NASCAR’s Extensive Research To Shape New Marketing, Communications Approach For Sport

NASCAR met with the Sprint Cup Series drivers and owners this week to brief them on the results of an extensive research study that examined nearly every area of the sport.

After 48 focus groups, 110 hours of fan interviews and 223 interviews with industry players – including some members of the media – conducted by seven different research companies, NASCAR believes it now has a complete picture of how the sport is viewed.

The question now is: What does NASCAR plan to do with the information? The sanctioning body’s five-year plan for action will help shape the sport’s future.

Some of those answers lie below.

The research was focused in five main areas:

Though NASCAR was told it could have achieved similar results with half the amount of research, executives insisted on making sure every possible geographical and demographic group was covered to provide the clearest picture possible. And NASCAR asked that nothing be glossed over – officials wanted the complete information, warts and all.

Here are some of NASCAR’s findings, and a few preliminary ideas for what NASCAR plans to do about them.

Communications: A new approach

NASCAR learned that its public relations efforts at the track were solid, and the media covering the events equated its level of professionalism to the NFL. The sport has been made “easy to cover” for reporters.

On the downside, NASCAR PR had been built to be reactive and defensive. And teams also felt the sanctioning body wasn’t helping their PR efforts enough while at the track.

As a solution, NASCAR created its new Integrated Marketing Communications department, which will handle every facet of both marketing and public relations for the sport. Among the changes, Brett Jewkes was named head of the IMC department while former communications chief Ramsey Poston left the company.

Next Generation Fan Study: Finding NASCAR’s new group of fans

NASCAR commissioned a study to examine ways to help find a new group of fans while emphasizing it won’t do anything to “pull against” its existing core fan. While the current group of fans remains a priority, the sanctioning body needs to expand its fan base to make sure the sport continues to grow, and there are three areas to do that: Youth; 18-34 year-olds and multicultural groups.

NASCAR learned that for non-fans, there was a huge “education gap” when it came to learning about the sport. New fans felt lost at first and needed to get up to speed on how NASCAR worked.

Other highlights of NASCAR’s preliminary plan:

Youth – There will be a NASCAR youth web site developed; NASCAR will expand its education platform into schools using the STEM program (Science/Technology/Engineering/Math); the sanctioning body will push to be included in more movies, TV shows and music (the success of Cars has helped get young people interested in racing); and there will likely be a NASCAR presence in youth racing.

18-34 age group – NASCAR will highlight driver personalities because “we’re not doing as much as we should in helping tell this story;” there will be a greater outreach to entertainment media to be included in TV/film/music; and NASCAR will lean on its incoming action sports starts like Ricky Carmichael and Travis Pastrana to help get the message to their fans.

Multicultural group –The research showed groups such as Hispanics might be willing to try NASCAR, but are waiting for an invitation and don’t feel welcome. NASCAR will develop a dedicated, consistent outreach to minority communities, create more Spanish-language content about the sport and more support for the Drive For Diversity program. In an era when the country is trending toward single-parent families, studies showed that Hispanics, for example, do more things as a community/family than other demographic groups. NASCAR would like them to bring the whole family to the races.

Digital and Social Media

Guess what? The studies showed NASCAR fans mirror the general population in social media savvy and expect to see content in those channels. So the good news is NASCAR recognizes that; the bad news is NASCAR has, by its own admission, underinvested in digital/social media strategy and personnel.

NASCAR is still looking for someone to head this unit and develop a plan, but the sanctioning body already has one idea: To make it easier for fans at the track to use their mobile devices.

Any time there are 100,000 people trying to all get content on their phones at the same time, there’s going to be a delay. So NASCAR is going to work with the tracks to help solve that issue because it realizes handheld technology is “a great way for someone to enhance the race experience.”

Event engagement

Studies showed that while tailgating/community, patriotism and the speed of the cars are some of the highlights of the attending a NASCAR race, its venues lack some of the more modern amenities that stick-and-ball sports stadiums/arenas have.

NASCAR acknowledged it’s “a gap we need to try and close” and pledged to work with tracks to upgrade the facilities.

In addition, NASCAR wants to make its venues more accessible to first-time fans. For example: Posting more signage about the best places to park, distributing information on what to see and do before the race starts and even what to wear to a race.

And, in a true biggie, NASCAR says it will “work with the industry to lower barriers – real or perceived – relevant to driver interaction” with fans. NASCAR knows the sport’s success has much to do with its drivers’ accessibility, and it says “we need to make sure tracks, drivers and teams understand that.”

Star power

The last of the studies concerned what makes fans like certain drivers and what spurs the connection with fans: Personality. NASCAR realizes it must connect the personality element to a casual fan to get them more engaged.

NASCAR also said the studies showed that “at times there seems to be a fan perception that the drivers are over-scripted.” So the sanctioning body will lead efforts to work on loosening up the drivers and make them less robotic while broadening driver appeal overall.

In addition, NASCAR feels there’s a need to develop the regional touring series drivers into household names before they even get to Trucks or Nationwide. That way, fans will already have connected with the lower-level talent and be able to follow their careers up the ladder.

NASCAR also wants to amplify driver stories more than ever before and used the example of NBC’s Olympic broadcasts, where virtually anonymous athletes suddenly become famous thanks to their stories being told.

And this isn’t about the top five or six superstars, officials said, but rather a “broader swath” of drivers.

Conclusion

NASCAR says it’s still going to take lots of time to sort through the findings – officials said the above information is just the tip of the iceberg of all the data that’s there – and come up with a clearer action plan on how to take the sport forward.

But what you just read is the beginnings of an action plan that, over time, NASCAR believes will lead to better things for drivers, teams, sponsors and the sport as a whole.