By Greg Lamm: The Seattle Sounders FC hopes to tap into the social networking craze to help build fan support leading into the Major League Soccer expansion team’s inaugural season in the spring.

The Sounders are launching a new breed of fan clubs with actual powers over key team decisions, plus an interactive website that allows like-minded fans to get seats together at the stadium.

Included, of course, will be Facebook-like web features to allow tech-savvy soccer fans to follow team updates in real time, as well as blog, chat and upload their own fan photos.

The Sounders recently signed up Digitaria, a San Diego-based marketing and technology firm, to execute the digital strategy. And the team also is working with Seattle website developer Cypress Consulting Inc. to build in social networking tools to sell tickets online, allowing fans to match up at the stadium.

Perhaps most unusual is the new fan membership group that will be armed with the power to vote out the Sounders general manager if the team has a horrible run.

Every four years, the group will be able to vote on whether or not to retain the general manager. Membership comes with buying a season ticket or paying a $125 annual fee.

In the meantime, the group will name the team’s new marching band.

Even before the formal fan group rolled out, the owners had allowed thousands of web voters to decide on the very name of the team itself. Comedian and minority Sounders owner Drew Carey brought the idea of establishing this kind of fan involvement to majority owner Joe Roth after hearing that Barcelona’s soccer team had a similar fan association.

Carey said he immediately knew it would marry the team to fans.

“I think you are going to see a level of loyalty to a team that’s pretty unheard of, or way above the norm, especially for a soccer team,” said Carey, who was in Seattle recently to attend the inaugural meeting of the fans association.

The Sounders’ front office wants to tap into a rabid soccer fan base that is accustomed to sharing information through blogs and bulletin boards. The team also sees an opportunity to fill a void left from the bitter departure of the Seattle SuperSonics NBA team.

And Sounders FC is looking to create some positive buzz around a professional sports team during a time when, except for the WNBA’s Seattle Storm, local sports brands such as the Mariners, the Seahawks and the University of Washington Huskies’ football team have performed miserably. But despite the black cloud hanging over the region, Carey said he doesn’t buy into any notion that Seattle is jinxed by the sports gods.

“No. No such thing, no such thing. I don’t buy into that thinking at all,” Carey said.

Carey also said he was not concerned about the timing of launching the Sounders during an economic downturn that promises to be severe, noting the success the Sounders have had in selling season tickets.

As of mid-November, the team has sold 18,000 season tickets at Qwest Field, ranging from $288 to $1,350, said Suzanne Lavender, spokeswoman for the Sounders.

Capacity at the stadium’s lower bowl, where fans will be seated, will be 24,500.

Bill Chapin, director of marketing and partnership development with the Seahawks and Sounders, said the Sounders are working with Digitaria to launch the social networking website by February, two months before the team’s inaugural season. Chapin said the Sounders also are working with an Austin, Texas-based social media software company called Pluck.

The Sounders also have been working with Cypress Consulting to beef up the social networking aspects of the team’s online ticket sales. Right now, ticket buyers go to the Sounders’ website and can find out in what section of the stadium they would find certain types of fans.

Do they want to sit next to the fans who plan to cheer and stand up during much of the game? Or sit with fans who are members of a certain local soccer league?

The next phase of online ticket sales will allow fans to post profiles and get to know each other, similar to the social networking experiences offered at Facebook or MySpace.

“It’s kind of like a matchmaker,” said Cypress CEO Nate Thompson, who has worked on new website projects with several other sports teams, including the Seahawks.

Thompson said it opens up opportunities for fans to trade tickets. And the team says it also can help fans get together to plan social events before or after soccer matches and also establish special cheers or other rituals for stadium seating sections.

Because billionaire Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen also is part owner of the new soccer venture, that pushes the team in a technology-friendly direction, Thompson said. He said the Sounders do want to have a pioneering website, much like Allen’s other sports teams, the Seahawks and Portland Trail Blazers.

In addition to the website development deals with Digitaria and Cypress, the Sounders also recently announced a multiyear deal with Fox Sports Northwest that grants the cable network exclusive rights to rebroadcast Sounders games both on television and as on-demand video.

FSN, a subsidiary of Liberty Sports Group, also will produce a weekly sports show on the Sounders. And the cable TV company signed up to sponsor the fan membership association, as well as youth community events associated with the team.

The Sounders realize what corporations such as Starbucks and Comcast already have discovered, said Eric Weaver, president of Brand Dialogue, a Seattle-based marketing company not involved with the Sounders’ effort. Trust among peers is rising rapidly on the internet, while at the same time people are more distrusting of corporations, Weaver said.

Weaver said he’s surprised more sports teams aren’t turning to social networking on the internet. They have the perfect opportunity to help nurture an interactive network of fans who can connect with each other and spread interest in the teams, Weaver said.

A Sounders fan might take video or pictures of a crazy play at a game and want to share it with a friend. Or he might chat about the ups and down of the team. “How cool is that?” Weaver said. “There’s no downside.”

Greg Lamm covers sports business, marketing & media and retail for the PSBJ. He can be reached at greglamm@bizjournals.com.