Episode 266 Snippets: Ishveen Jolly of OpenSponsorship

@njh287; www.dsmsports.net
On episode 266 of the Digital and Social Media Sports Podcast, Neil
chatted with Kyle Payne, Co-Founder and CEO, OpenSponsorship
(two-sided sponsorship platform matching athletes and brands for
deals).
What follows is a collection of snippets from the podcast. To hear the
full interview and more, check out the podcast on all podcast
platforms and at www.dsmsports.net.
Best Of The Digital and
Social Media Sports Podcast
Episode 266: Ishveen Jolly

Ishveen’s career path
“I started in sports back in 2009 when I moved to India and became a sports
agent there doing shirt-front deals and sponsorship deals for cricket teams and
fell in love with sponsorship. I thought what a wonderful form of marketing. Fast
forward I moved to America and realized that there was this opportunity for,
what we called at that time, the Airbnb of sports sponsorship. So somewhere that
brands and rightsholders — that could be athletes, teams, events — could
basically connect. Fast forward another eight years to where we are today and I'd
say it's massively evolved to the point that — the biggest focus is athletes, all of
them, and really the rise of influencer marketing led to that. We have 19,000
athletes on the platform now, maybe 20 by the time this launches and we've done
loads of deals, worked for brands as big as Walmart or JD Sports or FanDuel. It's
been an epic journey to get to where we are.”

“I played a lot of sports growing up. Sports was my absolute passion to
play, more so to watch. So I was a really keen student-athlete. Then I
graduated and I was a management consultant. Back then, I studied at
Oxford and no one was really talking about a career in sports. It just wasn't
even a thing I knew you could do. England is not the best for sports courses
or things like that, so I didn't even know it was an option. Then when I
found out, I was like, ‘Oh, this is interesting. I would love to marry my
passion for sports with my profession.’ So that's kind of what led me to
starting the job.”

“Growing up I wasn't really aware of sports marketing that much. Maybe I was
quite young and I think, as you said, it was less athlete-driven. It was like
Manchester United having lots of sponsors. So when I went to India, I didn't
really know the world of sports marketing, I didn't have any clue what it meant.
And I think what really appealed to me was the idea of, like, money can't buy
experiences. One of my team this weekend was at an event with David Taylor, the
USA wrestler, and we were talking about functional stuff to do with the deal. And
like, kids were going wild, trying to take pictures and get his autographs. And
she's like, ‘He's having a normal conversation while he's signing like 20
autographs’. And I think you can't really replicate that. You might not be a fan as
much or you might not really know who David Taylor is, or you might not be into
wrestling, but it appeals to someone. And when you work in it and you see that
it's pretty powerful to connect your brand with a fan base via someone that they
absolutely adore.”

On the premium value of sports partnerships
“I think it's mostly the legitimacy that it brings, like the validation. You know,
being the official partner of the LA Dodgers — there's something real about
that. You're like, ‘Wow, you've reached the big leagues’ kind of thing, right? I
mean that's why we all, as startups, put logos across our front because we're
all just seeking validation. So I think if you're a product today, whether you're
Walmart or a super small company, having an athlete wear your product, eat
your product, use your product, and being able to talk about that is
legitimacy, being the official partner of your favorite team. So there is this
connection for emotion, but I think you could argue you could do that
without [the partnership], right? You can create an amazing ad and put it out
there, but it's the legitimacy as well that the athlete and the sport brings.

“A great example is Super Bowl ads. There's this company that no one had
heard of called Temu that did a Super Bowl ad this year, and they are now
blasting social media with ads. And now that you've seen them do a Super
Bowl ad, you are probably more receptive to their Facebook ad, their
Instagram ad. If you hadn't seen that, you would be like, ‘What's this
random company I've never heard of?’ So of course it's an expensive one,
but it's just if you just saw that ad on TV — there's something about sports
that makes it a bit more real.”

On the initial thesis of OpenSponsorship and how the company came together
“Sponsorship is a massive industry, of course, but it feels quite often that if
you know it, you spend a lot, and if you don't know it, you're very much on the
outside. And it's such a wonderful form of marketing that it makes sense to
democratize it. Like, every athlete in the Olympics wants to do deals and every
brand would love to do a deal with an Olympian, I'd categorically say, if the
budget was right and the fit was right. But most people don't do deals because
they don't know where to start, how much it costs, what the ROI is, what the
strategy is. There are too many unknowns. So the thesis behind
OpenSponsorship is — similar to Uber or similar to Airbnb, similar to like a
LinkedIn Recruiter, if you can solve for the unknowns through some matching
mechanism, then you can create fits, right?

“There's a brand that wants to pay $100, and there's an athlete who'll take
that $100. There's a brand that wants to pay $50,000, but they need
someone with over a million followers. There's an athlete with over a
million followers, he'll take that money, right? And then there's a case of
like, we'll do the demographics fit, does the personality fit, and all of that.
Dating's a great example. Like, if you can find a husband online, you can
definitely find a sponsor, right? So that was really it, it was taking other
industries and seeing, well, what have they done right? How did they get
assurances? How did they win trust? And putting those into the
sponsorship industry through a platform.”

On the sophistication of sponsorship when OpenSponsorship was starting out and how
it has evolved
“At the beginning, it was a lot about, like, what did they say? Like, are they into
charities? Are they married? And we've got way more sophisticated, especially thanks
to social media. We know their demographics, we can do some social listening on the
athletes. So I'd say loads more [sophisticated]. Like, if you want virality we can show
you data on views. If you want to try and get sales, then you should be looking at click-
through rates and things like that. So even what you look for might depend on your
strategy. So we've definitely got mre evolved over time. And brands are getting more
involved because, as you said, back in the day it'd be like ‘Who does my boss like? My
boss loves golf, let's sponsor a golfer. Then it became a bit like, Alright, well, who uses
my product?’ And now it's like, cool, well, is their audience aligned with my audience
and are their values aligned with my values? So as brands have gotten more
sophisticated, we've definitely had to add in a lot more levels of filters.”

“I'd say because a lot of people come to us having already done influencer marketing or like
alongside that a lot of people are worried about like fake followers and their social media not
being real, and then you're just paying for like, shit. So that's an important one. It happens a
little bit less so with athletes, but still something to be wary of. Then the flip side of that is
actually there are a lot of athletes who don't post a lot on social, right? Their everyday job is not
to make money through social media. A brand doesn't want to work with someone and then
they're like, ‘Oh shit their last post was six months ago.’ Because at the end of the day, the
algorithms are all always changing. Even we don't really know. I was at the NBA Tech Summit
recently and Mark Cuban was literally complaining — there were some senior execs from Meta
on stage and Mark Cuban, and he was like, ‘We wish we knew what your algorithms were doing
because we try and put things out there.’ And then Michael Rubin of Fanatics was also saying
the same thing. So it's quite hard because as a brand I'm literally paying you as an athlete to be a
distribution channel. I'm paying you for content and I'm paying you to be a distribution channel.
So it's a bit annoying if everything changes and suddenly, like, I thought I was going to get tens
of thousands of views and now I got like 50. So there's a lot to think about, and some of it is to
do with the athlete and some of it's to do with just the strategy of the platform as well.”

On OpenSponsorship learning from its data and feeding recommendations back to
brand clients
“So we were always wanting to do the recommendation and we always tried to do it
through tech. Then what we realized recently, probably in the last couple of years,
was…I mean, obviously, with generative AI and all of this stuff, maybe it'll get better,
but ultimately it's really hard to predict through tech what is the best fit for you
because, like — is it funny? Is it serious? It's all about you as a brand. So yeah, in the
last couple of years, we've added services, like our team advising, and we've found that
that's what's needed. Because it's both sides. It's like you might pick the right athlete,
but then what do you get them to do? There's such a big difference between making
them do a Reel or a Story. A story has a click-through link, a Reel doesn't, but a Story
just disappears after 24 hours. So there's a huge level of like, ultimately everyone's
looking for success, some ROI, and a huge part of that is the strategy you take and it
unfortunately can't be like a blanket for all.

“So we've realized in the last bit that brands need some support. And of course, if
athletes are a small part of their strategy — athletes might act very differently from
influencers, so even though they have something for influencers, they might need
something different for athletes. I'd say we've found our home being that advisory.
We're like the matchmaker plus the advisor afterward on how to make it successful.”
“If you want great UGC we have a lot of athletes who are like snowboarders and
they're like outdoorsy guys and hikers and marathon runners, and they do produce
great content. You know, we've seen it even in all the leagues. Like, within the NFL,
DeAndre Hopkins, I love his content. There are loads of people whose content is
funny. Chad Johnson is hilarious in soccer as well. Like, there are athletes who never
post. And then there's quite a few athletes that you're like, your content's great, so
people follow you for your content, but then they become like 5x the cost because
then you're buying the brand name.

“And that's the other thing, like what's the ROI? So when they get great
content creators and they play in the NBA or the NFL, you're paying a lot.
So that's again, like back to your point, you do have to change your mindset
because you might turn around and be like, ‘Oh, but I can get someone for
a million followers who's a mommy blogger for $10,000.’ And it's like,
yeah, but they don't play in the NBA, right? You can also get that with us,
but they're probably like an ultramarathon runner. So I wouldn't say it's
completely different but either the price goes up a lot when they are a
household name and [produce] great content or they're a household name,
probably not great content or they're great content but not a household
name. So it's like, which one do you want to do?”

On activating with a few large influencers/creators vs. a higher quantity of
smaller micro or nano influencers
“It's so hard because I get it. As a brand, you're like, well, if I spent $20k on
this one post, is it going to do anything? But then that goes back to the point
which is, well, don't treat them as an influencer, treat them as an athlete and
then get PR, get amplification, turn that one piece of content into 50 pieces
of content, right? Put that on your website. But, again, it's all strategy. Iit's
definitely a difficult one and that's probably the hardest thing for
marketplaces like ours is you turn around and you think it's enough to be a
matchmaker and it's not. We definitely need to make sure that you're
thinking about amplification strategy, and repurposing content in the best
way. All of that stuff on the back end.”

On the types of athletes on the OpenSponsorship platform
“I'd say for us it's the non-top 5%. So once you hit that top five, you're
talking millions of dollars just to say hello kind of thing, so at that point you
could probably go direct, and you've got a big agency or you've got the
expertise in-house. Below that top 5% is our sweet spot. So, you know, deals
are anywhere from hundreds of thousands of dollars all the way down. And I
would say there's a lot of demand for it. And when it comes to strategy, when
it comes to which one, I really would say it's really up to the brand when
they've got a test budget is like, let's say it's $20k, do you want one big guy? I
would say a lot of people are going for a five times five kind of thing and
trying to get a bit more, hoping that 1 or 2 people work, double down there,
take some learnings and then keep going right after that.”

On how athletes work within the confines of their team while doing their brand
activations
“That's a great question. We actually don't work with the teams closely at all. The
way that we do it is through the agent of the athlete directly, so we kind of leave
everything up to them. So they might be getting the teams to shoot that content
when they do a deal, we're just not really that involved on their side of
production. Again, because the deals are not that big. So of course, if it's a bigger
deal and the brand is paying for production, but a lot of these brands want UGC,
they want homegrown content, so they're not like you must record it on the field.
And mostly you can't do that, right, because there are logos in the background
and, you know, a lot of the brands that we work with, they're not official sponsors.
So yeah, I don't really know how the teams feel about all the non-team endorsed
brands deals that they do.”

On the value of each platform and format and how proportional and consistent it is
“I'd like to say it was really formulaic. I think you can set prices pretty formulaic,
but what the brand is willing to pay is often not as formulaic. Like, I was speaking
to one of our clients today and he was saying when was the last time they posted
and is it good quality? Does it fit with my brand? If it's a steal then fine, but I'm not
going to offer this. So I think there's a lot more brands wanting to make sure it's the
right fit than just like, ‘Oh, this is a good price.’ There is a little bit of that, but not
as much, so it's quite hard. And again, like recently we've heard a lot more people
talking about cost per view. But that's if you want brand awareness because, as you
know, with Reels I'm sure, like we have 16,000 followers on Instagram, and we
have some Reels that will have like 30k views, and that didn't used to happen,
right? Your engagement was a percentage of your following. So do you care about
the virality or do you care about them following [the athlete]? So there's a lot to
think about depending on your strategy.

“I do think for a lot of brands it kind of changes; like they might care about
this, they tick that one off, then they care about this, tick that one off and
then they probably go more lower funnel. So their top-of-funnel awareness
then they're like, alright, convert, then they're like okay we need sales. So
it's a bit of a journey funnel.”

On how important follower count is now
“I don't think [follower counts] matter as much. I think they are still important
because it is it's a signature of your popularity. The followers is how many people
follow you, so that is still important. But if what I'm looking for is for you to do 1
to 3 posts for me, what does it matter about your following? I’m probably more
interested in, one, your content being right for me, the vibe of your content.
Second, I probably look at your sponsored content to see, like, how do you do?
You know, there's a lot of people who are great when it's their own, and then you
put them with a brand and they just don't care. So you want to look at that. And
then third would be what we talked about. the engagement. Ideally it's the
engagement for companies like me, but that's obviously really hard. So it's
probably some sort of engagement on sponsored posts or engagement [in
general].”

On the types of goals and campaigns prevailing or growing nowadays
“Top of funnel still really matters because people, like, as you say vanity metrics,
but they're not, because they're like, how many people viewed your brand? How
many people interacted with your brand? That's really important. So top of funnel
is still very alive and kicking. That's where it works best with influencers and
athletes. As you go bottom funnel, yeah, you can do giveaways, right? Like, you
could drive to a website landing page, sign up for this competition, put in your
email and you might win something, tag some friends, etc.
“Then of course bottom of funnel is literally purchase this product. Put my name in,
this coupon code, my name Olympics whatever 2024 and get 20% off. Right. So as I
said like brands go up and down in different needs. So sometimes it might be more
brand awareness and then sometimes they're like, well, we're really pushing sales.”

On marketing the OpenSponsorship business
“I'd say it's a combination of everything. So we market our athletes and
how great they are. We market how many Olympians we have or like, you
know, Formula One just started. And then we'll market our deals. So you
know here's a deal we did with [F1 driver] Alex Albon. Here's the deal we
did with the USA Soccer team. And then we're also trying to remind you of
tentpole moments. So, you know, Father's Day, Mother's Day. ‘Father's Day
around the corner, are you thinking about using athletes? For back to
school, are you thinking about using athletes?’ So I'd say it's a combination
of lots of different things to hit the brand where they might hear it.”

On one-off deals vs. long-term deals with athletes
“We love long-term. They definitely happen [less often] than the short term, as you
can imagine. There are a lot of people doing short-term as a test, and if it works out,
then they turn it into long-term. So both are very possible. And to be honest, there
are athletes who would never do short-term because they care about their brand
too much or how many partners they have. And then there are lots of athletes who
will definitely do short-term because they love the product and they're like, you
know what? ‘Hey Levi's, I love you, and I'll do a one-off deal because you're a great
brand’, right?
“It's not always black and white because they might do a short-term deal with a
brand they love who frankly wouldn't do a long-term deal as much. And they might
not do a long-term deal for supplements, they might only do a long-term deal
because it's a category that is more long-term in its nature.”

On the growth of influencer marketing and NIL and how that affects demand
and rates for athletes
“It's hard to say if it is going down or up because it's changing so much because
there's so many more dollars coming into influencer marketing, right? It's one
of the fastest-growing marketing channels out there, so you're seeing more
deals, but are they actually going down in value because of college sports? I'm
not sure. I'd say the price has been corrected. So just because you're a college
athlete, if you have 10,000 followers, you're not going to make thousands of
dollars because brands want to support college athletes, right? You're going to
make market value, and that could be quite low. So I think there's a lot of
athletes who've also come in and gone, ‘I'm not really that bothered about
making $100. I'd rather have my social media feed just be mine.’ And t

“So there’s whatever 567,000 college athletes or something. There are not
that many doing deals, and there are not that many brands. So it's hard to
say the impact of college because you could also argue it's grown the
market because it's brought more awareness to athletes. So we have a lot of
brands who come in and they're like, ‘We're interested in college.’ And then
they're like, actually, but we'd also quite like to do pro and retired and
everything else. So there's more eyeballs on the athlete sponsorship market
as a whole. Of course, there's more supply, but I think there's more
awareness as well.”

“As I said, like you're trying to get the brand the best ROI. If they've already
worked with that athlete to try new platforms, it’s quite interesting. But a lot
of our brands are coming to us for a new athlete or they've not really done
athletes. To test out a new platform with a new athlete — like, in marketing
you shouldn't really ever change more than one variable. So if a brand is like
you know what I sell really well on YouTube, [then] don't come to us and
start doing TikTok. Unless you're like, I do well with athletes on YouTube
and now I'm going to do well with those same athletes on TikTok, but then
they're probably not using us because they already have those athletes,
right? So we might pick up an athlete and they're like, ‘Oh, I love this
athlete.’ And then we might say, cool, let's turn this into a longer-term deal
and test their other channels as well.

“I'm not a big fan of like, ‘Hey, LinkedIn just got on loads of athletes, let's
do that.’ Unless the brand says themselves that LinkedIn is a tool we
use…So YouTube is a big avenue for brands to spend. Not many athletes
are there, so that's great. I've never heard any clients say we want to sell
through Threads, so it would not make sense to be on Threads because no
brand is looking to activate on Threads.”

On the growth of women’s sports and athletes on their platform
“100%. For a number of reasons. One, it brings a whole new set of brands
in. Brands focused on selling to women. So that's huge. Second is often
women make really good content. They put a bit more effort in. So that's
kind of cool. And then the third is like there's a little bit of the CSR; like, it's
good to support women — but frankly they produce really great results.
Like, the engagement of the USA [Women’s] Soccer team is amazing.
Again, probably because women probably use social media a bit more,
right? So therefore you're targeting a set of people who use social media
more and engage with it more. For all the reasons, for sure, we do a lot of
deals with our female athletes.”

On what it’s like starting and running a business
“I enjoy it. I think it's about solving problems every day. You turn up to
work not knowing, and these could be small problems and they can be
huge problems. So you have to be resilient. My traits are quite good for
running a company. I enjoy it. But obviously it's very hard…I started the
company because I was very passionate about our mission. I keep doing it
because I'm still passionate about the mission, but I can handle what
running a company throws. I think there are many people who give up, not
because they lose the passion for the mission, but it's just very hard to get it
done.”

Ishveen’s most memorable game from her competitive, athletic career
“I was captain of our cricket team at Keble [College] at Oxford and a big
part of cricket is getting 11 people to turn up on a Sunday morning. So one,
the feat was to try and get 11 girls to show up on a Sunday morning after
big Saturday nights out, and we managed that, which was epic because, you
know, it was just fun to make sure everyone comes together. Then the
second was that the quality was all over the place. I won't go into too many
details, but it was just a really fun game and people just getting involved,
even though they hadn't probably played before, and then some people
who were great. So it was my first ever time being captain of the women's
cricket team. It was definitely memorable.”

The first deal ever booked through open sponsorship and also the most
memorable one
“I don't remember the first deal, so I'll go with one of my first memorable
ones was a deal between Glassdoor and Draymond Green. I think that was
like the first time we did a bigger athlete deal, it performed really well for
them, and it was just really fun to say we worked with Draymond Green.”

The most important lesson Ishveen has learned so far in her time as an
entrepreneur
“I would say keep upskilling. And try and be patient. Entrepreneurs
naturally are quite impatient people. That's why we start businesses and we
want to get shit going. But to run a company, there has to be a balance of
who you are, plus working with everyone around you. So whether it's
clients, whether it's team, whether it's investors, be patient. Not everyone
goes at your pace. Then the flipside of that is to be resilient, probably
because you have to be patient with everyone.”

The number one tip Ishveen would give to brands using OpenSponsorship
“I'd say today if they have the budget, I would be using our full-service
team. I think having the strategy is the number one game changer behind
working with athletes. I think too many people try and just do it alone and
you need the help.”

The most memorable sporting event Ishveen has ever attended
“Gosh, there's been a lot. Given the American audience, I'd say Super Bowl,
but which one? Obviously a [big part of the] Super Bowl is the halftime
show, so I got to see that year that Shakira and J-Lo and Pitbull performed,
and that was amazing.”

The athlete whose brand building or social media presence most impresses
Ishveen and why
“Well, I think DeAndre Hopkins, as I said earlier. He's funny, individualist,
and interesting. I like funny people. I think it's great.”

Ishveen’s favorite insight about the greater athlete and or social media
marketing space that has come from her time working on OpenSponsorship
“I think being authentic. Like, I think it's really hard to fake something. So,
like we talked about being funny; if you're not funny and then you do a
couple of posts being funny and then you just stop it's a bit weird. So if you
are great at training videos, just do training videos, especially when you
think about how your fans will follow you for the right reason and brands
will work with you for the right reason. So whoever you are — if you love
hanging out with your kids, post about it if you like. Whoever you are,
ideally should come across on social media because then it will be easy for
you to keep it up.”

The best meal to get in New York and
where to get it. And also what is the
must-have meal in the UK?
“I love this restaurant in the Hell's
Kitchen called Pio Pio. It’s a Peruvian
place. So go there and there's like a
chicken and a rice fish dish that's
amazing. So that would be my New York
one. And then in the UK, I'd say if you
can go up north and have fish and chips
with gravy, it's the best.”

The most prominent sport whose athletes are crushing it on
OpenSponsorship that may surprise us
“A lot of the martial arts or fighting sports. So, like, we do well with WWE
or former WWE [athletes]. We did a deal recently with Ric Flair. And,
again, like, they're actors, right? They're natural content creators. That's
what they did. UFC is inexpensive, very loyal following; again, like they
kind of perform. So those are definitely doing really well. And then outdoor
like hunting, fishing, hiking, all of these like outdoorsy sports; again,
natural content creators, universal, a loyal following, that kind of thing.”

From a global perspective, the sport whose stock Ishveen would most want
to invest in today
“I think tennis could get stronger. I think it relies too much on the Grand
Slams and if they figure it out — I think it's loved, but people [only] watch
the Grand Slams. So yeah, assuming that stuff happens I think tennis.”

Ishveen’s Social Media All-Star to Follow
“Well, I probably would have to give an ode to my own team that have been
working really hard on our social. We recently picked up a new content
creator who has their own channel, but they're doing a lot with us, and we're
trying to make a lot of our content very educational, so we'd love for people to
check it out and give us feedback because I think, as a company, it's always
really hard to balance. Like, obviously we sell a product, but you kind of want
your social media to be interesting and educational and cool and not just
about your product. So I'm going to say my own team for their hard work.”
(They’re @OpenSponsorship on all platforms; check out their Instagram in
particular

@njh287; www.dsmsports.net
Thanks again to Ishveen for being so generous with her time to share
her knowledge, experience, and expertise with me!
For more content and episodes, subscribe to the podcast, follow me
on LinkedIn and on Twitter @njh287, and visit www.dsmsports.net.

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