionals use unobtrusive research everyday to find out how their organization is being talked about among professionals and its publics.
This morning I was browsing Yahoo! Sports in search of some insight on this year’s Major League Baseball Playoffs (considering I haven’t had a lot of time to keep up with the end of the season) and I came across an Associated Press article about Roy Halladay. The article was titled “Roy Halladay finally gets to make postseason debut.” This title caught me off guard at first for the small fact that I didn’t realize that in his 13-year-career Halladay has yet to pitch in the post season. (I’m only twenty so the first few year of his career were somewhat irrelevant to me) The article, I felt, described Halladay’s integrity and passion for the game. Phillies’ Manager, Charlie Manuel, was quoted saying, “…he’s very intense, he wants to win, he definitely wants a ring.” I found this topic very interesting so I decided to conduct further research on Halladay and the Phillies’ upcoming series against the Cincinnati Reds.
I went to Google and searched for blogs about Halladay. I came across this blog from, again, Yahoo! Sports that describes ten important numbers to the Phillies/Reds upcoming series. The blog’s main focus is comparing numbers between the two teams and even more so, the playoff experience of the two teams. Philly has had playoff experience in the past few years from winning the pennant two years ago to being runner’s up last year, but the Reds have not seen playoff action since 1995.
This article and blog are only two of the many beyond many articles and blogs that have been created since the playoff match-ups were announced. These articles and blogs are important to sports PR practitioners because they offer views and opinions of the teams but they also give fans (or strong non-fans) something to converse about on social forums. After the first article, there was a comments section for readers to express their opinions on the subject matter. As of this morning, there were over 50 comments from readers. Some discussing their praise for the Phillies organization, some discussing their praise for the Reds, and even some Yankee fans trying to get the last word in (as always). Team organizations can look at these social forums and see the types of topics that are being discussed among their publics. Even for Yankees, who are basically getting free word of mouth by having their name stamped on a story that has to do with two completely different organizations.
Blogs and articles can help sports PR practitioners view what is being written about their team, players, name, game, event, etc.. Having these tools at their fingertips allows them to take necessary actions about bad press if necessary and keep operations under control.
This article was written using data found through unobtrusive research. The lives/environment of the subjects were not intruded upon while conducting the research. That is the purpose of unobtrusive research.
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