Brands that fail to market sincerely to the LGBT community are missing out on serious growth opportunities, according to panelists yesterday at the '14 CSE Sports Marketing Symposium. The panel, which focused on the LGBT community as one of “Ideas That Move Us Forward” discussions at the conference, was moderated by espnW's Kate Fagan and included NYU sports management professor Robert Boland, You Can Play co-Founder Patrick Burke, WNBA Fever G Layshia Clarendon, Marriott Int'l Senior Dir of Segment Marketing Kristine Friend and WNBA VP/Marketing Hilary Shaev. “I think there’s three ways brands can (interact with the LGBT community),” said Shaev. “One is do nothing, two is market to, and the third and the best would be to engage with.” Friend said she takes this point of view when forming Marriott’s Love Travels campaign. She said, “When you can kind of get at the core of what the sense of belonging means to somebody, regardless of who they are, I think you can really engage and that person just aspires to be a part of your brand, be part of what you’re doing.” The panelists cited the Love Travels campaign, the WNBA’s Pride initiative and Nike’s social media success with its Be True campaign as successful examples what can be accomplished by properly engaging with the community. Burke said “The only reason left why you would not be diving in head-first is because you don’t get it and you’re not paying attention to what’s going on. There’s no risk involved. Any metric will show you that. There’s billions of dollars being left on the table by (the marketing) industry.” Boland added, “There will be people who will be left on the sideline because they don’t think they need to be there. It never hurts to push the envelope.”
SEX DOESN'T SELL? The panel also discussed a change in the way that women, both straight and gay, are portrayed as representatives of brands and organizations. According to Shaev, the traditional notion of selling the sex appeal of an attractive female athlete is in decline. She said “Sex sells sex. It doesn’t sell tickets to sporting events. What becomes sexy is authenticity. It’s about athletes portraying themselves on the court as exactly who they are.” When asked about the broad attention given to gay male athletes like Michael Sam and Jason Collins, Clarendon spoke of how the lack of coverage for lesbian athletes hurts the community. “It speaks to the assumption that if you’re an athlete and you’re a woman, you’re a lesbian, because you would never play sports because you like them,” she said. “We have to give (gay women) the same publicity. We have to make it just as big of a deal.”
