March Madness, the annual NCAA Division 1 Men’s Basketball tournamentis underway, and with millions of hours of productivity up for loss due to employees following the action online, retailers need a more effective way to deal with it than trying to block every site that talks about basketball. Instead of trying to quell your employees from following the games, embrace it. Get employees and customers involved by exposing their team spirit and creating discussions around how the tournament will play out: Get your employees involved: If your employees are into March Madness, your customers probably are going to be as well, and with so much popularity conversations are easy to start. Have your employees monitor the latest scores and highlights with their smartphones and show off their team spirit. When something big happens, make a big deal out of it right in the store. Customers will love the energy and excitement. Create faux-betting pools for in-store promotions that are social: When customers make a purchase, allow them to choose a team in a pool. If their team wins the tournament, they receive free merchandise. This can be done in-store by creating a massive display of the pool with names or photos of the customers posted next to the team’s they’ve chosen. This will create a great conversation piece, as new customers will want to talk up their thoughts on the tournament. Feature user-generated content of team spirit on your Facebook Page: Create a contest both in-store and on your Facebook store page where fans can win the chance to be featured on your Page for showing their spirit for your company’s chosen team. This team can be chosen based on location or manager/employee preference. Have customers take photos and videos of their team costumes, shrines, and fan groups, and post the best ones on your Page. This is a great way to associate yourself with a collegiate basketball team, without paying for expensive copyrighted material.

Bottom Line for Local Businesses

Like with any massively popular event these days, much of the fan activity is happening on the social web. People are live-tweeting during games, posting highlights and game scores on their Facebook accounts, and watching endless hours of replays on YouTube. Like the fans themselves, retailers can get involved with ease. Having great user-generated content, interesting/unknown facts and great analysis about what’s happening will garner you attention, respect, and customers. Check out Mashable’s How To: Keep Up With March Madness On The Social Web