Ad Age : How do you go about building the
individual brands of drivers?
Mr. Phelps: One key is that we're not just
going to be focused on the stars of today but on those emerging
stars even outside of the three national series. We're going back
to the local level and identifying young talent. We'll start with
kids that are 15 or 16 in developmental series. We'll identify who
has the best talent and who has real charisma.
Ad Age : How far along is the process?
Mr. Phelps: We're in Round Two, where we are
doing the profiles and brand mappings for 120 drivers. We hired two
new people to take this on, and we'll talk to the team, sponsors
and drivers to determine the best approach to have each driver
break through. Certain drivers are media-savvy and like the lens,
so to speak. Others, candidly, don't. So we won't ask a guy who
doesn't want to be on TV to go on Fox to promote the Daytona 500.
We may instead get him involved in a hunting and fishing blog, if
that 's his passion.
Ad Age : How will your digital and social
strategy shift going forward?
Mr. Phelps: We are hiring someone new, and a
big part of the job will be training an entire industry -- from
driver reps to driver teams to our own internal teams -- on
social.
On the digital side, we've had a relationship with Turner since
2001, where they operate Nascar.com. That relationship has served
our industry very well. That said, our agreement goes through 2014,
and we will probably go in a different direction after that . Not
because Turner has done anything wrong, but because in the future
it will be important for us to control our own message and content.
They have allowed us to take portions of their rights back. For
example, all the Twitter feeds that we do come from our internal
team and are not run by Turner people anymore.
Ad Age : How are you improving the event
experience?
Mr. Phelps: We wanted to get a sense for how a
Nascar race stacked up against other sports. So we [anonymously]
sent families of four or four college buddies to a Nascar race, an
NFL game, the circus or a concert. [A third party] asked what they
liked about each one, which provided very rich data. What came out
of it was, for a new fan, if they're not with someone who has been
to a race before, they don't know how to be a fan. Where do I park?
Where's my seat? We had guys come in button-down shirts and khakis,
not realizing this is a big party. We'll use all of this to make
changes.
Ad Age : How are you reaching a new,
multicultural audience, specifically Hispanics?
Mr. Phelps: We've done some small things. At
three of our race tracks we did heavy up-spending in those markets
buying media. We had a virtual garage tour in Spanish. The Nascar
website can be viewed in Spanish, as well, but that 's basically
just a translation. Looking ahead, we're in discussions with a
Spanish-language outlet to create digital content for us, and we
hope to have meaningful content live in 2013.