Wednesday, February 8, 2012

NTRA & Gulfstream Park: Social Media Juxtaposition

This morning we got a nice contrast on what racing should be doing, and what it shouldn't, when it comes to social media.

Penelope Miller, the new NTRA social media person, was interviewed today and had some good social media answers.  

She spoke of how tracks should get involved to promote, engage and give out fun and worthwhile information via the web.

Conversely, in my twitter feed this morning, I saw this line from a horseplayer tweeted to Gulfstream Park:
  • "I don't follow you for slots results"
Investigating, I see that Gulfstream Park - one of the highest handle tracks in the nation - uses their twitter feed for this:


 and this::


I have no problem with a track promoting their casino side, but when the track uses the main twitter feed for slot machine news?

Slot revenue will not save us, and it appears there is no one in charge, or someone with a will, to use this revenue for something to grow the demand side of the game (sorry to sound like a broken record on that).

That being said, I don't think it's too much to ask for a racetrack twitter feed to be about the racetrack.

Note: The headline news marches on. In Pennsylvania the government is again looking to raid slot-purses for general revenues.




2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Regarding the note, it's tough to blame the governments. The tracks have had slots for 10+ years and have done little to nothing to improve their product (other than bump purses). How long did the tracks really think the gravy train was going to run before someone objected to the subsidies?

It's always about the money. Right now, the money is in the casinos, not the horses. From a strictly monetary/government standpoint, it makes perfect sense to "raid" the slots to purse fund.

Who knows? Maybe some more desperation out of the tracks when they are not on the take anymore will lead to some real innovation and growth...

Natalie Keller Reinert said...

Not only are the tweets about slots, but Gulfstream is integrating their tweets with Facebook, which is lazy and ineffective. Come on.

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