A Quick R2 Chat With NYRA’s Dan Silver

In a recent blog post about social media, marketer Seth Godin said we should lead with our glass jaw.

“If you’re in a low trust industry (like car sales), a social media presence dramatically increases the opportunity people have to call you out, beat you up, tattle on you and flame you in public.”

Come again?

Seth thinks this does you some good, because by doing it you build trust.

Dan Silver, NYRA’s Director of Communications and Media Relations seems to agree. NYRA, under his direction, along with NYRA Director of Marketing Neema Ghazi, has embarked upon an ambitious social media and web campaign to gain trust and hopefully improve NYRA’s business. In a recent chat with us he highlighted some of the things they are doing, and the thinking behind them.

“Every possible new media is being looked at” he said. “We have a very large email database, and keeping fans informed with email has been the norm. Now we use our database for other things like Facebook and the Serling chats.”

NYRA’s Facebook page has well over 3500 fans and Dan and the team use Facebook for events, news and feedback.  Sometimes that feedback is of the glass jaw kind, but that does not seem to stop NYRA.

“We get negative feedback but we try to answer those questions and criticisms. We do not run away from them”, says Silver.

Dan seems to think, like most in racing, that Twitter and Facebook’s value lies in handicapping information, and informative real time use.

“The Andy Serling twitter page has been a success.We also have the Andy Serling Friday night chat. The first night we had almost 500 fans log in to answer questions. The Breeders Cup chat was also well attended.”

Maybe they are brothers?

NYRA has also started a blog with behind the scenes information from their tracks. It is not your everyday corporate blog, because the team knows that is not the right approach. They try and make it fun and engaging, like the separated at birth photos they run with famous NYRA regulars and their long lost lookalikes.

As we know as web marketers, often times companies have grand ideas, but do not put forth a vision, devote the people needed, or the money needed to give things a chance. As well, often times management is not behind anything new unless it shows immediate tangible ROI.  NYRA does not seem to fall into that trap. To promote the chats, facebook pages and other web-centric ideas NYRA is spending money; namely on banner ads via various industry websites. In terms of a 2.0 workforce, there is a team behind the effort. It is not a one or two person show.

“We have plenty of people to work the mediums”, he said, “and we are fortunate that we have Charlie [Hayward] and Hal [Handel] behind us on this. They are supportive and know growth will not happen overnight.”

One important area that Silver believes they might have to improve on is web metrics. Data mining and tracking customers through funnels is vital and he thinks more time needs to spent on this to learn what is working.

It seems NYRA is on the right track with their web marketing. One of the most, if not the most difficult part of doing this for racing, is that gaining fans sometimes does not mean an increase in revenue. For all of us who follow the sport, and these efforts, that is the elephant in the room. Bettors are what drives that revenue and converting them from fans to players is paramount. For that Silver seems to lack worry, as he believes that trying to grow the grassroots (and giving them an avenue to join racing as a player like they do on their marketing properties with links to NYRA’s ADW for example) can pay for itself in the long run.  But he is fully aware that the long term goal is gaining revenue and market share.

Time will tell if NYRA’s plan will work, or only a be a minor part of NYRA’s ongoing marketing efforts. However, for an industry which is almost always reticent to try something new it should be welcomed by most.