Sasha Vujacic - The official Web site of The Machine

For a look at a terrific professional athlete fan page, check out the site of Sasha Vujacic, the point guard / shooting guard of the Los Angeles Lakers' triangle offense. Sasha was a member of the Slovenian junior national team and was drafted by the Los Angeles Lakers in the 2004 NBA Draft. He's now in the thick of the NBA playoffs.

The Sasha Vujacic site is beautifully designed and contains a huge amount of information about Sasha, including videos, photos, and much more. And get this, there's content in multiple languages (English, Italian, Slovenian, and even Chinese and Japanese) because Sasha has fans from all over the world.

The @SashaVujacic twitter feed updates on the site and there is an RSS feed of "regularly updated insider information and stories that you may publish on your Web site automatically as Sasha publishes them."

The best part of the site is that it gives off a vibe that Sasha is approachable. There are many casual photos of him. There's a tool where fans can ask him questions and can even create their own T-shirt design and send it to Sasha. If he likes the design, he will post it on his official online store.

Vladimir Cuk and his firm Attention Interactive built the site for Sasha. But more importantly, Vlad and his firm developed a terrific strategy for Sasha to interact with his fans and the media.

"The site is a hit with fans and NBA officials alike," Vlad says. Sasha and his management team are amazed at how the site looks and the level of interaction and response from fan community, according to Vlad.

Other players have noticed as well and are intrigued about the possibilities of engaging more intimately with the public via the Web and social media.

When Vlad was pitching for the business, he was up against the traditional public relations firms that frequently work with other NBA players. Sasha and his manager asked very intelligent questions and during the meetings and came away ready to try what to date is non-traditional promotion for a pro basketball player.

Most players use the media to tell their stories and are removed from interacting directly with fans. Not Sasha.

I have several suggestions to improve what is already a great site.

Sasha could update Twitter a bit more and maybe provide a little more about his life. Fans would be interested in the details of a player’s day and Twitter is a perfect way to do this.

The site should have permalinks. The way it is set up now, it is impossible to point to individual pages or photos.

But these nits are minor. Great job Sasha (and Vlad).

And good luck in the playoffs.

Comments

[Tim Dempsey]

David, As a Boston area resident, it is apocryphal that you would promote a Los Angeles Lakers initiative of ANY KIND before the Celitcs conclude their 18th championship banner campaign.

:-)

[Jeremy Kossen]

I have to say I am also surprised that you'd be promoting a Lakers site during the playoffs. But I do have acknowledge that this is a really great site, and it's good seeing an NBA player create a site that truly engages himself with his fan base.

and he is on Twitter, too!

[Tony]

Sasha is a great example of someone who could greatly benefit from a good fan page. While he's on a great team, he's still looking to break into the starting 5. A strong fan base could help this effort.

[Chris Plamann]

Agree with the positive comments on the site. Great design and interesting content.

But what the national crowd might have missed is all the ribbing Sasha has taken from his teammates regarding some of the site content. The site included a "What color headband should Sasha wear?" fan poll. Not sure of the results, but I'm willing to lay odds on either purple or gold.

Kobe in particular, who has taken Sasha under his wing as kind of an older brother, has had some funny comments in the local press about the site.

[T.J]

not to sound like a "hater" but I seriously find 90% of what I saw on his website to be rather silly. For example , I could really care less about the little girl naming her dog Sasha or the other fan based " me me me" articles. Much of the content has no actual value. It's all silly randomness..IMO.

[David Meerman Scott]

Tim and Jeremy,

Yes I live in Boston. But that doesn't mean I can't talk up a player site that I like. I've been sitting on this post for a few months. Thought the playoffs were a good time to send the post.

Thanks, all, for your comments.

David

[Janice O'Brien]

Thank you, David, for voicing your thoughts on Sasha's web site even though you live in Boston ~ free speech is an awesome asset that we all have. I enjoy the various articles that are written about Sasha's play after each game, and the articles that describe an analysis of his play. There is a lot more to his site than meets the eye and if a person took time to really check it out, they would find many, many interesting articles written about him and other aspects of his play and life. Thanks for writing a candid commentary that tells the truth. :D