We Aren't Investing in Robots...
WE AREN'T INVESTING IN ROBOTS
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Brian Burke never led the Toronto Maple Leafs to the post season during his tenure as the storied franchise's president and general manger. However, what he did lack in organizational success he did make up for in memorable quotes (and of course the classic un-tied tie on trade deadline day).
There were many quotes that got a great reaction from fan bases and media alike but only one quote of Burke's has really stuck with me far past his time in Toronto. I can't seem to find the video of this - and for all I know it might not have even been a Burke quote at all - but I recall overhearing him during one of his media scrums discussing a Maple Leaf injury (likely could have been the James Reimer concussion saga)...
"We aren't investing in robots"
No, he wasn't discussing the global economy.
He was referring to the Toronto Maple Leafs investing in human beings as it's primary assets for performance, exposure and success. As much as Burke wanted to robotically calibrate Reimer to immediately recover from a concussion or his captain, Dion Phaneuf, to score 20 goals like his former self - he couldn't.
We can wish athletes to perform, act or react the way we want them to but these are merely "projections" or "expectations". We can't physically go in there and make an athlete perform exactly the way we want them to. If we could, this would take the thrill out of the sport and make the jobs of agents and endorsers MUCH easier.
Human's unfortunately aren't robots (yet) - we aren't designed to repeat the same task over and over with the same outcome and in the midst of this we are inherently emotionally inconsistent in the way we act and think.
We are volatile.
We have bones.
We are bound to break.
This quote has stuck with me over the years and I have applied it to essentially everything I do, most notably my every day work in sport marketing and athlete brand building. This same mind set that Brian Burke took towards his players also applies to the athlete endorsement and marketing space.
Major companies would be a lot more willing to drop the big dollars on an endorsement deal if they knew there wasn't the chance that said athlete could have a career ending injury, have a catastrophic season or get suspended for some ill-mannered decision.
So why are so many companies still investing in these volatile and potentially fragile things in professional athletes a.k.a human beings (outside of the obvious reasons)?
It's simply that - we aren't robots, we are humans. We are relatable to each other and have the ability to trigger an emotional reaction amongst one another.
It's easy to put professional athletes on this pedestal as a near god like creature from another planet but it's their human features that draw us in and make us become a "fan." As marketers, this is something we need to pay specific attention to.
Once an athlete begins building up his corporate partner portfolio, it's easy for their media conversations and social media channels to almost become robotic in nature (watch any NHL player interview). This is birthed from a responsibility to never say anything that goes against the corporate standards of it's partners. As marketers and brand builders, we of course want to appease the athlete's partners but also want to allow the human nature of our athletes to prosper and be front and centre. After all, along with performance, this is what draws these partners in - they stand for something their company believes in.
When we collectively get together in a room and begin laying out the brand building process for an athlete we should sit down and think, "what makes David, David?" We should think about what is human about him instead of how can we craft him and mould him into something he really isn't. If he's philanthropic, help him build a charity. If he loves tattoos, let's show them off instead of hiding them. If he's hilarious, get him interviewing some other players.
If we showcase what they are really about, the right partners will come along. These partners need to be a "brand fit" and this doesn't occur unless the two sides actually share similar images and beliefs instead of something that is built unnaturally.
Why has this athlete signed with Nike? Why has this athlete signed with Under Armour? Their needs to be intertwining stories that create a connection between athlete and partner to make it believable and human or else the audience will see right through it.
Everything needs to be natural and organic. It needs to sound real as if it is coming exactly from said athlete's mouth and this doesn't occur unless this is something the athlete believes in and does. Our generation is at the point now where if we get a whiff of anything that smells forced or overwhelmingly corporate we will brand the athlete as a "sell out" or immediately lose interest. This puts pressure on the athlete's partners to be involved organically with the athlete and make sharing their corporate story something that is symbiotic to the athlete's life. They achieve this, they ultimately achieve a better return in their investment.
We spend this time building everything around an athlete (their "brand") such as their foundations, their social media channels and getting them press exposure to expose who they really are underneath all of that skin. So when the day comes that their bones and body will inevitably break, fans will still be drawn to the human aspect of who they really are.
Until next time,
- D.
