With no football on this weekend, us sports fans had to find something to do. There were some great college basketball games on, but my team (Missouri) is brutal this year and as much as I love college basketball, sometimes it pains me to watch when my team is down.
This also happened to be a weekend where most of my family was out of town and I had a lot of downtime to fill. I did the usual searching around my cable system to see what was on and then I flipped through the various apps.
What I landed on was very out of character for me – NASCAR Full Speed on Netflix. I am not a NASCAR guy, never really have been. Maybe I will catch a few laps of the Daytona 500 if I happen upon it, but never have I sought out any sort of NASCAR programming.
That might soon change.
I love documentary style shows and I had read several people offer very positive takes on another Netflix racing show, Formula 1: Drive to Survive, which I kept meaning to check out, but each time I would start to, I realized I didn’t know one single thing about F1 racing. For some reason, maybe out of complete boredom, I hit ‘play’ on the NASCAR show to just see if it could hold my interest.
About four hours later, 235 minutes to be exact, I had taken in the entire five episode series, found myself looking up information on several of the drivers and even went to look at the NASCAR schedule. After watching Full Speed, there is a pretty good chance I will be in front of my television from green flag to checkered flag on February 18 when the Daytona 500 airs on FOX.
The series was really well done, but I am not here to write a review on it, I would simply suggest you check it out. It covers what happens in the sport, the drivers, their teams and their personal lives. Drivers Denny Hamlin, Ryan Blaney, Bubba Wallace, William Byron and a few others are prominently featured. Plus, Dale Earnhardt Jr. is an Executive Producer who sees plenty of screentime and you also get plenty of 23XI Racing team owner Michael Jordan as an added bonus.
While watching the show, I couldn’t help think about how this all translates to our industry. NASCAR has had a lot of the same audience for years. It picked up a little steam there for a bit in the early 2000s but seems to have come back down from that high. So, how does it attract new people?
Isn’t that a question we are always seeking the answer to? Whether you host a radio show, run a television station, host a podcast, do a YouTube show or produce any sort of content, you are always looking to grow. So, how do you do it?
One of the answers lies in what I experienced this weekend – some form of alternative content that draws people in. It wasn’t that I didn’t like NASCAR, I just didn’t have any connection to it. I didn’t race go-karts as a youngster, don’t know anybody that did. And as far as racers were concerned, my knowledge as a kid ended at Richard Petty and Dale Earnhardt.
Now, however, I feel a bit of a connection to NASCAR, and it isn’t simply because of Ryan Blaney’s fiancee Gianna Tulio. Five episodes of content and I learned a ton about the sport, the playoff system (which is very new to me) and how the teams operate. Now, I have a bit of a connection with the drivers and know their backgrounds.
The Netflix show brings you in to the driver’s lives and lets you know who they are as people. This is no different than what Hard Knocks on HBO does. I’ve also seen this first-hand. My wife is a somewhat interested sports fan, but her fandom is usually limited to the local teams. However, this year she very much had an interest in the success of the Miami Dolphins and it was 100% due to her watching Hard Knocks with me. Before the show she might’ve been able to tell you who Tua Tagovailoa was, but this year, late in the season, she’s asking me about the health status of Dolphin’s backup linebacker Andrew Van Ginkel.
This is such a lesson to hosts of any kind. Your listeners and viewers want a connection with you. For the most part, it is why they stay and keep tuning in. And yes, you can pick up more of an audience due to word of mouth from current people who tune in and you can promote your show on social media. In order to really grow, however, you need a constant supply of new people.
One great way is to provide alternate content on an alternate platform. For example, if you are a sports radio talk show host, how else are you engaging with your audience and more importantly with people who may not already be tuning in? YouTube is a great way to create new content and maybe it is something you do that focuses on a subject you enjoy the most but can’t spend too much time on your radio show talking about it.
Another way to do it might be social videos on X or Instagram. Give people a look in to your personal life, your family, what you do away from sports. The goal here is twofold. One, your current audience gets a chance to see you in a different way away from the airwaves. Two, this content can drive people who see a glimpse of your personality and think they would like to check out where they can get more.
That is exactly how NASCAR got me. I didn’t watch a race and feel like the sport was one I would all of sudden love to watch. I saw a glimpse of the life, the pageantry of race day, the teamwork and all that goes in to the racing side, plus learned about some personalities I think I would enjoy following.
I don’t know if I’ll become a big NASCAR fan, but I can promise you the likelihood of me tuning in to a race is significantly greater than it was just a few days ago.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________
The Best Thing I Heard This Week
It helps to have friends in high places. One day after the Kansas City Chiefs knocked off the Baltimore Ravens to clinch a birth in Super Bowl LVIII, Chiefs head coach Andy Reid was on with Brian Mitchell and JP Finlay on 106.7 The Fan in Washington D.C.
Mitchell played under Reid in Philadelphia for three seasons. Not only did Reid talk about the game and the upcoming Super Bowl, he also said Mitchell was one of the best return men in the history of the league and that he should be in the Hall of Fame.
Click here to listen to Andy Reid with BMitch & Finlay.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________
In Case You Missed It
Our team at Barrett Sports Media works hard each day to bring you stories and information that are meaningful in our industry. We realize everyone is busy and you can’t always consume all of the content offered to you. So, I have decided to start a section each week highlighting one piece you may want to go back and check out if you missed it.
This week I chose Derek Futterman’s piece on ESPN’s Laura Rutledge. Learn about her background in pageants and ballet and how they helped her in her TV career. Rutledge, who hosts both NFL Live and SEC Nation for ESPN, said this to Derek, which is a great reminder to any young broadasters out there:
“I learned a lot, I think, in those early days, but I think the keys to getting more opportunities at ESPN was showing that I didn’t care what it was going to be that they were going to ask me to do,” Rutledge said. “I was going to find a way to do it and hopefully perform at a high and acceptable level.”
Click here to read the whole article.
Dave Greene is the Chief Media Officer for Barrett Media. His background includes over 25 years in media and content creation. A former sports talk host and play-by-play broadcaster, Dave transitioned to station and sales management, co-founded and created a monthly sports publication and led an ownership group as the operating partner. He has managed stations and sales teams for Townsquare Media, Cumulus Media and Audacy. Upon leaving broadcast media he co-founded Podcast Heat, a sports and entertainment podcasting network specializing in pro wrestling nostalgia. To interact, find him on Twitter @mr_podcasting. You can also reach him by email at Dave@BarrettMedia.com.
