Last night, while watching (sort of) a very boring Orange Bowl, I was belatedly catching up with my TwitterStream and saw quite a few Tweets raving about the terrific World Junior Hockey Championship game going on between the US and Canada.  Fortunately for the US, but unfortunately for me, by the time I got to those Tweets I also saw the news that the US had won a thriller in overtime.

Disappointed, I figured at least I would be able to tune into ESPN SportsCenter at 11 and see the highlights.  Whereupon I was treated to:

– a detailed discussion (top story) that Mike Shanahan had signed on to coach the Redskins, and long loving shots of he and Redskins owner Danny Snyder buddying up

– a detailed discussion of Randy Johnson’s retirement and a review of his career highlights – saw enough pitches to have someone warming up in the bullpen, who was….

– a detailed discussion of Matt Holliday’s contract with the Cardinals

Combined with the commercials, it seemed as though it was at least a third of the way into the show until SportsCenter even got around to showing any actual athletic accomplishments from that particular day.  The hockey game coverage consisted of perhaps 15 seconds toward the end.

Yes I’m a rare US hockey fan, and I fully realize that hockey – particularly junior hockey – isn’t exactly the #1 sport in the US.  But this was a world championship for the US, and by all accounts a thriller of a game.  Something just seemed a bit out of balance.

Which got me wondering about parallels between sports and tech media, and in particular the influence that the Spin Doctors – in sports, the agents, and in tech, the PR firms – have on how our respective industries get prioritized and reported by the media.  Perhaps ESPN truly considered three sports contracts more important than any sports events – such as a world championship game – that had taken place that day.  Or perhaps not.

Is That Like Geeks Writing About Tech Business Instead of Actual Tech?

Before I get bombarded with hate mail from the Randy Johnson’s agent or fan club (or more close to home, the tech PR industry) let me say that I have no bone to pick with what the influencers are doing – by getting their clients coverage, sports agents and tech PR firms are just doing their jobs – and doing it well.

I am simply asking for a bit more balance and focus on actual accomplishments – across all media.

As an example on the technology side – as a long-time CRM analyst and consultant, I have been hearing a lot about ‘Social CRM’ (or ‘SCRM’) from my former & current CRM analyst brethren – and of course from the many tech vendors (some old, some new) who have decided to adopt that label.  Yet all of the conversation seems to center around tech vendor pronouncements of their exciting new offerings, and supportive tweetings and bleatings from analysts.  Lately I’ve even heard it said (repeatedly) that 2010 is going to be the ‘year of SCRM’.  Great (really).  But where are the customers?  I would hope that they got the message – and that some of them might want to talk about it a bit.

In other words, just because nobody’s getting paid to do the publicity for junior hockey, and for the tech customers who are actually trying to sort out acronym soup, figure out where to invest and run their businesses – that shouldn’t imply that we bury their stories in favor of discussing who put out a press release or signed a contract.  These stories can not get buried – if they do, the media simply isn’t doing its job.

Of course, if the tech ‘buy side’ stories don’t exist, then perhaps it’s the analysts who aren’t doing their jobs.  Sure tech futures are interesting (I like them too) but the industry can’t stay afloat on VC & PR alone – eventually customers need to buy something, and make those investments successful.

Baseball is wonderful – and I look forward to hearing much more about it.  In April.

I also welcome your SCRM success stories.  Just send me the ones with real customers – and real money – involved.  Feel free to toss in a few Social Media success stories while you’re at it.

Who knows, I might even write about them.