Athletes: Find what works for you. Focus on it like crazy.
One of the cool things about 2022 is that there are more ways than ever for athletes to grow their platform. Investing in and growing your platform is the single best way to attract business opportunities.
Remember. Sponsorship deals are just one way for athletes to make money. In today’s market, sponsorship deals are often dominated by those with large social media followings. While this is not always the case, it’s important to understand the market you are playing in.
Not everyone is going to grow their IG account to 100k followers. It’s really hard. However, there are other ways you can spend your time and still get the attention of sponsors, advertisers, business partners and events.
Here are a few ways we are seeing athletes grow their platform and increase their value in the market:
Write a regular blog: One of our clients started a blog a few months ago detailing her journey in the WNBA. The first post received around 250 clicks with an average read time of 3 minutes. Not too bad! Her second post received over 1,000 clicks with an average read time of 6 minutes. This is incredibly valuable data to present to partners. It also plays to the athlete’s strength - which is writing. Consistent blogs open the opportunity for ad partners, sponsored content and guest writing opportunities with larger media outlets.
Newsletter: This is the age of the newsletter. More companies and content creators are starting newsletters. Newsletters are a fantastic way to promote yourself, share your voice and attract partners to your brand. Whether it’s weekly, monthly or quarterly is totally up to you. A newsletter gives you a reason to start an email list and grow it. This is another valuable marketing asset that you can bring to the negotiating table.
Get a buddy to help you with social media content: Something we’ve found is that social media posting becomes much easier when athletes enlist the help of a friend who can help them capture video content. If your friend is good and editing and can create a few IG reels for you, that’s the mecca. We have one client who came to realize that social media was a two person job. He asked for help from a close friend to help record and edit IG Reels content. They spent 1 hour filming on a weekend and this provided weeks worth of IG Reels. One of their reels has over 250k views and his IG following grew 10% in a month.
Find what works for you. Focus more of your energy on that space. Don’t give up after the first few tries, these things take time. You will be surprised at the results and stress it takes off of you. Good luck, you can do it!
