Sports 3.0

When athletes learn how to advertise themselves they also advertise the sport. The below is an extract from Arnold Schwarzenegger's autobiography, and explains his philosophy on advertising. Spot the parallels with the biggest athletes. "You can have the greatest movie in the world, but if you don’t get it out there, if people don’t know about it, you have nothing. It’s the same with poetry, with painting, with writing, with inventions. It always blew my mind that some of the greatest artists, from Michelangelo to van Gogh, never sold much because they didn’t know-how. They had to rely on some schmuck - some agent or manager or gallery owner - to do it for them. That wasn’t going to happen to my movies." What a line. "They had to rely on some schmuck to do it for them". Ryan Reynolds is hollywoods best example of this approach over the last decade. He has also brought it into sports via his approach with Wrexham. Many icons of the sporting world have also understood this - Muhammed Ali, Senna, MJ, Beckham. BUT we are entering an era for athletes where this is becoming more important than ever. As media is democratised the power for athletes to shape the destiny of themselves and their sport is unrivalled. See: Ilona Maher (Just look at the google search volume for Women's Rugby in the US) Learn how to build your brand - Learn how to create content - Learn how to sell. The most successful challenger federations of the next decade will likely realise they should literally be giving up and coming athletes promotional toolkits. Create the best storytellers in sport (Hint: We are already working on this at CAPTAIN 👀 - DM for more) Image Credit: @trungphan on X.

Introducing CAPTAIN, the personal brand agency for leaders in sport 🎉 Why CAPTAIN? When Captains speak, others listen. We make you the Captain of your category. Leaders in the sports industry often overlook the power of personal content creation and branding, missing out on power to increase profile, authority, and business growth. I created CAPTAIN to make it easy for Founders and CEOs in sports to stand out with impactful personal brand content. When sports executives began asking me for LinkedIn strategy help last year I knew this was a common challenge for many. We’re proud to already be partnering with leading founders, CEOs and commercial teams at rights-holders, agencies & tech companies. For more information, DM me or visit our website – link above this post and in the comments. CAPTAIN is part of Sports 3.0. Sports 3.0 is creating specialist agencies at the intersection of sports content, media, and technology.

The Sports YouTube dilemma YouTube is by far the place which forms most of my content diet. And more widely its the platform I continue to be most bullish on for growth and long term returns when it comes to the sports industry. BUT I think there is a strategic mismatch with how many sports organisations approach the platform. Normal YouTube creators typically fuse a topic niche with a content type and style that audiences resonate with. One of YouTubes great strengths is growing creator niches at scale based on the way the platform serves and learns recommended and related content. The best creators then build a sense of community around this - from the most basic ways such as responding to comments and crafting content around the community to separate products. The trap I see so many sports organisations fall into is that they are used to simply publishing content, and they have far too much of it. Although by proxy they operate in a niche (the sport), content type and style are often not catered for. Fans are not fans of ALL content. Because whilst the niche (the sport) may be the same. The fans who will consume the different types and styles of content (highlights, bts, storytelling, challenges, lifestyle etc) may be different. (Never mind if you are a league publishing highlights of fixtures between all teams - many fans will only be interested in their own team.) And this results in huge disparities in performance but also potential growth. Because the YouTube suggested engine works on a superb and sophisticated combination of watch time, lookalike audiences, click through rates etc. This is the reason why so many creators have second channels (and beyond) to cater for content that falls out of their main channel niche. Or for example why podcasts create 'clips' channels. The clips actually work against the long form content if posted on the same channel. The summary here is, I think more sports organisations should be putting more effort into the strategy behind their YouTube content mix. Niche down. For the sole purpose that you may discover it boosts holistic performance as fans see more of the content they way mote regularly. Of course there is a resource problem with this. Most content teams are criminally under resourced, but this is more or an awakening to senior execs that you should be focusing on YouTube and its nuances.

Technology x Culture x Sports I'm excited to head down to SEG3 next week to chat all things future (and present!) of sports. Drop me a DM if you want to catch up or if you're thinking about going. I've teamed up with SEG3 to offer a 20% discount on tickets - the brands registered are below so there will be some great people in the room. Just use the code: Sports320 Tickets are available here: https://lnkd.in/em6zQD8P Look forward to catching up with friends old and new

Beaming 🪄 Fair play to Chicago Bears for trying something different. Last night they gave fans their first interaction with draft pick Caleb Williams via hologram, beaming him in to a draft party. So much fun tech for Sports rights-holders to experiment with at the moment. How long until we see this as part of a new signing unveiling in The Premier League? #sportsbiz #sportsindustry #sportstech

When crisis meets opportunity... and this is an opportunity for ATP Tour and WTA It's no secret the docuseries-ification of sports via streaming platforms has been perceived as a trawler to widen the net of fandom following Drive to Survive. Or what I like to call 'MediaMimicary'. Where one thing works for one sport, and suddenly the approach is adopted across everything and anything. We've seen this to potential saturation point in sports where the spark that ignited the genre needs evolving I hear collective groans in WhatsApp chats now when new sports documentaries are announced. There will be casualties as we are seeing with Break Point. But the opportunity to evolve for the Tennis Tours is staring them right in the face. And it's taking back ownership and optimising for reach via weekly storytelling on YouTube. Raw, authentic, vlog style, creating a community around the content. Not just 'behind the scenes' camera rolling content. Considered storytelling and platform first editing & optimisation. Something that is still, to my disbelief, well underserved within sports. I say this as someone who was part of the INEOS team as we decided participation in the Tour de France documentary equivalent, but also took the decision to continue our weekly vlog storytelling format, Off-Script, still very popular to this day. The touchpoint for giving fans a peek into the lives of the talent shouldn't purely be an annual event, it should be weaved into the fabric of the calendar. And I taking this approach will bring far more new and existing fans into the ATP and WTA ecosystem than a one off annual launch in the hands of a 3rd party. #sportsbiz #sportsmarketing #sportsindustry

🚨 I've re-opened up my 1:1 Power Hour sessions, following many enquiries from my updated "How great sponsorship proposals should feel" guide. These sessions are for Commercial Directors, Heads of Partnerships, Sponsorship Sales Managers, Sales execs and anyone in between who want guided feedback and actionable steps to improve their offering. The below great was one of the testimonies I received from the last time I ran these. Sign up below, or email [email protected] for more info: https://lnkd.in/epNVaFbF

The power of 'Story Driven Sponsorship' proposals I first posted the below carousel 6 months ago and it was well received with rights-holders and brands seeking change. I've now updated point 4 with a fresh take based on a phrase which is great to hear from brands, and I've heard many times since offering more support to commercial teams. But also shows how the sponsorship proposal bar still needs to be lifted. Let me know your thoughts! #sponsorship #sponsorshipmarketing #sportsbiz

This is mindblowing. I had chance to try this out in person this week at Rezzil HQ and it was truly sensational. There is so much rights-holders and broadcasters do with this tech, both in mixed reality devices and on mobile. - Live simulcasts (like you can see here) and POV angles to create the most immersive experience imaginable on mobile or VR device - Produce alternative broadcasts to target new audience groups - Create 3D highlights for custom fan experiences - Import action directly into gaming worlds such as Roblox and Fortnite I'm helping Rezzil work with some of the most forward thinking leagues, teams, brands and broadcasters to build out these experiences. Get in touch if you’d like to see and hear more. #sportstech #sportsbiz #sportsindustry Andy Etches Sports 3.0

"We need to engage with younger audiences" What most rights-holders and broadcasters say, but it's not always acted on. The National Football League (NFL) are the most serious at realising the challenge and delivering on this. The range of activations they have pulled off focused on younger audiences this year has been amazing to see. Culminating in the Spongebob themed alternative broadcast for this weekends Superbowl. And it didn't just end up appealing to kids, online audiences resonated with the mayhem. It had a more spontaneous unhinged feel that you would expect on live Saturday morning kids TV than the most premium sports real estate of the year. I pulled together a few of my favourite clips of the action. If anyone rights-holders or broadcasters want to actually engage with younger audiences through live get in touch. I'm cooking something up. #sportsbiz #sportsmarketing #content Sports 3.0