KANSAS CITY, Mo.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Speedway Motorsports, Inc. (SMI) (NYSE:TRK) has selected Sporting Innovations, a Kansas City-based sports technology company, to redefine and enhance the fan experience across its enterprise, including eight motorsports venues around the United States, which host some of the world’s largest events including NASCAR, INDYCAR, and NHRA race weekends.
SMI’s diverse portfolio of facilities provides the challenge of taking full advantage of each venue’s strengths in terms of events, market and audience while also maximizing the benefits of informational scale afforded in operating eight such venues across the country.
To address its challenges, Sporting Innovations will implement its FAN360 platform for SMI. FAN360 is a sports operating system that will centralize and consolidate all fan touch points and data systems across the SMI enterprise to provide a more comprehensive understanding of fans’ interests and behaviors, resulting in more tactful sales, marketing, and operations. Sporting Innovations and its FAN360 platform have been globally recognized for successfully redefining the fan experience for Sporting Kansas City fans and at its “living lab,” Sporting Park.
“What really attracted us to Sporting Innovations, and what we feel sets them apart from other providers was they were not just a vendor, but the company was born out of the need to grow a sports organization. The Sporting KC success story speaks volumes to the effectiveness of the Sporting Innovations platform,” said Mike Burch, senior vice president of national sales and marketing for Speedway Motorsports, Inc. “As we got to know the team, we really saw how our vision and values aligned, and we’re excited to not only be using their platform but also working with them in shaping its evolution.”
SMI will utilize three key components of the FAN360 platform that work in conjunction with one another. The FAN360 Core serves as the epicenter of all fan data. It integrates current systems including ticketing, point of sale, social media, mobile, and more into a single profile for each fan.
The information collected by FAN360 becomes usable in FAN360 Dimension, a suite of business tools that enables data visualization, fan insights, and sales and marketing outreach. Dimension provides more accurate and efficient ways to analyze various data sets and provides actionable insights to SMI based on fans’ individual demographics, behaviors, preferences, affinities, and more for true relationship management.
The third component is Uphoria, the mobile experience for fans that delivers personalized communications, offers, content, and other features designed to enrich the fan experience. This component will be rolled out to fans next year.
Fans using Uphoria will ultimately reap the benefits by receiving messaging, offers, and content that is specifically tailored to their individual tastes, including how and when they receive these communications. For instance, fans will receive up-to-the-minute event weekend schedules, facility maps, driver and celebrity appearance information, traffic and weather updates, and real-time offers and opportunities which can be customized as events unfold.
“During an event weekend, our speedways are full of fans, each with a variety of allegiances – different drivers, different sponsors, different manufacturers, different bands, different foods,” said Burch. “As we learn more about where a fan’s passions lies, we can provide them customized information based on what they are interested in. We can also use those interests and responses to determine what other types of experiences and entertainment they would prefer. Our challenge isn’t as much providing something for everyone, but more about letting them know when and where that thing they love is happening.”
“We couldn’t be more excited to work with SMI, our first partner in motorsports. The leadership at SMI has a tremendous vision for enhancing the fan experience, and its investment to build engaged and sustainable fan bases,” said Asim Pasha, co-founder and co-CEO of Sporting Innovations. “Together, we will continue to build a long-term technology strategy that will position SMI speedways as the best places to experience a live racing event.”
With competition only increasing among how consumers spend their leisure time and money, SMI is looking to technology to build their audiences and improve their experiences. SMI speedways will use the aggregation of data to improve sales and marketing initiatives and become smarter about how they approach each fan. Additionally, Uphoria will provide opportunities to incorporate more sophisticated and effective sponsorship opportunities from a mobile perspective.
Partnering with Sporting Innovations is a key piece of an overall fan engagement transformation for SMI. Implementing FAN360 complements other tactics including an information consolidation across all eight speedways, continued facility improvement, more events, connectivity improvements, and aligning the appropriate resources to achieve its goals.
About Speedway Motorsports Inc.
Speedway Motorsports is a leading marketer and promoter of motorsports entertainment in the United States. The Company, through its subsidiaries, owns and operates the following premier facilities: Atlanta Motor Speedway, Bristol Motor Speedway, Charlotte Motor Speedway, Kentucky Speedway, Las Vegas Motor Speedway, New Hampshire Motor Speedway, Sonoma Raceway and Texas Motor Speedway. The Company provides souvenir merchandising services through its SMI Properties subsidiary; manufactures and distributes smaller-scale, modified racing cars and parts through its U.S. Legend Cars International subsidiary; and produces and broadcasts syndicated motorsports programming to radio stations nationwide through its Performance Racing Network subsidiary. For more information, visit the Company's website at www.speedwaymotorsports.com.
About Sporting Innovations
Sporting Innovations is a sports technology company that designs software solutions and provides strategic services specifically for the sports industry. Its FAN360 platform transforms how leagues, teams, and brands utilize data and technology to enhance the fan experience and grow revenues. Founded in 2011 by sports and technology veterans, Sporting Innovations has won numerous awards for product design, including the prestigious Product Innovation Award by TheStadiumBusiness. Headquartered in downtown Kansas City, Mo., learn more at www.sportinginnovations.com or on Twitter @SportingInnov.
