Why the NFL hired a fashion editor—and other moves from its social media playbook

The NFL is enhancing its social media and influencer marketing strategies as it looks to create more fans all over the globe. The work includes the appointment of stylist Kyle Smith as the league’s first-ever fashion editor, a move to create more content featuring players’ personal lives and families, and dispatching a small army of creators to Green Bay, Wisconsin, to cover this week’s NFL Draft. The NFL is preparing for seven international games in 2025, including its first-ever contests in the cities of Dublin, Madrid and Berlin, so developing international fandom is top priority of the league’s social media marketing teams, said Ian Trombetta, the NFL’s senior VP of social, influencer/creator and content marketing. Fashion, Trombetta said, is one of the most effective platforms to connect with new fans. The NFL is also seeking a VP of global influencer marketing whose remit is to connect with youth culture through talent marketing partnerships. Eddie Capobianco, who formerly held that role, departed in February. Below, more from Trombetta on Smith’s hiring, which occurred last fall, and other ways the league is bolstering its social media marketing. This interview was edited for length and clarity. Explain what a fashion editor does at the NFL. Kyle Smith is our first-ever fashion editor here. It was born out of this real interest that we saw emerging with our fans related to our player fashion. We’ve been showcasing that more and more across our social channels, but also editorially and across many of our other partners. At the Super Bowl, we hosted a red carpet. Kyle was a part of it with Tubi and Olivia Culpo and others. With Tubi having exclusive digital rights to the Super Bowl, it was a really great way for us to continue to expand that storytelling and celebrate the players and the fans that are coming in from all walks of life. That’s one example, and there are many others, of how we can enrich player storytelling, not only on a domestic basis, but as we go international. Where the game is a little less familiar, fashion is one of the ways that we’re going to talk to fans and showcase the players so fans have a bit of an understanding of players’ personalities and what drives their style. And we’re really excited about the potential there, with things like Paris Fashion Week and other big fashion shows. When we really dig into fashion, the storytelling is really rooted with the players, first and foremost, but now also with wives and girlfriends. You’re seeing the Kristin Juszczyks and many others branch off, which is phenomenal. It’s another way for us to engage new fans, especially women. [Also read: Super Bowl 2025—how brands showed up on social media] How did Kyle come to you? He had built a small Instagram account after working in a different capacity with the NFL Network. My social team started to notice what he was posting around the NFL players and fashion. As it grew, it became evident that he was developing these relationships with players and actually taking them shopping, shutting down big luxury stores and having these personal shopping experiences together with the players. And as that started to unfold, we realized that we had an opportunity to create an entirely new position focused on this editorial component. He’s been fundamental in helping us elevate some of the storytelling on what we’re doing with fashion. And I think that’s highlighted by what you probably saw last year with Justin Jefferson and Joe Burrow at Paris Fashion Week, where [Burrow] wore the backless suit that made headlines all over the world. Vogue even had a reference to NFL players taking over Paris Fashion Week, and that’s editorial that you just can’t buy. So we’re looking for ways in which we can continue that level of storytelling with folks like Kyle that go through all levels of fashion. It’s not just the high end. It goes down into what we’re doing on the merch collab front, urban street wear and the like. How do you know that social media marketing works? One way is to look anecdotally, right? And the anecdotes are matching the data. All of us in our personal lives are seeing the impact of social media. If you’ve got kids or deal with folks in that 13-to-24-year-old age range, you understand where they’re spending their time. When you zoom out from that and you understand what the data is telling you, it shows the power and the influence of platforms like YouTube and TikTok and Instagram. For us, we see it as a key vehicle to enhance the things that we’re doing and the storytelling around the game. And it’s really key off in the off-season, because we can get into more of the personalities. And when you look at the continued rise and growth of our fan base all over the world, and even here in the U.S., it really comes down to the fans caring and understanding more about the players. And we’re able to showcase that at scale through social media because all the players have social media. In this Draft, you’re going to see the top 10 picks—I would say all of them get an A+ in their social media strategy. Travis Hunter has got three things on his mind: football, fishing, and his podcast and social media. It’s really interesting to see this level of sophistication now, of guys coming in from the college ranks and really having a good understanding of how they’re crafting their brands through social media and using it as a tool to build themselves and the things they are doing with partners. Older, more established veterans now are also seeing the benefits of [social media] as they’re looking for things like broadcast careers in the future. We just came out of the broadcast workshop in L.A. and a lot of what we talked about was, before you actually get on air, how you start developing those skills of being comfortable in front of the camera, of storytelling, of all the different things that you need to do to kind of build your brand and build your personality online and on TV. Increasingly, those worlds are merging together. How has social media marketing evolved for the NFL? Our fans love the game highlights, but I think increasingly they’re loving the access and the off-the-field stuff. So as you look at our programming mix, it’s leaning increasingly in the direction where it’s much more about access and understanding who the players are, even getting into some of their personal lives and their families. Isaac Rochell and his wife Allison are a good example. He is a fantastic guy and obviously a great player, but he’s bounced around. You would probably call him a journeyman, but he built a really strong brand online through TikTok primarily. And he and his wife now have become creators, and they’ve driven a lot of success that way. So I think the storytelling is not for just the star quarterbacks and the star receiver anymore. If you think about the two biggest guys in media today, it’s Jason Kelce, a center, the least glamorous position there is, probably; and a less glamorous or less talked-about position—a punter, Pat McAfee. You’ve also got guys who utilized social media to build a part of their media empires. Peyton Manning and Eli Manning understand this, and Deion Sanders certainly understands it. Is it okay for the players to be doing their own thing online? We just got off a few calls today with different players who are looking for insight on social strategy and how they can continue to build their brands and even their businesses through social media. The education we try to provide is the positive outlets of social media and ways in which they can stay on the right track. Clearly, if you’re going to start stepping into things that are divisive or potentially pitting different communities against each other, that’s not something we’re likely going to be very supportive of. And that’s probably not going to be the best long-term strategy, depending on what it is you’re looking to do. I remember five or six years ago, when we had guys who were jumping into the comments a lot more frequently, and going at fans who were going at them, but at the end of the day, what are you accomplishing by doing this? We try to back players out of that keep it as positive as possible. We reported on how the NFL used creators at the Super Bowl. Is that something we can expect to continue? We’re still working through plans, but creators will be front and center this year. We’re expanding our creator programs with YouTube, as well as with Snapchat, and we’ll have YouTube and Snapchat creators at the Draft. We think there’s just going to be all kinds of storytelling opportunities in a place like Green Bay that’s so approachable, and I think the fans are going to be excited to engage with them. Beyond that, as we think about the growth of the game internationally, creators are going to continue to play a really big role for us in all the markets, whether that’s in Spain for the first time, or Brazil, or in Dublin for the first time. We’ll have a range of creators and influencers as a part of that. [Look back: How the NFL is using creators to attract a more global Super Bowl audience] Tell me about the VP of global influencer marketing position you are looking to fill. There’s been a tremendous amount of interest in it. We’ve had applicants from virtually every company you could imagine, in the tech spaces and the entertainment spaces and beyond. So we’ve got a great pool of candidates that we’re working through, and hope to have this person in place by early summer. We’re going to take our time, filling with the right person. The role is really about connecting with youth culture through talent marketing. It’s working with top talent, everyone from the Kendrick Lamars all the way down to the up-and-coming YouTube or TikTok or Instagram stars that are emerging. We’ve got to work with different creators and influencers and celebrities in ways that are probably a little different than a normal brand. We’re coming in with a proposition that’s much more about the shared value that we can offer together, versus writing the biggest check. There are some companies that have a gigantic budget that can basically sign whoever they want. From our perspective, it’s much more about the relationship and hopefully developing something over the long term that works with our clubs as well as with the league, over many different marketing beats and different initiatives throughout a year or hopefully multiple years.

Why the NFL hired a fashion editor—and other moves from its social media playbook

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