NFL CMO Tim Ellis today touted the NFL’s collaborative approach to business endeavors and his efforts to modernize marketing league-wide during the opening session of SBJ’s virtual InterSport Brand Innovation Summit. Ellis told SBJ’s Ben Fischer that people might think of NFL CMO as a “fantasy job … and it is.” However, “the things I didn’t quite understand about the NFL have been surprising.” One of those is the “level of camaraderie and teamwork” among players, teams, the league and other stakeholders. Ellis: “Of course, this past year, we’ve really had to pull together.”
On balancing his time consulting and advising NFL clubs, versus league-level marketing:
Ellis: When I first came on board … I put in a club marketing function, which really is one of the better decisions I’ve made. We’ve not only been able to inspire and enable the teams -- and of course, they’ve helped us be smarter with our decisions -- but I’ve also been able to help the team CMOs, presidents and owners build strong, modern organizations.
On the NFL's current "It Takes All Of Us" brand campaign:
Ellis: It's all about using the scale and power of the NFL to unite the country. At the end of last year, we hit and all-time high with our fan base of 187 million people. So, it was really our goal to do everything in our power during this very challenging period to serve as a cultural guiding light and a uniting force.
On consumer mindset during the pandemic:
Ellis: We’re in a world of never-seen-befores. … The vast majority of our fans feel that this is the most important election of their lifetimes. No surprise: Cable news is up. And because of the pandemic (other leagues) all playing at once, which is something we haven’t seen before.
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On making the best of the pandemic:
Ellis: From a marketing perspective, let’s not look at this as how to survive. Let's look at this as how we can actually come out of this stronger. How can we build our brand during this period?
On whether the NFL can count on continued demand for its content:
Ellis: Be careful about that because we've seen how fast people will switch their behaviors and move away. In fact, that's one of the things that we talk about a lot. We talk amongst the 32 teams in our league about, "Hey, let's not take this for granted that this all is just going to come back."
On using social activation when in-person experiences are hard to come by:
Ellis: We didn't have an influencer program two years ago. Now we have a thousand influencers and all of those influencers have massive social footprints, big audiences in their own right. … We have been working with players diligently, bringing them inside to teach best practices in social media so they can build up their own brand footprints.
