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2014 Olympics: Winning Marketing for Team USA’s Athletes

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BS USBF logo The 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi Russia have come and gone.  Tuvel Communications was pleased to lend its support to the USA Bobsled & Skeleton team’s marketing efforts. Olympic athletes rely on many forms of sponsorships to fund their dreams, from individual and corporate donations to sponsorships to crowd funding. Prior to the Winter Games, Tuvel worked with the USA Bobsled & Skeleton and Washington, DC-based ad agency ds+f to bolster the team’s online community building efforts, resulting in record sponsorship revenue.

Many lessons were learned on our Olympic marketing journey. Please keep in mind that individual athletic performance has a huge impact on any type of marketing effort, including everything social. The following list includes some of the lessons learned – and reminders that we picked up along the way.

Content <still> rules

As you can see from the following examples, content rules! Reach, engagement and followers are only some of the metrics used to track success. Bobsled athlete Jazmine Fenlator and skeleton athlete John Daly’s Twitter reach was high when compared to the other athletes on the team. (Twitter ‘Star’ Lolo Jones was not included in our study due to her massive – nearly 400,000 – number of followers.)

Example: Jazmine Fenlator and John Daly’s Twitter reach:

Screen Shot 2014-04-09 at 5.25.45 PM

 

Jazmine

 

Jazmine’s updates during the Olympics include mentions of Hurricane Irene relief efforts and her mom’s health issues. She is also known for her crowdsourcing or Internet fundraising efforts to raise money for training, transportation, and Sochi-related equipment expenses.

 

 

 

BS Screen Shot 2014-03-31 at 8.15.45 AM John Daly
John’s updates include lots of humor and pics from the teammate Johnny Quinn’s famous Sochi bathroom door incident. Mr. Daly also gained notoriety when Cosmo asked readers if they thought he was the Ryan Lochte of the Sochi Olympics.

 

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Member Prospecting Webinar– Fishing in the Right Ponds

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We recently presented a Webinar as part of the Young Association Professionals & Association Universe Member Engagement Webinar Series.

A short description of the Webinar follows. We hope you enjoy! Please let us know, in the comments below, if your association or group is using Micro Marketing for recruiting or retention efforts.

[slideshare id=15625979&doc=assndec12webcastfinal-121213131540-phpapp01] 

An example of a power law graph showing popularity ranking. To the right (yellow) is the long tail; to the left (green) are the few that dominate. In this example, the areas of both regions are equal.

Associations want marketing to create new members at a predictable cost. We hear a lot these days about the “Long Tail” with its untapped and micro-targeted prospecting segments such as government, healthcare, and education. Mass marketing models are not designed to go downstream or cost effectively reach these new, targeted member segments.

In this webinar, you will learn how the core elements of online community building and social media are being used to cost effectively identify influencers and build relationships that produce loyal members and supporters. Mitch will also be sharing case studies and best practices for results-driven association programs, projects and campaigns. You will learn that reaching the promise of the Long Tail is hard but can be done using research, tools, analytics and the right people!

How Nonprofits can Raise More Money Without Asking for More Money

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How Nonprofits can Raise More Money Without Asking for More MoneyWhat does a struggling economy do to struggling nonprofits? According to a new study from Giving USA, charitable giving only grew by 0.9% in 2011. And guess what? Little growth is expected in 2012.

Depressed yet? Never fear. In this excellent post on Frogloop, Allyson Kapin outlines some ways nonprofits can boost donations in 2012. One tip that stood out to me:

Don’t always ask for money. Many nonprofits are so focused on raising money and meeting their budgets, they often don’t treat their donors as important stakeholders in the organization. Your donors are a critical part of your community and want to be a part of your organization fighting for social change. Show them how they can help you meet your mission through actions, volunteer opportunities, social events, etc. Give them several paths to engage with your organization and make them feel like they are a valuable part of your mission. And of course you can ask them for money along the way.

To many nonprofits, this may seem counterintuitive; but Allyson makes an excellent point that ultimately comes down to your relationships with your donors.

If you take the time to identify your key advocates and build relationships with them, the return will be worth the time investment. Offer value and make them an important part of your efforts and organization, and you will see them giving more of their time and money in return.

Here are some ways nonprofits can build relationships with donors:

  • Identifying key advocates and influencers: Conduct research to compile a list of those who are your strongest advocates or can influence others to do so. Check out this handy infographic from SmallAct and BlackBaud on identifying your influencers and scoring them for fundraising efforts.
  • Developing opportunities of value: Think about all the different ways these key advocates can help your nonprofit – such as, like Allyson mentioned, volunteer opportunities and social events. Other ways might be through online word-of-mouth – spreading the word through their social networks through a blog post, tweet, donation widget, etc.
  • Reach out: This is where you engage your advocates without asking for money. Ask them where they want to be involved and develop those opportunities for them. Focus on those who respond to your outreach and concentrate your community-building efforts on them.
  • Keep building those relationships: Keep key advocates and influencers updated with new information and opportunities, ask for their input on a continual basis, and use their feedback. Through ongoing relationship and community-building, you can develop broader fundraising programs that engage not only them, but their communities.