by Kristin Swartzlander | Dec 31, 2015 | Media and Public Relations, Mindset, Motorsports Marketing for Tracks, Teams and Businesses, Racing Social Media, Racing Sponsorship
As we close out 2015 this week, I encourage you to take some time to reflect on the past year. We all experience successes and failures in life, work, and racing, and I’m no different. Last week, I shared the powerful impact of 2015, both on me and on the community, and how grateful I am for the progress we’re making. You can read that here. Today and tomorrow, I’ll be in the office attempting to close out 2015 and plan 2016. (I’m only three months late on my October ‘2016 Planning’ target. If you’re behind, you are not alone!) We have a lot of fun things in the works for next year that I hope to announce in January and February, but we do have one coming up SOON: Sponsorship Marketing Workshop: Crafting Effective Sponsorship Proposals – Live on Sunday, January 10th. On-Demand Forever. Details Here. We had a great response to the first sponsorship marketing workshop on crafting and value the perfect offerings (you can get the on-demand version here if you missed the live event), so I’m adding more workshops just like it to the calendar. This is something that I’ve always thought could bring value to the community with a lower price point than private coaching, so I’m excited to share that we’re planning on releasing at least one workshop per month going forward in 2016. More details on that later, but if you want to weigh in on the topics and content, please feel free to share your thoughts with me here. Some of you are new to this blog (sign up for the free newsletter if so!),...
by Kristin Swartzlander | Nov 13, 2015 | Media and Public Relations, Mindset, Motorsports Marketing for Tracks, Teams and Businesses, Racing Sponsorship, Thoughts and Rants
At the end of the race, at the end of the day, what are you left with? ‘Trophies,’ according to Kenny Wallace. This morning, I had the pleasure of listening to Kenny Wallace keynote the RPM Promoter’s Workshops in Las Vegas. He made quite a few interesting points, but one that jumped out to me for racers was this (and, forgive me, but I’m paraphrasing): “For racers, the money goes into the accounts, and the money goes out of the accounts. All we have left at the end of the day are the trophies.” Kenny talked a lot about where we are as a sport, both fiscally and emotionally.He made sure to emphasize that as racing businesses, we need to be profitable. But what I took away from it was this: if you’re only paying attention to the financial side of things, you’re forgetting about why we’re here. Because at the end of the day – and this is according to Kenny – we’re all trying to get to that same moment where we’re cracking open a Bud Light after the hauler’s closed up and the lights are shut off. The money that came in has already gone out, and all we have left are the trophies. Kenny was talking about actual, physical trophies because we’re at a race track conference, but I think it goes beyond that. Our trophies are not just trophies. In your relationships, whether that’s with a fan, sponsor, racer or track, I think we need to ask ourselves: what trophy are we leaving them with? Are we giving them the trophy that they can...
by Kristin Swartzlander | Oct 29, 2015 | Media and Public Relations, Motorsports Marketing for Tracks, Teams and Businesses, Racing Social Media, Racing Sponsorship
It’s that time of year – okay, it’s always that time of year – when the stakes feel their highest for teams, tracks and manufacturers. We have to get that one last win, that one last show in, that one last sale and, often, that one last dig at our competition. Media training was a big part of my career when I started out working in professional football because my role was in the public relations department. Helping athletes to understand how to deal with media was one of our most important jobs, and I learned a lot about the importance of positive messaging as it benefits the: Athlete Team Sport Marketing Partners To say that trash talking in the media was discouraged is an understatement. Trash talking, in my opinion, hurts everyone. When you see another driver spinning his or her version of a story, it’s so tempting to hop on the media or social media bandwagon and try to correct it. Or put out your own equal-and-opposite take on the situation. But if you’ve ever worked with me, you know that I advise my clients to take the high road every time, no matter how difficult or tempting the situation is. (And, by the way, the high road doesn’t always mean silence. “No comment” is a response, too.) Why? Trash Talking Makes YOU Look Bad Whether you’re talking directly about your competition’s actions or highlighting your position at their expense, in this industry there are plenty of witnesses. If you think you can pretend you didn’t hit someone on the track or scream obscenities at them in the...
by Kristin Swartzlander | Oct 22, 2015 | Media and Public Relations, Mindset, Motorsports Marketing for Tracks, Teams and Businesses, Racing Social Media
As I write this, the offseason is barreling towards us like a train about to derail. Not that I don’t love the offseason…mind you, it’s become the most productive time of the year for me. In fact, last year’s offseason brought about a lot of changes for me in my business and in our personal life. I was able to do my annual Charlotte and PRI trips, along with adding the Florida RPM workshops and outlining the marketing and PR plan for the Dirt Classic months in advance. Personally, we also took a huge leap when Carl left the job he’d held for over 10 years at his family company to pursue racing as a more full-time profession. I talk more about how that came about in another blog on positioning yourself for opportunities. This year, the offseason looks similarly up-leveled. I have speaking engagements at the Las Vegas, Indy and Florida RPM workshops, along with the Western Auto Racing Promoters Association workshops in Portland, in addition to our annual PRI and Charlotte trips. And that doesn’t include the racing opportunities that have come our way in Carl’s career. While the offseason is fun, busy and relaxing all at the same time, I have to admit that life is just not the same without racing. And it doesn’t offer you the same type of opportunities to promote yourself, whether you have a race car or a race track, as racing season does. With a little bit of preparation, though, before the season ends, you can set yourself up for promoting success in the offseason, when there are no race cars on the track and fans in...
by Kristin Swartzlander | Aug 20, 2015 | Media and Public Relations, Racing Social Media
If you’re here, you’re probably already familiar with some of the reasons that social media can benefit your team. But, I still get tons of questions about the value of social media from drivers and team owners, tertiary team members – family, friends, crew and lurkers, marketing partners, and traditional media members who see it as fun and games at best or narcissistic and hurtful at worst. If you take a look around, social media can be all of those things: valuable, harmful, self-absorbed, and fun. But if you want to take the negative stand on it, here’s what I have to say: It’s generally more harmful to let others talk about you than to do it yourself. Detractors will argue that others will still talk about you. I agree. People will always gossip. It’s just a question of whether you want to chime in with your version of the story or not. If you go down this path one more step, here’s a kicker for you: I argue that if all you care about is controlling the gossip, you only care about what your peers think. And if all you care about is what your peers think about you, you’re in the wrong business. Because your competitors don’t pay your bills. Social media doesn’t just put your message out to your gossiping peers. It allows you to connect with fans, marketing partners, media members and other influencers. You might change the talk in the pits, for better or for worse, with social media. But that’s a side benefit in the grand scheme of bettering your racing program. At the...
by Kristin Swartzlander | Jul 24, 2015 | Media and Public Relations, Mindset, Motorsports Marketing for Tracks, Teams and Businesses
Last night, I was fortunate to get an invitation to a Cornell University alumni event through my Columbia alumni club. The gathering centered around a talk from alumnus Jeff Broadhurst, who is the CEO of Eat ‘n Park, an iconic chain of Pittsburgh-based restaurants, as well as other gourmet establishments and a catering venture. At the end, the group was invited to ask questions and an attendee asked about how blurry the lines were now for businesses in terms of fitting into a certain category. Broadhurst joked that now, more than ever, when asked who his competition was he could honestly respond: everyone. Gas stations are now serving fast food. Fast food restaurants are venturing into gourmet ingredients. Grocery stores now have gourmet coffee and high-end establishments have food trucks. It’s difficult to be unique, and communicate your uniqueness, in a crowded market. What I liked about Broadhurst was his positive spin on the ever-changing business landscape. Instead of focusing on the difficulty, he spoke to the opportunity. With so much competition and differentiation, you no longer have to fit in the proverbial box. There has never been a better time to do things differently than your competition. There has never been a better time to carve out your own niche, with your own audience. Race tracks are not alone in competing with everyone for race fans time, attention and money. We can complain about how we’re competing against the movie theaters, restaurants, theme parks and house parties, or we can look at the opportunity to be the grocery store with a gourmet coffee shop. Does every race track serve...
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