On May 16, the six-month mark between Thanksgiving in 2012 and Thanksgiving in 2013, Turner Sports host Ernie Johnson wanted to encourage fans, followers and network partners to express things they were grateful for via social media. Turner’s social team created the hashtag #ThanksgivinginMay so that sentiment behind the idea could easily be explained. Fans, followers and network partners were asked to share a moment of thanks via social media using the #ThanksgivinginMay and also find a way to touch someone’s life by paying it forward. On May 16 at 9 a.m. ET, a personal note from Ernie Johnson was posted to the NBA on TNT Facebook page introducing #ThanksgivinginMay. Throughout the day via Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, fans and followers tweeted photos and shared words of thanks and encouragement and ways that they paid it forward. That afternoon in Atlanta, the NBA Inside team of Ernie Johnson, Shaquille O’Neal, Charles Barkley and Kenny Smith volunteered with Samaritan Hands at Kipp Middle School to provide new shoes and wash the feet of underprivileged children. Later that evening, during TNT’s pregame NBA coverage, Ernie expressed his gratitude for everyone’s involvement in the #ThanksgivinginMay movement. As a result of the on-air integration and social push #ThanksgivinginMay generated more than 93 million impressions, and 7.8k tweets.
http://allball.blogs.nba.com/2013/05/16/thanksgiving-in-may/