A Deep Dive Into The World Of YouTube Golfers
I have a confession to make: I’m a horrendous golfer.
There, I said it. Honestly, you have no idea how long I’ve been waiting to get that off my chest.
As you can imagine, my poor golfing abilities have been a particular source of shame as a washed-up athlete in my mid-20s. The older I get, the more it seems everyone I know wants to hit the links anytime the temperature creeps above 50 degrees. I’ve never once taken a golf lesson in my life, so on the few occasions I’m able to go out and play a round, I’m always astounded by how much better everyone else is at this silly, impossible game. I trot out to the range with my rented clubs and knock-off TravisMathew polo and try my best, but I never fail to make an absolute fool of myself.
I know: his blog is supposed to be about SEO and branded content and brand publishing, right? And it is. But just stick with me here. I promise we’ll get there soon enough.
Don’t get me wrong, I still enjoy playing golf. But it’s more the act of playing rather than the golf itself that enthralls me. The socializing, the culture, the escapism; it’s the happy, tranquil activity that all the “cool kids” are doing. And I’d be lying if I told you that I didn’t want to become a member of this exclusive club.
So, on one particularly uneventful evening a few months back, inspiration struck. It was time, I told myself, to really learn how to play golf.
I opened my desktop and ventured to where anyone would go for high-quality educational instruction: YouTube. I began my journey with a straightforward search: “How to fix my golf swing.” I clicked on the first result: an innocuous, six-minute video by Rick Shiels Golf on how to correct some common backswing mistakes.
Three and a half hours later, I found myself deep inside a rabbit hole of YouTube golfers.
It started with Rick Shiels, whose hours of content and 2.8 million subscribers put him at the forefront of YouTube’s sizable golf content creator ecosystem. Then came Danny Maude (1.32 million subscribers), GM Golf (1.17M), Grant Horvat (703K), Fore Play (464K), Paige Spiranac (422K), the list goes on. I barely had to type anything new into the search bar; the algorithm fed me everything I needed.
But somewhere along the way of my long, strange (and, honestly, educational) trip into YouTube golf land, I stumbled upon one creator whose professional accolades were quite different from the rest: two-time U.S. Open champion Bryson DeChambeau.
As an avid golf fan, I’ve watched DeChambeau compete in major tournaments for years. I was aware of the hard-swinging, analytical and outspoken reputation he had garnered on the golf course, which, along with his much-criticized move to the Saudi-backed LIV Golf tour, has made him a bit of a polarizing figure. So at first, I thought it was strange to see him churning out lighthearted golf content, where he does things like compete against amateurs and play an entire round dressed in suspenders. Why would an established pro like DeChambeau, who has accumulated over $68 million in career earnings, spend all this time and energy making YouTube videos?
The answer to this, my friends, is where the rubber meets the road. (Iron hits the tee? I don’t know, I couldn’t think of any good golf puns).
It’s because DeChambeau, like more and more athletes nowadays, is leveraging the direct distribution power of the internet to build his own brand. Sure, he earns a generous wage as a tour pro as it is, but one surefire way to make that paycheck even bigger is to get more people to watch.
Think of DeChambeau as his own company and his YouTube videos as his own kind of brand publishing. Sure, golf fans have all seen the Bryson DeChambeau who hits bombs off the tee on tour and once said that par at Augusta National for him was really 67. But through his YouTube channel, viewers can see and connect with a whole different side of him.
“YouTube is just an unfiltered look at who (DeChambeau) is behind the scenes,” his caddie, Gregory Bodine, told ESPN last month.
DeChambeau’s content ranges from documentary to instructional to pure entertainment. Some videos give viewers an inside look at his day-to-day life as a tour pro, and others (his more popular ones) feature quirky challenges and head-to-head matchups with some of golf’s other big names. DeChambeau’s page is a smorgasbord of highlights, collaborations and just plain ol’ fun on the golf course. It doesn't feel awkward or forced when he takes on Horvat with thrift store clubs or gives Shiels a golf lesson. It’s engaging, high-quality content that, when added to his successful pro career, establishes DeChambeau as an authority on all things golf and one of the game’s most recognizable players.
That authority and recognition have shot DeChambeau’s content toward the top of the YouTube SERP rankings. It’s no wonder that the 30-year-old is far and away the most popular tour professional on the platform. With 823,000 subscribers (as of July 10) and millions of views, DeChambeau is reaching audiences far beyond the typical LIV or PGA Tour crowd. And while that’s all rewarding for the man making the content, it’s also beneficial for the organizers of the events he plays in.
For a sport with a viewership that has tended to skew older, golf is gaining surprising popularity on a site where the age distribution of users is overwhelmingly on the younger side. Rather than going through the usual routes of ad deals or branded content hosted on traditional media platforms, DeChambeau is growing the game by meeting the next generation of golf fans where they are. But that doesn’t mean he’s completely abandoning his day job. Quite the opposite is true. DeChambeau is playing some of the best golf of his career. He’s the No. 9 ranked male golfer in the world, and his U.S. Open win at Pinehurst last month was the most watched in nearly a decade.
DeChambeau, it seems, is leading a movement to inject a little more fun into the game of golf. He’s doing it with content, but he’s also doing it in real life. On tour, he’s made it a point to interact with fans and lean further into his showman personality, showing audiences that golf doesn’t have to be a stuffy, solitary pursuit.
So, what can we learn from Bryson DeChambeau regarding content strategy? Quite a bit, actually.
Stick to what you do well. DeChambeau didn’t rise to online prominence by making his own cooking channel. He’s a golfer. He plays golf and knows people want to see him play more golf. Better yet, they want him to teach them how to play golf while entertaining them in the process. DeChambeau has the expertise and the personality to do just that.
Originality and authenticity win the day. People crave content that’s informative and genuine. You could flood the zone with lots of unoriginal posts that may drive clicks now, but over the long term, nothing grows a loyal audience like unique, well-produced content they can’t get anywhere else. It took some time, but DeChambeau found that sweet spot of originality. It’s proof that the results could be spectacular if brands put in enough effort to get it right.
Blending brand publishing and branded content can be an effective content strategy. DeChambeau didn’t go all in on one over the other. If anything, his YouTube channel (brand publishing) compliments his golf career (branded content), a balanced blend of attracting younger and older fans. The same can be true for other brands. Taking time to invest in both and developing a complementary brand strategy has its payoffs in the form of attracting new demographics and rewarding your core audience.
As for me? My golf game is still miserable. Maybe just a few more hours of YouTube golf content will turn things around…
This article was produced and syndicated by MediaFeed.us.
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10 Unmissable NBA Social Media Posts From the 2023/24 Season
In the ever-evolving industry of professional sports, eyeballs are currency. Whether it's the fans who pay to see the action in person, the ones who watch live on television, or even those who follow along through social media highlights, viewership is the most important driver of revenue — and, ultimately, the best barometer for a league's success.
Sure, the games are still the primary product. After seven long months of them, the NBA's 2023/2024 season finally reached its (somewhat anticlimactic) conclusion on June 17 when the Boston Celtics dispatched the Dallas Mavericks in a speedy five games to win the NBA Finals. An average of 11.3 million people tuned in to watch it unfold, primarily via network television.
But just like other leagues and countless other businesses (like Red Bull), the NBA has spent a better part of the last decade finding new ways to create new forms of its own content. To accomplish this, it employs what has become a sports industry-wide standard content strategy that pushes fan engagement through in-house photographers, videographers and reporters who work to deliver a steady stream of online NBA content. Teams are no longer just publishing the standard highlights, post-game pressers and run-of-the-mill media interviews; their accounts are growing more sophisticated, churning out exclusive behind-the-scenes footage, conversations with team reporters, intricate video and photo edits and much, much more.
Why are brands like the NBA and its 30 franchises producing and publishing their own content? It's simple: branded content is one of the most effective tools with which businesses can drive and sustain customer (or fan, in the NBA's case) interest. Sports fans love to be entertained, and leagues like the NBA have all the drama and intrigue — and content — to feed their insatiable appetite. Pro sports leagues are no longer forced to rely solely on TV networks or local news outlets to tell their story. With social media, they can deliver that content directly to the consumer and reach larger audiences than ever before.
There's no platform on which the NBA does this better than X (formerly Twitter). Each team runs its own social feeds, and the various team accounts have their own unique ways of connecting to their followers, giving them the insights, information and entertainment they crave. In return, teams get instant feedback through content analytics, informing them of how effectively they're promoting their brand and attracting new audiences.
It's a key component of the NBA's branded content marketing apparatus — engaging and growing its audience through mind-blowing graphics, funny memes or thought-provoking stories that allow fans to see a different side of their favorite players on the court.
With another NBA season in the books, here's a look at some of the most memorable posts from 2024.
@sixers/X
The Celtics jumped on this popular NBA social media trend in the leadup to Game 2 of the Finals, setting the stage with a clever nod to the franchise’s storied past. It’s a remarkably simple yet thoughtful way to bring iconic photographs of club legends to life while stoking engagement and drumming up fan nostalgia ahead of a momentous occasion. What better way to get your audience excited about the present than tying it back to the best parts of your brand?
@celtics/X
Everyone appreciates a good clap-back — especially NBA fans. This Indiana Pacers post after their Game 7 victory over the New York Knicks took a not-so-subtle shot at ESPN’s panel of basketball analysts who all picked the Knicks to prevail in the series. The “keeping receipts” tactic is a playful brand strategy that shows a little personality and fires up the fanbase.
@Pacers/X
Team social media admins better be ready to capitalize when those special playoff moments happen. The Dallas Mavericks made sure to give their followers all the angles on Luka Doncic’s epic game-winning three-point shot over Minnesota’s Rudy Gobert in the Western Conference Finals. The three simultaneous camera shots (including the bench reaction) give fans another dopamine hit, while also giving the Mavericks another opportunity to tag one of its sponsors on a high-visibility post, a true win-win.
@dallasmavs/X
Sideline reporter Nick Gallo was a popular post-game fixture for the Oklahoma City Thunder this season during their run to the Western Conference Semifinals. On more than one occasion, he was mobbed by Thunder players after a few pivotal wins, and he even participated in the team’s signature dog bark after it clinched the West’s top seed. As those smiles can tell you, there’s a tremendous upside to having in-house reporters embedded night in and night out with the guys on the court. It fosters trust and camaraderie, which can lead to a few viral moments — like these.
@okcthunder/X
Sometimes, a single photo speaks for itself. Thanks to the many talented team photographers working throughout the NBA, team accounts can quickly produce their own masterpieces to disseminate out into the Twitter-verse (X-verse?) for fans to cherish. That’s what the Philadelphia 76ers did with this simple post the night Tyrese Maxey stunned Madison Square Garden. And while this tweet elicited some solid traction, a screengrab from the national telecast after this shot created a new meme for a certain New York comedian sitting courtside (spoiler: it was Jon Stewart).
@sixers/X
The Los Angeles Lakers didn’t go far in the playoffs, but their social team did strike gold with this amusing reaction video featuring a young fan’s strikingly accurate portrait of LeBron James. (It was the hairline that gave it away!) Joking aside, this is an excellent example of using fan engagement (the fan-submitted portrait) to create unique “bonus” content that lets the world see a more playful side of the athletes’ personalities. It’s this relatability that endears people to your brand.
@Lakers/X
Since we’re on the topic of art, it would be difficult to put together this list without at least mentioning the brilliant ArtButMakeItSports X account that has ballooned to over 470,000 followers. Within minutes, the human behind the page finds a piece of art that bears freakishly accurate resemblance to whatever screengrab of a sports image comes their way — and in this case, it was Minnesota’s Anthony Edwards crossing Denver’s Reggie Jackson into the earth. Smart move by the Timberwolves social team to give the curator of this account a big tip of the cap (and maybe also enjoy the visibility that comes with leveraging another account with a big following).
@Timberwolves/X
Sticking with the art theme, the Denver Nuggets found a creative way to recreate and amplify one of the team’s signature moments of the playoffs. The Nuggets enlisted the services of one talented artist to draw and animate Jamal Murray’s thrilling first-round game-winner against the Lakers, giving fans a new way to enjoy a big-time highlight — as opposed to a simple re-posting of the broadcast feed. It shows that sometimes, a little outside-the-box thinking can go a long way in brand promotion.
@nuggets/X
Teams posting player pre-game outfits is common across the vast web of NBA Twitter, but fit pics that get 2.8 million views are a bit harder to come by. That’s the magic of Nuggets superstar Nikola Jokic, who showed up to the team’s first playoff game this year looking like Gru from the movie Despicable Me and set the internet ablaze. As it turned out, the carefully coordinated outfit was part of Jokic’s ad campaign for Despicable Me 4, demonstrating the symbiotic relationship between team accounts and their players’ promotional partnerships. (It also allowed the three-time MVP to show off a bit of his unexpected acting chops.)
@nuggets/X
Simple. Elegant. Timeless. The Celtics succeeded with this excellent callback to the iconic moment when Kevin Garnett won the NBA title with the franchise 16 years earlier. This photo of Jayson Tatum captured all the elation and emotion of Boston’s 18th championship victory, adding another indelible moment to the club’s rich history of basketball greatness.
This article was produced and syndicated by MediaFeed.us.
