by Dan Leary, USTA director of marketing and communications

Tucson, AZ — Adapting to the New Racing Media was the topic of this year’s Mark Kaufman Workshop, presented by the Turf Publicists of America at the 2012 Global Symposium on Racing and Gaming hosted by the University of Arizona’s Race Track Industry Program.

Moderated by outgoing TPA President and Monmouth Park VP Bill Knauf, the panel included America’s Best Racing Sr. Manager Digital Media Penelope Miller, Paulick Report Publisher Ray Paulick and long-time, former USA Today racing writer and current National Turf Writers Association President Tom Pedulla.

The panel addressed the challenges to the racing industry in adapting to the sweeping and rapid changes in the shift from traditional media to new media, including how to deal with empty racetrack press boxes, major media unfamiliar with racing who charge ahead with front-page stories, the demise of professional racing writers, and, most importantly, how to use emerging technology to promote horse racing in this environment.

America’s Best Racing’s Senior Manager Digital Media Penelope Miller’s presentation, New Media and Horse Racing: Growing the popularity of the nation’s oldest sport through the use of emerging technology provided a comprehensive plan on utilizing different social media platforms.

Miller began her integration of social media and horse racing at Tampa Bay Downs, where she initiated Facebook and Twitter accounts, incorporated photos and video, and created the first-ever Groupon deal for a racetrack.

Since joining the NTRA and America’s Best Racing in August 2011, where she manages ABR’s website, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Flickr, Pinterest and Instagram accounts, their Facebook followers have increased by 70 percent and Twitter followers 90 percent.

Miller provided specific advice on the benefits and best methods to utilize different social media platforms. She noted that Facebook has nearly a billion users with more than half of them being in the desirable 18-34 age demographic and suggested it is best utilized for publicizing promotions and big events as well as providing behind-the-scenes images and videos. Miller suggested that Facebook can be used to interact with fans via polls, contests and trivia and is an excellent vehicle for providing exceptional customer service through one-on-one interaction.

“Video is a great way to get your message to as many people as possible and is extremely compatible with mobile devices,” explained Miller on the advantages of using YouTube. “It provides an opportunity to share videos of past races and upcoming events.”

Miller cited several examples of how horse racing created national and international trends in 2012 and emphasized that it is crucial to take advantage of trends.

“It’s vital to take advantage of trends in order to inform the public about events and horses,” said Miller. “Use tweets (Twitter) with trending words and phrases, and include a link to a story or photo on your site to drive traffic there. The goal is to be retweeted. It is important to become the authority on the trend.”

Miller suggested including a hashtag that applies to a trend in tweets because it is helpful to new and casual fans while also providing the ability to analyze metrics later, which can be done through sites like HashTracking.com.

She explained that the use of social media should be a three-pronged approach, to hype the event beforehand, to give instant updates during the event, and to provide a comprehensive visual recap following the event.

Miller added that the racing industry needs to continue to take advantage of emerging social media like Pinterest and Instagram, platforms that utilize photos, in order to “capture a new audience and develop new fans.”

In summary, Miller emphasized the most important aspects in moving forward with social media:

• Remember your audience: Your approach to Facebook should be different to your approach to Pinterest, Twitter, etc.
• Are you talking to new or established fans? Make sure that your social media outreach appeals to everyone.
• Be social! Answer fans’ questions, comments, grievances, etc. to provide the best customer service possible
  

The Paulick Report’s founder, Ray Paulick, is a former newspaper man with the Rockford (Ill.) Register Star, Chicago Sun-Times, Chicago Daily News, Daily Racing Form and Racing Times, who also worked for the Thoroughbred Times and Blood-Horse, where he was editor for 15 years. He made the transition to the internet with his Paulick Report 4-1/2 years ago.

The Paulick Report focuses on providing unique content. While the site aggregates stories from many other sources, including press releases, it concentrates on investigative stories, commentary and the lighter side with entertaining stories as well. Paulick stressed the importance of providing comments and responding to them on the site because “it’s always important to communicate with our readers.”

Paulick talked about the 24/7 news cycle.

“We have never ending deadlines and report whenever the news happens,” said Paulick as he told a story about interrupting his Thanksgiving dinner to post a story. “The office is everywhere and we’re constantly connected.”

He finished with some words of wisdom for racing publicists:

• Don’t ever send out press releases on Thanksgiving or on Friday at 5 p.m.
• Do send photos
• Don’t just send attachments, put the text in the body of the e-mail or at least a description of what’s in the attachment
• Do get to know editors because it’s important to build relationships with them
• Do know who your contact is at media outlets
• Pitch specific stories to specific publications

Pedulla, who is a contributor to the America’s Best Racing website and the New York Times, described his difficult transition from being a member of the traditional media to earning a living as a freelance journalist after his “separation from service” the week of this year’s Belmont Stakes from USA Today, where he covered every Triple Crown race since 1998.

He explained that one of the biggest changes is that writers have to be faster with the news for the internet and acknowledged that for racing, we “have to have a balance (between traditional and new media)…and need solid editorial content.”

But he cautioned that with the explosion of bloggers and other social media platforms available to everyone, there is a “need to be out there with accurate information that people can count on.”

After a successful career in the traditional media, Pedulla has some major concerns with the changes he sees.

“Social media, I worry about where it’s taking us,” said Pedulla. “I hate to tell you how many inaccuracies there are out there. Many times there is no editor, a line of defense that protected me from making mistakes. Also troubling is that (with tweets and texts) we are mangling the language.”

Finally, he warned about the dangers of and the need to be responsible with social media.

“We have prominent athletes whose reputations are being hurt by social media.”