Stop Gatekeeping Content Meetings

👋 Welcome back to Sponcon Sports, a weekly newsletter dedicated to sponsored content strategy in the sports industry!

This week, my TikTok algorithm has been feeding me clips from Variety’s Actors on Actors, a YouTube series where actors discuss their careers and the industry.

I can’t get enough.

This clip from the Tyler James Williams and Anthony Mackie episode was particularly captivating. There's something special about feeling like you're eavesdropping on a genuine conversation between celebrities, especially when it doesn't feel dumbed down for the audience.

This kind of content is equally compelling in sports. Take, for instance, the TaylorMade Golf post I shared a few weeks ago, this awesome moment from The Edge with Micah Parsons featuring CJ Stroud, or even the Mind The Game podcast with LeBron James and JJ Redick.

I’m especially interested in bringing this concept to the team level. Imagine having someone on your roster talk with an athlete from another team or sport.

Partnerships could make this happen.

Find a team with a mutual partner and propose that brand as the presenter of the episode or series. Think of big brands active in the sports industry, like Verizon or Anheuser-Busch.

These brands could cover player, travel, and production costs.

Imagine Steph Curry and Aaron Rodgers in conversation. Both the Golden State Warriors and the New York Jets are Verizon partners. They're not competitors.

Think of the star power and the massive potential when you leverage the collab tool. That’s the sponsored content I want to see.

In Today’s Edition:

• Why Partnerships Must Attend Content Meetings 🤝 

• Uber Eats’ Clever EURO’s Summer Tournament Sponcon 🪖

• FC Bayern Brews An Excellent Partnership Announcement 🍻 

🏊️ DEEP DIVE
7 Strategies To Maximize Content Meetings

Every team should have a partnership representative in their weekly content meetings.

Ideally, this is your digital partnerships specialist. If your team doesn’t have that person on staff, invite a representative from the partnerships team to join.

This will strengthen interdepartmental relationships, save time, and streamline the content ideation and activation process by:

1. Increasing Trust: Partnership teams can directly see your hard work on client deliverables, making them feel more involved in the process.

2. Reducing Communication Gaps: No more games of telephone. Discuss activation details, feedback, and more face-to-face.

3. Identifying Concept-Partner Fit Sooner: With a partnerships representative, you can proactively spot revenue opportunities you might miss.

4. Educating Partnerships on ‘Good’ Ideas: Once they understand what good sponsored content looks like, they can filter out unsuitable requests.

However, this collaboration requires mutual effort.

By inviting partnerships into content meetings, you trust they won’t derail the meeting and will use the time effectively.

Nobody needs more meetings and adding a recurring digital partnerships meeting is unnecessary.

To ensure these meetings run smoothly, partnership reps should follow these seven guidelines:

Listen

This is the number one rule for attending content meetings.

Partnership reps should participate and speak up, but remember, you're here to learn.

• What is the content team passionate about?

• How does the content team measure success?

• Can partnerships provide solutions or financial support to bring ideas to life (e.g., access, equipment, freelancers, creators, vendors)?

• What are the content team’s goals?

• Are campaigns being planned that could be a fit for new or current partners?

Including partnership reps in content meetings helps them spot revenue-generating opportunities proactively. This also eases the load on content teams by reducing the need for separate sponcon brainstorming sessions.

For example, let’s say a player was injured last year and had to cut their season short. In the content meeting, you hear plans to document that journey through a long-form episodic series. They're budgeting for travel to document the player's recovery and hiring a freelance editor to lighten the team's load.

The team’s auto partner comes to mind. You suggest calling the series "The Road Back." Bring this idea to the content team in real time, ask them to put together a detailed content activation plan, and pitch it to your partner.

This could be a great upsell opportunity, and if time allows, a chance for your partnership sales team to pitch the concept to prospects.

Review Deliverables

Using your preferred project management software (Asana, Monday, AirTable, etc.), review the week’s deliverables.

This is the perfect time to remind the team of upcoming tasks and give them the chance to ask questions about activation.

It's also a great opportunity to look ahead to bigger projects and request any status updates.

Pitch Updates

To build a stronger connection with your content team, provide updates on the status of every pitch that includes digital elements.

Even mentioning that there are no updates or that you haven’t heard back yet is valuable.

This reassures the content team that their ideas for the pitch, which they worked hard on, were worth their time.

We need to close the feedback loop.

For departments to be more collaborative, everyone involved needs to have the latest information.

Path To Goal

Be transparent about the organization's progress toward its digital partnership revenue goal.

Partnership teams often keep content teams in the dark on this topic, but sharing this information builds trust and generates excitement around sponsored content.

Content teams have a lot to gain from digital partnership success. Meeting the organization’s budget can help them hire more staff, get raises and promotions, and buy more equipment.

It also provides context for the content team on why a potential deal is important to the partnerships team. If a deal can get you close to or over your goal, the content team needs to understand that to be motivated to support you quickly.

Ultimately, we want these teams to work together. Collaborating to reach a mutually beneficial goal goes a long way.

Would We Evers

Bring ideas and inspiration to content meetings.

If you see something in the market that you think could work for a new or current partner, ask the content team if we would ever consider doing it.

You’re looking for one of three answers:

• Yes, as is.

• Yes, pending edits.

• No, but here’s why.

The goal is to walk away with either new inventory and a clear explanation of how it comes to life (cadence, channel selection, brand integration) or a rationale for why the team would pass on the idea, which you can save for future reference.

Gather and Provide Feedback

If time allows, content meetings are a great opportunity to ask for and provide feedback on recent digital partnership activations.

Discuss wins, losses, and adjustments while the sponsored content is still fresh.

Make sure to communicate any feedback and learnings from the meeting to the larger partnerships team during your weekly department meeting.

Prioritize The Meeting

This meeting needs to be a priority for the partnerships team.

No skips—attendance is required unless there's an immovable conflict. There should always be someone from the partnerships team present.

Inconsistent attendance signals to the content team that digital partnerships are not important.

The Takeaway

The relationship between content and partnership teams throughout the sports industry is largely broken.

Content teams resent partnership teams for selling “bad” ideas and partnership teams are frustrated with content teams because they lack the bandwidth to deliver ideas quickly.

Inclusivity and transparency across departments into how content and partnerships come to life will foster stronger relationships and organizational strategies.

💼 CASE STUDY
Sponsored Content of the Week

How do you drive brand consideration around an event you’re not sponsoring?

Take a page out of the Uber Eats playbook.

A week before EURO 2024 kicks off in Germany, Uber Eats teamed up with LADBible to sponsor an episode of Snack Wars: England vs Europe, featuring CBS Sports hosts Thierry Henry and Kate Abdo.

For those who haven’t watched these videos before, Snack Wars is a series where celebrities taste and judge two foods in pairs to determine which is the best.

This thoughtful brand integration kept Uber Eats top of mind among fans through a contextually relevant concept, seamless messaging, and an attention-grabbing collaboration.

Contextually Relevant Concept

Without mentioning it by name, LADBible and Uber Eats made it very clear this content piece was designed to generate interest around the EUROs.

• They utilized UEFA Champions League Today hosts Thierry Henry and Kate Abdo.

• This episode focused on UK snacks facing off against European snacks.

• The caption nodded to the EUROs by saying, "Get your match snacks effortlessly during this year's summer tournament, on Uber Eats."

Seamless Messaging Integration

The goal of this sponsorship was to reinforce Uber Eats as a grocery delivery service, reminding fans that restaurant delivery is not their only offering. This message was highlighted in multiple ways:

• The title card was followed by a branded card at the 26-second mark saying, "Get tonight's match snacks effortlessly on Uber Eats." The card also appeared at the end of the video.

• Positioning the branded card before the 30-second mark was smart, as YouTube registers a view after 30 seconds.

• An Uber Eats logo bug with the message, "Snacks Brought To You By Uber Eats," appeared in the top-right corner of the screen throughout nearly the entire video, as well as on the title card.

• The post caption (above) ensures you know you can try these snacks via Uber Eats.

Aligning your brand with a show about snacks was the perfect choice.

Attention-Grabbing Collaboration

LADBible delivered with a great talent pairing that made the video highly entertaining. The rapport between Abdo and Henry was evident, and they had a lot of fun participating in this series, creating memorable moments.

Meanwhile, the Uber Eats branding in the logo bug and on the cloches was noticeable but didn’t detract from the viewers’ experience.

The Results

Snack Wars: England vs Europe was posted on YouTube and Instagram Reels, garnering over 3.5M views, 76K engagements, and a 2.2% engagement rate.

By teaming up with LADBible and using popular hosts in a fun, contextually relevant show like Snack Wars, Uber Eats kept their brand top of mind. Strategic messaging and subtle yet effective branding throughout the video ensured their grocery delivery service was highlighted without overwhelming viewers. The result? Engaging content with impressive viewership and interaction.

🔍 SPONCONSPIRATION
Steal These Ideas

The New York Giants had a choice: simply post Dunkin’s National Donut Day offer on their social channels or come up with a creative solution to capture more attention. The G-Men chose the latter.

FC Bayern once again shows that partnership announcements can thrive on social media. This clever concept highlighted their partnership extension with Paulaner.

More teams should follow the Phoenix Mercury’s lead by having on-court partners like CarMax sponsor court transition time-lapse videos.

Bryan Francisco’s (aka @BryanPrimetime) NBA Finals Media Day edit is a style worth pitching to a phone partner.

Speaking of phone partners, the NWSL highlighted cool elements of the Chicago Red Stars match at Wrigley Field via their Pitchside with Google Pixel sponsored content series.

🚨 ICYMI
What To Watch For

Gen Z ❤️ Video Podcasts: According to Spotify’s recent report, “2024 Podcast Trends Tour,” Gen Z is 18% more likely to watch video podcasts than other podcast consumers. Here’s my guide on how to pitch video podcasts to new or current partners.

Co-Branded Emojis: My ears perked up when I heard AI-generated emojis are coming to iOS 18. We should be thinking about sponsored or co-branded emojis [h/t Neil Horowitz].

Snap Out of It: Why teams and leagues should shift focus beyond just video content [h/t Andy Marston - Sports Pundit]

Stat of the Week: According to the Elevent 2024 Sponsorship Performance Survey, the positive correlation between brand sponsorship and consumer purchase intent improved from 59% to 66% YOY [h/t Priority Partnerships].

Must Watch: Colin & Samir interviewed the Head of Instagram, Adam Mosseri, for a deep dive into the algorithm, how posts gain more reach, partner ads, and much more! Don’t let the 92-minute run time scare you off. You can click right to your topic of choice via the timestamps in the caption.

A+ Crypto Partnership Idea: You need to check out this campaign via Slice’s partnership with Coinbase. It’s an outstanding framework for any team that wants to support a brand partner by driving brand consideration and increasing customers through a community-focused initiative [h/t Matt Kobach].