Henshaw

As a member of the Toronto Raptors, Bosh, considered by many to be an established star in the NBA, had made five all star games, played on the US national team and most recently had the ultimate in flattery, he’d been “picked” by Lebron James and Dwayne Wade to join them on the Miami Heat.

There were a number of reasons Bosh gave for leaving the Raptors, one of which was the opportunity to expand his career beyond basketball. Media, TV, music all appeared to be in Bosh’s sights. But 14 games into his first season Bosh’s Heat are disappointments and Bosh himself has become something of a laughing stock.

So what happened?

Could it be social media?

In Bosh’s case social media appears to have amplified and accelerated his ascent into the highs of stardom but also greased his descent into the lows of

Accelerated Ascent:

Prior to joining the Heat, Bosh had been a good legitimate good guy – some might have even considered him somewhat savvy when it came to self promotion:

• He launched a campaign to get himself selected to NBA’s allstar team, and was successful.
• Bosh even challenged other NBA players to challenges, who could add the larger amount of followers.

These activities combined with solid play on the basketball court, appear to have allowed Bosh to increase the awareness of his brand outside of Canada and into the US market.

Accelerated Descent:

What Bosh proved was that like any brand – poor use of social media can be damaging. This is particularly true if it is used inappropriately, without an apparent strategy or alignment to goals.

Bosh has touched all of these examples of poor uses:

• Upon becoming a free agent Bosh used Twitter to communicate his struggles with which team he was going to join. Given he was the Raptor’s franchise player this had the effect of alienating fans and the local media who easily interpreted his activity as indications he was looking to leave. If Bosh’s strategy was engagement with his fans this was not a sincere way to do things, he should have selected a different form of communications.
• Although the NBA has a no tweeting policy during games someone tweeted from Bosh’s account during a recent game. Obviously it wasn’t Bosh…which makes Bosh seem further disconnected from fans as the tweets are very clearly not coming directly from him.

Bosh’s play with the Heat has been poor this season. This combined with his presence in social media has led to the development of a video by jilted Toronto fans – “Like a Bosh” which has taken off online. This video has the potential to make Bosh untouchable for new endorsements for a while, hindering his objective of making himself bigger then the game of basketball. It would appear that all Bosh can do at this stage is let his basketball do the talking.