Philly Pretzel Tebows: When Social Meets Traditional Media

When No Limit Agency* posted the Tim Tebow pretzel photo on Philly Pretzel Factory's Facebook fan page, the expectations were high.

“The Tebow pretzel has been in retirement for the last few years,” Alia Rajput, social media manager for the Chicago-based communications agency, said. “We simply brought it out of retirement and let the Internet take over.”

The Philadelphia-based franchise had reason to get Tebow-centric following the football star's signing of a one-year contract with the Philadelphia Eagles.

However, using social media as the foundation for the story was only the beginning. After the post gained thousands of share, the traditional piece came into play.

“Social media is changing. We all know this. It is now more important than ever to ensure your social moments also carry over to the traditional media,” said Nick Powills, chief brand strategist for No Limit Agency. “The traditional media now covers viral, in that they are waiting for fun news bites to lighten up their news and engage with their audiences. With the Philly Pretzel Tebow moment, they can now ride out all of the traditional media buzz, as well.”

For a franchise brand, moments like this should also create exposure of the business opportunity, Powills continued.

“If I am ever going to look at a business to buy, I am going to look at the brand from a consumer standpoint first. How does the brand stand out in a crowded market place? For Philly Pretzel, they continue to outshine the competition with wit and the ability to add human interest," he said.

From a traditional media standpoint, here are some of the coverage points, out of the nearly 800 media hits and counting that happened within a four-hour span:

CBS Sports

Comcast Sports

Washington Post

SB Nation

Sports Illustrated

From a Social Media standpoint, here are some tweets about the Tebow pretzel going viral:

NFL

ESPN

Sunday Night Football

FanDuel