Network Interactions-- Implementing Systems Theory to Examine NCAA Basketball Twitter Accounts

By understanding the formation of social media platforms and the ways in which actors on these platforms communicate, sports organizations can be assisted in devising appropriate marketing strategies and communication plans to engage their consumers at a higher level. This is extremely important in developing long-lasting relationships between sports fans and sports entities. If social media is meant to facilitate human connections and interaction, then a greater understanding is needed regarding the formation of social networks within Twitter's oftentimes decentralized world. Therefore, the purpose of this mixed method study was to employ systems theory as the theoretical framework to examine user characteristics of 10 NCAA basketball conferences on Twitter. A social network analysis and content analysis were used to address the problem, with an emphasis on systems theory. The results of this examination indicated that an identifiable network was found among the observed actors (n = 799), with fans composing the largest percentage of the network (59%). The number of observed reciprocal communication was low, only 5% of the interactions, and only 7% of the nodes. Messages were predominantly directed at team-related actors, yet these actors did not reciprocate communication with the message originators to a high degree (11%). A system theory-based network was found, and included input, throughput, and output components. The feedback loop was the weak link in the network, indicating a possible lack of importance of direct feedback on the social media platform, Twitter. Conferences predominantly utilized Twitter to provide information to followers, ultimately neglecting fan engagement-directed activities. Recommendations for future studies include a study replication of other business sectors, sports, and Divisions (DI, DII), time expansion, and the consideration of other actors within the network.