Online sports destination MLB.com used mobile to engage fans and reward them with prizes during the Social Media Day 2011.

MLB.com engaged with fans last week and encouraged them to vote for their favorite teams in the upcoming  2011 All-Stars Game on July 12. Users used the company’s iPhone app, as well as Facebook and Twitter to interact with the game.

Mobile rewards
During Social Media Day 2011, fans who attended MLB games could check-in with the company’s At Bat 11 app to win a t-shirt at the stadium.

Nine MLB games were held and team-specific t-shirts were distributed.

Users could also browse interactive ballpark maps, post and track messages on Twitter and watch video highlights.

MLB.com and 30 club Web sites also let users tweet with All-Star themed hashtags.

MLB.com then tracked the Twitter hashtags and rewarded the team with the most engagement with a special discount at its online store.

The participating baseball teams and MLB.com also posted a photo on their Web sites that users could submit photo captions. The best captions were then retweeted by the teams and one tweet was posted to MLB.com’s handle, @MLB.

Additionally, users could like their favorite teams on Facebook to enter contests.

After liking a page, users were entered in a sweepstakes to win a personalized All-Star jersey.

As a grand prize, the sweepstakes included four tickets to this year’s Midsummer Classic in Phoenix, AZ on July 12. Fans were also able to vote for their favorite players in this year’s All-Star Game on Facebook.

Hand-held home runs
Social Media Day is not the first mobile initiative for MLB.com.

The company partnered with Yahoo in April to launch an iPhone Fantasy Baseball ’10 app. The app let users manage their fantasy baseball teams from their mobile devices (see story).

Also this year, Volvo partnered with MLB.com for an exclusive advertisement with the At Bat 11 app. Volvo offered a free trial of its live-streaming service, MLB.TV, for the month of April on Apple iOS devices (see story).