Cost, Value, Price, How Do We Get There

Welcome to February everyone, from a motorsports aspect this is really the official start to the 2023 motorsports season, Rolex 24 hours of Daytona, The Clash, Speedweeks, World Series of Asphalt, Dirt Car Nationals and so much more. This is the time of year we feel the power and hear the engines roaring to life. The snow will melt in the north and the tracks will get painted. For those not competing in Florida over the next few weeks, the cars will be completed, and grassroots racing will regenerate like the grass every spring. The new cars, new bodies, new teams, all combined with the hopes and dreams of all motorsport's competitors.

If you are a business seeking to break away from the pack, indulge yourself, explore something new, experience motorsports marketing, it will be spring soon and spring brings a new perspective every year. In today’s buyer-empowered world, marketers need to seize every opportunity to build relationships, generate goodwill and earn the trust of prospective customers. The modern consumer wants more than a pitch when evaluating solutions or making purchasing decisions. motorsports offer a unique opportunity for them to interact with brands to get a firsthand sense of a company’s focus, perspective, and personality.

Last week I wrote a bit about two areas of motorsports marketing that create a great deal of questions and not many very clear answers, cost, and value. The lack of clear answers is not because anyone involved in motorsports wants to be vague, it is about the vast opportunities motorsports marketing can create. In the last three weeks I have been asked twice how much does a motorsports marketing program cost.

Asking how much a motorsports marketing program costs is like asking how much to build a house or a website.

You can get a house built for $10,000.00: it will not be very big; it will not have any or many amenities, and it will provide the very basics of shelter. You can get a house built for over $1,000,000.00 as well, it will be significantly larger and much more prominent, it will have just about every amenity available, and it will provide shelter and the ability to entertain friends, family, and colleagues. Both homes have value, the value is different based on the needs of the individual. The small house would be of great value to an individual with very limited resources. The small house has less value to a person with much greater resources as it does not meet the needs of the person with more resources. The house that has significantly more space and amenities, may not have the same value for the person of limited resources, they may not want or need the space or many of the amenities, they may not have the resources to maintain this much larger house. From the aspect of the person with more resources the larger house fits the needs and capabilities. Motorsports marketing is no different, how big is the geographic footprint you choose to focus on, what is the specific outcome you desire, data capture, sampling, product interaction or employment applications?

A website has this same ideology just on a smaller scale, we see advertisements all the time for a $149.00 website, it is at best a landing page with a basic message and little to no interaction. On the other hand, you can spend $10,000.00 on your website, this would be highly interactive, with multiple internal and external links, multiple pages with a wide variety of information, and most likely an e-commerce opportunity. Motorsports marketing and a website are even closer related than the house analogy. Do you want a simple landing page that looks great, and you can tell people you have a website, no problem I have a great single door space for you, and you are part of a race team. Do you want a website or a motorsports marketing program that has more interaction and visibility, we will get a team website that links to your site, an autograph card with your website on the back, you can be on both quarter panels or other multi visible location on the car. That is more opportunity to create traffic at your website. Now you are thinking I need my website to be truly interactive, where people can get information, I know who is coming to my site and I have an e commerce site that people are buying. Again, motorsports marketing is getting people to give demographic information at photo or sampling booths trackside, CPG shows, tradeshows and fairs.

A motorsports marketing program is the same: do you want to invest $10,000.00; I will get you a nicely framed 8x10 autographed by the driver at the end of the season, you can be on the autograph card with your website listed and a thank you letter. Will it drive business to your brand and company, possibly, however just as probably not and there will be no tracking mechanism in place to know if this had any impact. Add a zero and invest $100,000.00 and now we have a fully branded leverageable motorsports team with all the bells and whistles that obtain information about the customers being driven to your brand. Motorsports marketing is no different than any other form of marketing from the standpoint you only get out what you invest. Do you want the conversion opportunities to collect data, have these loyal fans sample your brand or interact with your product? Do you want this interaction at the track, at an outlet partner, tradeshow, or CPG show, all possible with a motorsports marketing program and you get a show stopping vehicle to get them to stop and see what you are all about. A spokesperson creating content interacting with people at all these opportunities, persuading people to purchase your product on the way to these events, all part of motorsports marketing, social media interaction, weekly recaps websites with blogs and clickthrough opportunities. The real question is what do you want to do with your motorsports marketing opportunity.

As a company when you invest in a media marketing package that includes radio, television, streaming, social media, billboards, any type of print or electronic media, do those entities promise a specific number of new customers or product placement? No, they speak of impression, conversions, and reach. Why would you expect anything different from a motorsports marketing program. Motorsports marketing is all the same platforms, the difference is motorsports marketing can put something in the hands of a perspective customer almost every week in a multitude of different situation expanding the reach and impact over any other marketing program.

Here in the upper Midwest, we start racing April 1st and go to November 1st. The opportunities to compete as a pavement oval track team are greater than ever. On a Wisconsin statewide schedule perspective even some of the most economical divisions with a great ROI can compete 15 – 20 events from Mid-April to Late October. Expand this to a regional footprint of Minnesota, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, and Wisconsin: there are twenty-six premium events to for a team, track, or series to brand your company at in this same time period. This does not count the weekly events, that when combined will run into the hundreds of events, just in paved oval stockcar racing. Take the next step to a national grassroot roots motorsports events and thirty – five to forty of the premium level events are contested coast to coast, throughout a calendar year.

Teams, tracks, and series have similar conversations about value and pricing. Multiple times I have had conversations about valuation of teams, tracks, series, and events. Grassroots motorsports teams, tracks, series, and events are seeking sponsorship more than ever. Teams, tracks, series, and event promotors are asking for amounts from $5000.00 to $50,000.00 per event.

Teams, track, series, and events must realize they are a brand, your brand has as much value as you put into it. If as a team, track, series, or event you are not willing to put in the work that equates to the amount of value you deem to have do not expect companies to see the value. How much work are you willing to put into your part-time or full-time job of motorsports marketing? Teams, tracks, series, and events must also realize that company’s want more than a billboard, and a logo on a website or a decal on the side of a racecar and/or trailer. Valuation of teams, tracks, series, and events, when these entities ask about valuation, I ask them what they are doing to create value.

Do you have a current interactive website, with tracking mechanisms in place?

Do you have other current social media account, Twitter, Snapchat, YouTube Channel with tracking mechanisms?

Do you spend FOUR HOURS per week working on these outlets to talk about the companies involved?

Do you collect demographics?

?What non track events are you a apart of?

What non motorsports events are you a part of?

Without these items in place your value to a sponsor is minimal.

Websites with pictures or video of last season and even LAST WEEK, logos with clickthrough link to the sponsors site, clickthrough’s for event naming rights from the schedule, fan voting spaces for different future or historic questions.

Facebook pages for teams, tracks, series or major events with current pictures, current fan interaction. Product endorsements and product use content. These are the items that show the value to potential sponsors.

Who are your followers, attendees and secondary fans, businesses want to know not just that you are pushing their product, they want to know who is absorbing the information.

Are you involved in non-trackside motorsports events, i.e., car shows, promotion of events, etc. What are you doing outside the motorsports world, are you reaching other segments of society by being a part of trade shows, community events where the public can stop and interact.

For teams, tracks, series, and events, many are confusing cost with value. Each of these entities have costs of varied amounts and repetition. Costs have very little to do with value in the end, however they must be taken into consideration of value.

Pricing is more about what you want to invest in your brand.

Valuation is about the work you want to put into your brand.

Contact Motorsports Promotions at [email protected] for more information on how to start your motorsports marketing program.

Thank you

Jim Naumann

Motorsports Promotions

www.motorsportspromotions.com