Delancy Bennett, Clemson University
Abstract
It is often stated that one of the hardest parts of working in the sports and entertainment industry is merely gaining entry to the industry. To this end, the goal of this article is to provide insight for students and scholars of the critical success factors for entering and excelling in this highly competitive industry. A panel of industry executives from MLB’s Tampa Bay Rays, NBA TV, and CLEAR (a secure identity company) were interviewed for this Industry Connections article. These executives share their insights on breaking into the industry and the challenges of their current positions.
Industry Expert Panelists
| Nicole Eppig, Sports Partnership Coordinator, CLEAR | Josh Muirhead, Director of Season Ticket Services, Tampa Bay Rays | Morgan Mitchell, Social Media Assistant Manager, NBA TV |
Delancy Bennett: Can you tell us about your role with your organization
Nicole Eppig (CLEAR):
I work for CLEAR, a biometric identity company. Our whole vision is to power a more secure and frictionless world. We are an opt-in only service that empowers you to use your biometrics; your face, your fingerprints, whatever it may be, to help you move around easier. This may be in the airport, trying to get through security or at a sports stadium to get into the game and buying concessions. I have nine team partnerships that I work with. I make sure that all of our marketing assets are being optimized and that operations on the ground are running smoothly.
Morgann Mitchel (NBA TV):
NBA TV was part of Turner Sports that was just bought by AT&T. So now, we’re Warner Media News and Sports. I help run all of NBA TV’s social media. So anything you see on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, that is what I’m working on, making sure that we align it all. Making sure that everything that’s going on the NBA TV network is aligned with the storylines in the NBA that people actually hear about.
Josh Muirhead (Rays):
I’m Josh Muirhead. I’m the director of season ticket services for the Tampa Bay Rays. I’m on the retention side, so as someone becomes a season ticket holder, they get turned over to my team. We’re getting to know them, growing that relationship in hopes of growing the business. There’s also a lot of benefit execution in what we do, so when you buy a season ticket, it’s not just a ticket and a seat for 81 games. There are special events and gifts and touchpoints, and my team is putting that on as well.
Delancy Bennett: Can you tell us how you each got started in sports marketing?
Nicole Eppig (CLEAR):
My career started with a professor introducing me to a contact at the Orioles for a school project. It wasn’t to get a job, but we kept in touch, and then he ended up saying, “Oh, by the way, we have some internships open. If you’re interested, I can pass your information along.” And that was how that happened. Once you get a foot in the door, you learn how small the sports industry really is. Really once you’re in somewhere and meeting all the people in the organization, it becomes a “you never know who someone might know” type of thing. Also, not being afraid to reach out to someone way before you need a job is essential. When I was talking to the gentleman at the Orioles, it was for a school project, and then it ended up turning into something else. But I didn’t just reach out to him just because I wanted a job. The biggest thing for me was being willing to do anything and everything and go anywhere. I started off interning with the Baltimore Orioles for one summer in the partnerships department as a summer internship. From there, I was connected with someone at the Rays as a postgraduate intern. And then, I kind of bopped around Dallas. I was actually working for the College Football Playoffs in their marketing and partnerships department, and that led me to my full-time job here. I think just being willing to make those jumps wherever and just literally be a sponge and soak up as much as I could in every single position is what got me to the place that I am today. Also, no matter what time of year it is, no matter whether you’re a junior, senior, sophomore, whatever, it never hurts to reach out to someone to say, “Hey I just want to learn about what you do and kind of get to know you a little bit better.” That can lead to something in the future. I’m excited to continue on that path. I feel like I’m still learning and growing so much every day, so it’s a cool opportunity.
Josh Muirhead (Rays):
For me, it was internships and just determination. This is something I want to do, and I understand the sacrifice, long hours, low pay, I’m just going to do it. I just kept grinding and sticking with it. I actually, coming out of college, got verbally hired by the Florida Marlins right about the time that they came out of nowhere For me, it was internships and just determination. This is something I want to do, and I understand the sacrifice, long hours, low pay, I’m just going to do it. I just kept grinding and sticking with it. I actually, coming out of college, got verbally hired by the Florida Marlins right about the time that they came out of nowhere and won the World Series. The Bartman year with the Cubs! And so all this time, I’m not hearing from them. All right, they’re not focused on bringing me in yet. They’re in the playoffs, and then a couple of weeks go by, and I haven’t heard anything, and they’re celebrating, they’re decompressing. And then, I finally get H.R. on the phone. They were like, “Oh, right, Josh, we’re putting that position on hold right now. Something might open up in May. You should reapply.” And so, I was kind of back to square one. It was devastating at the time. I was delivering pizzas at home and found another internship with the PGA tournament, and then parlayed that to a similar role with the Devil Rays at the time. When I got to the Rays, they were selling out of the phone book. Not to date myself, but literally selling out of the phone book. But I just kind of stuck with it. So one lesson from this story is to make sure you have an agreement on your employment before you go start picking out housing and all that (laughs).
Delancy Bennett: Was there any class or any class project that prepared you for work in the field?
Josh Muirhead (Rays):
I remember Branding Principles really standing out for me at the time and something that sort of opened my eyes a little bit, made me think big picture as far as like, what are we as marketers doing? What’s the point of all this? And it all ties back to that, whether it’s sales, customer service, marketing. So that really stuck with me, and I took that into my roles in the professional world. Just having that perspective. I’m not just sitting here grinding, selling season tickets. There’s a bigger picture to this, and basically, everything I do is about how am I improving my company’s brand. There’s a lot of situations where you’re working with other departments, and they may have something that they want to do that sort of grinds against what you want to do. But taking perspective, you can see it’s just working together to make sure you’re doing what’s best for the organization, doing what’s best for the brand. So that lesson really stuck with me.
Nicole Eppig (CLEAR):
I think for me it was probably in the sports marketing strategy class, where you actually run a golf tournament in the spring. I think that helped me get poised to for a team and understand and how that all comes together and how brands can use sports as a channel to their goals. It is another part of a brand marketing strategy. Sports fits into their overall marketing piece. That class and all the internships are where the fire for sports was ignited for me. Besides the golf tournament, we also did smaller things in that class. We did sponsor recaps that helped us understand how to put together an event like that and incorporate sponsors. So going into the internship where this wasn’t just class, that’s actually what the job was, I just had a lot more confidence because these were things that I’d seen before, I’d done before, and so I knew how to execute them well in practice.
Morgann Mitchel (NBA TV):
My stuff is different because when I was in college, social media was like a thing, but it wasn’t a big thing, right? At that time, sports properties were not heavily leveraging social media. We only had one account for my university, I think it was a Facebook page. For my work, it was more about learning how to work with people. My psychology class was really important for me. What you have to realize as a young professional is that you’ll be managing up and working with bosses who are different than you are. You’re not going to start off with a team of people that you’re managing, but you need to know how to manage up and figure out what people want. And as soon as you figure out what they want, then they can put you in a better position to get to what you actually want. So my psychology class was beneficial in allowing me to learn about how to communicate with different people.
Delancy Bennett: What advice would you give to students regarding their resumes and interviewing?
Morgann Mitchel (NBA TV):
I like to see a resume that has a lot of sports things on it. I’m not looking to see that they know everything about my sport, but when I see a lot of work in the field, I know that they’re trying to get into the industry. I know that it is hard to always work with the team or sport that you want to work with, but students need to get exI like to see a resume that has a lot of sports things on it. I’m not looking to see that they know everything about my sport, but when I see a lot of work in the field, I know that they’re trying to get into the industry. I know that it is hard to always work with the team or sport that you want to work with, but students need to get experience somewhere. Here at Clemson, with so many sports, it doesn’t matter what it is, work with a team to gain experience. If you can’t get on with football, that’s fine, but get into something. Women’s basketball, baseball, whatever. Because then, when we see your resume, we can say, “Oh, you really want to get into sports, you’ve been trying.” Also, I know for a lot of us, we don’t see all those resumes until you get past a certain point with H.R. You have to understand that H.R. has keywords that they’re looking for that match each position, so don’t have the same resume for every position. Each position is different. Look for what they’re asking for in the qualifications. I know it’s annoying to change your resume all the time but put that stuff, the right keywords, in there.
Nicole Eppig (CLEAR):
I think it was my ability to give examples of everything I did and show full-picture I think the ability to give examples and show full-picture stories of things that you’ve done is really powerful. Maybe if something’s not on your resume, you might want to bring that into the interview to show another kind of experience that you had, whether it’s volunteering or something like that. Just indicating, “here are all the things I did, and here are the key transferable skills.”
Josh Muirhead (Rays):
I think you just heard a number of different philosophies from how people look at resumes and cover letters. The difficult part is there’s no silver bullet as to how to do this, right? Everyone’s different. I’m looking at some totally different things than some of these guys mentioned, but that’s just how it goes. I think the one universal thing is grammar, your punctuation, your structure, don’t make any errors on it. That’s the first thing I see. What is their attention to detail? Not good if they misspell a word. So have people look at it. Proofread it a million times. Get help. Because you don’t want to eliminate yourself before you even started. For interviews, I would say being able to bring that energy to the phone call. It might be at 8:30 a.m. But there’s nothing more frustrating than when I’m asking questions, and I’m getting maybe one- or two-word responses, or just, it’s kind of dull. Get me excited about you. So bringing energy and being prepared, put some time into it. If you really want this, that’s just a really good sign of how bad you wanted this, how much you put into it. So your resume should be on point because you put a lot of work on it, and your interview should be on point because you thought about it, and you rehearsed, and you went, and you did some research on the organization’s website, all that stuff. Show that you put in the effort.
Delancy Bennett: Teams don’t always have a winning season, what strategies do you employ to sell tickets when the team isn’t winning.
Josh Muirhead (Rays):
I’ll take that one. I think the main thing is by asking questions. So there’s a best practice sales process training. There’s a lot of training that happens when you’re in a sales role. But to answer your question, it’s asking the right questions. What is this customer about? Why are you a season ticket holder? Why did you decide to make this purchase? Or if you’re not ready to buy yet, why are you taking my phone call? Why are you allowing this conversation to continue? There must be some interest level. So it’s really just clean slate, asking right questions, and finding out who they’re about. And then, when you find out what their needs are, we have products and processes that can meet your needs. And so there’s a lot of different angles I can take with season tickets, depending on if you’re a Fred Fanatic or a Sammy Successful or that type of thing. So I’ve got to find out who you are and what you’re interested in and then I’m going to you about this and why this is a good fit for you. Yeah, and it sounds cliché, but you don’t want to sell them wins because you can’t control that. You want to sell the experience of coming out with your kids or with your dad or mom. That’s stuff you can sell, you can not control wins, you can sell bringing your company out for a cool team outing and have some hot dogs and beer at a game. Stuff that you can sell, that’s what you want to try to sell, because that’s repeatable whether you’re the best or the worst team in the league.
Delancy Bennett: Sports and entertainment, at least starting off, pays less than other fields. There are long hours and long seasons. For you, why is it worth it?
Morgann Mitchel (NBA TV):
I didn’t know what I really wanted to do. I played volleyball for my university, and I really liked watching T.V., and I knew I liked going to sporting events and stuff. So I made a list and started marking stuff off, stuff on my list that I thought I could do. I got my real estate license. I tried volleyball coaching. And then, I was like, why don’t I try sports? So I started freelancing. I did an internship at Vegas Summer League, where I had to wear boy’s basketball shorts (laughs). Hello! But you have to be really humble for whatever position in whatever industry you want to be in, just to meet people. That’s the reason why I’m at Turner now because, from that internship, I met the Turner social media team. They let me run Snapchat for them. I did a good job. Then a position came open. I was already in Atlanta, already freelancing for Turner, and it turned into full-time. People want to come in and have a full-time job as soon as they graduate, but a lot of times in sports, you start off freelancing, or you start off doing other things, and then it turns into something better. So just don’t be afraid to do that. My friends did not love their jobs out of school, right? They were trying to pay off student loans, so they got whatever they could, and they weren’t happy, and they had aggressive weekends to try to deal with their weeks. I didn’t want to do that. So find something that you actually like and then you figure it out from there.
Sport & Entertainment Review 