Too much of social media looks and sounds the same. Brands and individuals exhibiting the same personality, trolling with the same memes, and trying to shout the loudest in hopes of standing out in increasingly cacophonous, homogenous platforms and feeds.
But what is a brand if its primary distinguishing factor is simply the volume? When every team repeatedly tries to out-savage the other or invokes the same well-worn tactics, all of a sudden it’s the black and white cow that stands out amidst the herd of purple cows.
This is not a call for blandness, merely one for purpose, for values, and for giving fans a reason to believe in you, not only to be entertained by you. Jess Smith has been enmeshed with distinctive sports brands throughout her career, appreciating the balance of amusement and aura that the most powerful, lasting brands exhibit. Everybody will say that maximizing engagement is the goal, but that’s oversimplifying things. A couple of slices of pizza may get you the same calories, and more quickly, than a plate of lentils and vegetables, but overdoing either of those meals, regardless of your macros, is a recipe for bloating or blandness. Jess says it better than my nutritional meandering:
“I think not all engagement is created equal,” said Smith, who is Vice President of Brand and Digital Strategy for the Stewart-Haas Racing NASCAR team. “…I always tell the team there are certain things that we’re going to have to tell the story about or initiatives that we’re going to have to talk about. It’s probably not going to be the most engaging, but our job is to figure out how we take it and improve engagement, and build upon it…
“There are some things that are core to the organization, core to our partners, core to values and we have to do them…So I think just understanding that from a team standpoint and I always tell the team, as long as we take care of the foundation, then those fun things that we know are going to pop and are kind of silly and maybe are more of a fan engagement [play], then we can do that.
“But I think it’s just making sure that the team understands what the purpose of it is, and even though it doesn’t hit those engagements, there’s still a ton of value to it.”
Teams would do well to do their meal prep and allow for cheat meals — okay, we’ll skip more food talk, but Smith did discuss the structure and organization it takes to manage a brand and content strategy these days. There are too many demands, too many channels, and miles of monotony interrupted by unexpected detours of urgency and opportunity. One of the more unique characteristics of planning and strategy in sports is that so much of it can end up being all for naught. In a split second, a triumphant victory can turn into an agonizing defeat — but you better be ready to capitalize on the potential win because those are the fleeting moments when outsized returns and results happen. Such preparation is why just about everyone who has worked in sports will know what it means to have a folder of tears (what I called it), a virtual graveyard where the best-laid plans and content remain, having never seen the light of day.
But you still have to be ready. And there are ways teams can be ready for the big moments and also ready for the times when strategy has to be pivoted or executed more quickly than a NASCAR pit stop.
“I feel like in sports you actually have to plan for the unexpected,” said Smith, who spent time with the New York Yankees and New York Rangers prior to heading to Stewart-Haas. “So you know when trade [season] starts to happen, you have to build all the templates and think of all the different scenarios that could happen. I feel like you have to be anticipatory and plan for the things that might not happen. That’s hard because sometimes you might put in work on something and it might not ever see the light of day, but if you don’t plan for it, the team’s going to be in not a good spot. So it’s all about planning for what you can plan for and being prepared for the unexpected.”
It’s easier to be ready in real time when the team knows its brand and knows its identity. Decisions aren’t made in silos, but instead backed by collectively recognized frameworks that keep everyone driving in the same direction (left turns only — NASCAR joke for you). But brands and frameworks can’t be constrained or overly rigid, lest they remain tethered to patterns that shut them out of conversations or even entire platforms where their presence could be relevant and where their existing or potential fans want to engage. There’s a level of flexibility inherent in the most successful brands now, appreciating that their fans want them to color outside a set of lines, at times, as long as they remain true to distinctive guiding principles. It’s not easy, but it’s necessary, to keep relationships burning hot and growing.
“My perspective on what fits within a brand box has evolved over the years,” said Smith, who also writes wonderfully on her blog Social ‘n Sport. “I feel like early on I was overly strict, it was brand above all else…I do believe there’s a brand foundation and you have to do the work that matters.
“So you have to understand who you are. You have to understand your tone. You have to understand what you won’t do. I think that’s really important. Always outline what you won’t do. But the media landscape has changed so much. People, I feel like, consume to take a break, it’s entertainment [and] every brand needs to loosen up a little bit. You have to figure out what that line is for you.”
Stewart-Haas Racing knows who they are and what they stand for. Smith helped tease it out and bring it to life more than ever before, and it was remarkable to hear her articulate the SHR brand, how organic it feels, and how it guides what they do and don’t do, who they seek to engage and not, and, well, everything. This is where conceptual meets practical, where the dreamers must also be doers. It can be easy to put up a few PowerPoint slides outlining a brand, but it takes the next level to translate that brand into everyday execution. But once you can identify the north star, it illuminates and enlightens, making where, when, and how to be active across platforms feel relatively simple.
For Smith and SHR, one of their most important content pillars is the fact that their team is, as she put simply, ‘a bunch of racers.’ Racing is in their blood, across the organization, and it’s that passion for the racing that they want to instill in their content, their passion, and their fans.
“While that seems like just basic marketing speak,” Smith explained,” everyone across the organization — like our fabricators are spending their weekends at Millbridge local dirt track, racing a dirt [race]. It’s true to our DNA. So ‘bunch of racers’ is one of our pillars. We want to show how all of our drivers, most of them race outside of NASCAR. They’ll do dirt racing, they’ll do modified. Kevin [Harvick] tonight is doing SRX, like they love racing. So that’s going to show up.
“That pillar is never going to change; if it changes and it’s not core to our DNA, but how we tell that story needs to change year to year.”
The guiding principle for SHR also helps them stay in the right lanes in their marketing and digital strategies. Brands that try to be everything to everyone often end up so convoluted or confused, with nothing for fans to latch onto or hold dear; they’re inconsistent. Smith articulated how SHR knowing who they are ensures its brand is strong and distinct, recognizable from the rest.
“When you think about that pie [of all potential sports fans], you think about NASCAR, I think we have to be really intentional about who we are or we’ll dilute ourselves and then we’re competing against a bunch of noise and almost don’t stand for anything,” she said. “Of course we want to bring in casual fans, but I think that where we do our brand a service is focusing on those casual racing fans and trying to bring them into the fold.”
As more brands succumb to the temptation to be whatever helps them achieve the biggest engagement numbers and viral growth, it’ll be those that remain distinct that stand the test of time. Everybody loves the jokester, people pay attention to the troll dropping savage lines and memes, they can’t help but look at the absurd and unhinged — but real relationships, backed by emotional investment require something more than surface-level gambits meant for a quick laugh. Well-rounded exposure and engagement matters. You can aim to attract attention for a day or strive to gain unconditional love for a lifetime.
One more thing…
Jess offered tremendous advice for people in leadership roles and I wanted to include an excerpt of that because it’s too dang good to leave out of this post. Listen (or read) the full interview below!
“One piece of advice — I think that you owe it to your team to give feedback and [to give] feedback often. When I first stepped into a management role, it felt like feedback sometimes was not, I don’t want to say a negative thing, but I was uncomfortable giving it. And as I learned, if you don’t give feedback, no one can read your mind. So it’s important for you to make sure that you give feedback, you give it often, you’re direct, and you also have candid conversations about your style. Like I’m going to give feedback, it’s not a negative, it’s a positive because I’m trying to help you. So I think the first time you step into management, just learning to give feedback, learning your style is super important because it helps your team and I feel like if you’re not giving it, you’re just doing a disservice to everyone.”
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LISTEN TO MY FULL CONVERSATION WITH JESS SMITH
READ THE SNIPPETS
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