Whether it’s for the championships, new products, or major events like the Super Bowl, social media helps sports brands and athletes build a community around their brands and connect with their fan base. Sports are inherently social, so it comes as no surprise that sports brands and finding exceptionally creative ways to successful engage with their communities and keep the conversation going with social media.

Here’s a look at a few of the top sports brands leading the way with social media.

Nike

If you ever need a little motivation before a workout, Tweet at Nike and you will receive an instant motivational response that will drive you to hit an extra 5k. Not only have they successfully extended their brand’s motivational image from their advertising to real-time communication on social media, but they are delivering impressive real-time customer service on their social channels as well.

sports brands nike

Gatorade

Gatorade uses a storytelling content marketing approach to successfully drive engagement and awareness around their brand. They use rich, vivid imagery on their social channels (especially Facebook), that represent the brand’s messaging and instill inspiration and motivation in their community. Their branded images are shared widely on social media.

sports brands gatorade

MLB

We recently took a look at the way Major League Baseball (MLB) celebrated the Fourth of July with their online community. They put together a twitter stream on the MLB website featuring Fourth of July tweets from MLB players. This was a very cool and engaging way for MLB fans to follow the tweets and photos of their favorite players in real-time, and give fans an inside look at how each player celebrated Independence Day.

sports brands MLB