I ANALYSED MARCO ODERMATT AND HIS SOCIAL MEDIA STRATEGY SO YOU CAN IMPROVE YOUR BRAND IMAGE

To be the best you have to learn from the best. Marco Odermatt is the face of Swiss and international ski. This alpine skier does a lot of things right on the mountain: in giant slalom, super-G and downhill.

But he does a lot of things right off the mountain too: in personal branding, sponsorship showcase, and community engagement.

This document is an analysis of some of the strategies and tools Marco and his team use to leverage his image in a financially sustainable career. The Tools are:

1. The Consistent Celebration Shot
2. The Connection Shots
3. The Season Balance Shots

The Consistent Celebration Shot

Marco is a consistent guy: he wins a lot. This means he lifts a lot of trophies in front of the camera. This means newspapers publish a lot of photos of him, which sponsors of course appreciate a lot.

This is obvious, but there are other less obvious things that are consistent in his social media strategy:

• His skis are usually on the shot.
• His Redbull hat is usually on the shot.
• His smile is usually on the shot.

You will tell me: of course Nico, it must be in the contract or something, any athlete does that.

But if you look closely in his instagram profile, what he does and you don’t as an elite athlete is that he does it EVERY SINGLE RACE.

This can build so much trust to a prospect sponsor you are trying to bring in your team. Companies like reliability, and if they can’t have a proof that you can be consistent, it won’t be in your favor.

One thing is to SAY to the sponsor you will do it every time.

One thing is to SHOW you are doing it every time.

Of course it doesn’t have to be a post: it can be a story, an email, an update on your website. My point is your regularity is as important (an maybe more) than your rank at the competition, the quality of the photo or total engagement with your fans.

Showing consistency in your social media vitrine, in your branding, is one of the most impactful and comforting thing you can do when looking for sponsors.

The Connection Shots

When you have so many sponsors like Marco Odermatt, it can be hard to follow track. Marco has 26 partners, so how does he showcase al of them ?

Of course he doesn’t tag 26 people on every image. You can’t have a good retention over 3-5 usually.

The first type of connection he makes is practical (and logical). He connects his brands to his equipments. In the following image he shares different sponsors and links them to different objects of the image.

The Redbull cans are inside the bag, the stoeckli skis brand are in his hand, etc.

As you can see he links 3 brands, and give context with 2. It’s not “too much”. Fans remember posts like this better than if you bombard them with 26 sponsors on each post!

Another piece of advice. Sometimes you want the sponsor to feel special, you want to dedicate a full post to them, without tagging other people. This is important for their reposts, or if they want to do a collaboration as well.

But it’s also symbolical: “you are special to me”.

The Season Balance Shots

You don’t want your instagram profile or website to feel like a billboard. Fans are going to get annoyed, brands are not going to feel special, you will lose the attention of your audience.

If you don’t want to look like a hockey player but still have to post more during the season, here is a trick Marco uses: he balances posts according to the period in the year.

In-season = business as usual

Off-season = more personal posts, less sponsors and ski photos

You can balance offseason with more personal messages, emotional content, lifestyle shots. Don’t do only relaxing shots, but find a good balance, maybe share one off-training behind the scenes for example.

It’s okay to have less sport-related content when you don’t have competition. It can also be new opportunities or ways to showcase your sponsors.

For example Marco shows his watch in two different situations on the pictures above:

in-season = it’s time to shine, time to win some trophies, look at my watch when I’m celebrating

off-season = it’s time to slow down, time to recover, look at the good time I am having in this jacuzzi.

You got the idea, find balance in your content to keep your audience entertained, and embrace the different parts of your season.

Sources

Wikipedia – Marco

Redbull – Marco

IOC – Marco

Personal website and his partners

Credit

As for the other images in this article, credit to the instagram account of Marco Odermatt.