Zach Soskin on How Athletes Can Build Their Brands with Content
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Zach Soskin is the Co-founder of Voltage Management, an athlete and brand marketing agency specializing in athlete representation, brand strategy, content creation, and ownership. Zach started his career in grassroots football marketing at adidas before starting Voltage Management. Brian and Zach chat about why athletes can build such powerful personal brands, how athletes can develop their content strategy to achieve their goals, and best practices for brands that want to work with athletes.
Follow Zach on Twitter and Instagram
Full Transcript:
Brian Bosche: (00:03)
Hey, everyone. Welcome to High Tea Hoops. This is Brian. Bosche and today I am super excited to bring on Zach Soskin, the co-founder of voltage management. We're gonna talk all about athlete branding, Zach, welcome to the podcast.
Zach Soskin: (00:15)
Appreciate you having me on excited to connect with you.
Brian Bosche: (00:18)
Yeah, definitely. I think you followed me on Twitter and then I immediately asked you to come on the podcast, cuz I loved your background. This is the fastest turnaround time from connection to pod I've ever had. So thanks for coming on. Hey,
Zach Soskin: (00:29)
I liked, Hey, that's the name of the game in this world? Gotta act quickly. I love it. So now be here. Appreciate
Brian Bosche: (00:33)
It. Yeah, Twitter just, it happens in the DMS. Uh, so it's absolutely,
Zach Soskin: (00:38)
I, I, I joke that I do, you know, I, Twitter is the real LinkedIn kind of thing for me.
Brian Bosche: (00:42)
Yeah. I, I would say LinkedIn, you get almost 0% responses on messages and Twitter. It's almost a hundred percent, um, if you follow each other. So, so absolutely. Um, but I didn't give you much of an intro there. So do you want to go a little bit into your professional background for the listeners?
Zach Soskin: (00:56)
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Um, my name's Zach Soskin. I, uh, so I started my, I guess, so, um, grew up in Minneapolis, wanted to work in sports. My whole life kind of was singularly focused on that knew I wasn't athletic at a young age. So like from like sixth, from like sixth grade on, I was like, all right, I can play high school sports and that's it. Um, so kind of figured out what I wanted to do and, and, you know, did my research at university of Oregon's a good spot to go to for sports marketing. Um, so went out to U of O um, intern for the football team there. Um, and it's kind of, it's funny now, as far as it relates to content production, um, one of the big things while I was there is they let us take over the Oregon grid, iron social media channels. And you know, they be, by the time we were done there, um, they were the most followed in college football. But when we started, like our first viral tweet was like a blurry iPhone, two photo. Yeah. And it's like, like, wow, I can't believe that was, you know, I guess actually
Brian Bosche: (01:51)
Early on that authentic content.
Zach Soskin: (01:54)
Yeah. No it's cyclical, right? Yeah. Cause we went from iPhone photos to super well produced and now everyone's back to iPhone stuff. Yeah. I love everything's, you know, it's always like that. Um, it's a lot, my time there, um, went and worked at Adidas after that. Um, because the social background, um, so it was the manager of Adidas football and baseball social for
Brian Bosche: (02:14)
How'd like, get you, instead of Nike is like Adidas, like sneak onto campus and be like all, if you want go to the dark side,
Zach Soskin: (02:20)
Everyone always says that it's funny, but you know, Adidas is right in Portland. I know they well. So there's they north American. Exactly.
Brian Bosche: (02:27)
It's the north American headquarters there, right? Yeah.
Zach Soskin: (02:28)
Yeah. Now they're, they're big on calling it it's the co world headquarters that their whole big got it. Got. But yes. Got it. The north American headquarters for the most part, but um, yeah, so I actually had a, a friend couple friends that were at Adidas at the time. One of 'em was again in Nick, Adam who actually was, he hired me at Oregon football. And um, I worked, you know, like when I said we took over the social media was Nick was one of the guys that I did it with or one of the people I did it with the other one was, uh, CASBY Peterson. She's still there. She's not Cay. Uh, Noyer, she's, it's funny how it all goes there. But, um, so we I'll never forget it. I wasn't really thinking I was gonna go on the brand side of things. Mm-hmm um, was looking more on the agency, uh, side world, but I got a call. It was a Friday at 10:00 PM from Nick, Adam and Christian Larson. And, and Christian was like, Hey, I got promoted six months ago. They can't find anyone to take my job. Um, you're gonna take it. I was like, great, sounds good.
Brian Bosche: (03:21)
It's a good recruiting method. Like,
Zach Soskin: (03:23)
You know, and because the truth is at that time, that's really probably the only job that I would've gone to Adidas for. Cause I really wanted to be in football and I liked social. Right. So it's um, loved it learned a lot from Christian and Jeremy Darlow were two, the smartest, you know, brand it's like a, I, I joke, but I, you know, I got a small salary to get my MBA, right. So I got to learn a ton from them. Um, and then went over and did grassroots partnerships for three years. That's again, common theme for me, got to learn under a lot of really smart people guy named Shannon Ferra who, um, was like under armors 12th employee. Um, so learned a ton about, uh, partnerships, relationships did a lot of things. We were really proud of there, um, live streamed high school football games on Twitter for the first time built up seven on seven circuit.
Zach Soskin: (04:07)
Um, anything that was building relationships, these top young athletes. Um, and then at the same time I'm realizing, oh wow, these young athletes are moving more cleats than our NFL players. Right. So kind of saw their writing on the wall that, Hey, this, this ni L thing is coming and they really deserve it. Right. It's needed. Um, I'm super, again, I'm a people person first and I had interned at an NFL agency while I was in college and it kind of always had my eye potentially getting back to that side of things, like I said, and, um, was like, you know what? I want to, you know, I joke loved what I was doing at Adidas, but they were gonna do 20 billion with, or without me. Yeah. Um, so I was like, all right, lemme go,
Brian Bosche: (04:42)
Oh Zach, you had a bigger impact than that. Don't sell yourself.
Zach Soskin: (04:45)
I mean, look the truth of the process
Brian Bosche: (04:47)
20.1.
Zach Soskin: (04:47)
Yeah, exactly. Right now we made great inroads. So I will say this, we crushed it in grassroots football. Right. We, we went from basically third to first in high school football at the time, but the entire American football market is
Brian Bosche: (05:00)
American football. Okay. That's what you're sorry about just for my London audience, my UK audience, American
Zach Soskin: (05:04)
Football. Got it. Yes. That's why it's not big business. Cause it's American football where we only play it here pretty much. Um, you know, the entire American football market is 1% of the running market. So it just, doesn't just doesn't move the needle in the same way. Yeah. Yeah. Um, but no loved it built up a ton of great relationships, learned a lot went, you know, wouldn't change anything there. Um, but got an opportunity to start voltage, um, partnered with Steve Clarks, who is a, you know, he is known as a famous quarterback coach, but he is really like just a brilliant marketer who happened to, you know, quarterback coaching was his platform. Um, but he really invented that entire industry. Um, and got, you know, we fortunate enough to get investment from, uh, one of his old clients, um, and really built it out from there.
Zach Soskin: (05:44)
And, and again, preparing for ni L before ni L was a thing. Um, and just knowing that this was coming, we wanted to make sure that when it did come, we were gonna be super well prepared for it. We were already connecting with brands and helping them create their strategy, helping educate athletes. Um, and frankly, because it was so the wildest, like trying to help shape exactly what some of the rules or, or, you know, regulations would be. Um, so lot of that, and then as, you know, as it relates to this, that's the content production business kind of came not ne you know, by accident almost I'd say, yeah. Um, I had leaded some different shoots while at Adidas, um, like was fortunate to even help kind of direct some commercials for just like the, you know, the 10 seconds of American football that was on there got to be the, the football expert.
Zach Soskin: (06:30)
Um, and then a ton of social content, all these different, you know, campaigns, videos, all sorts of things there. And so when you're starting voltage, you know, wanted to still, you know, it's such an important part of controlling an athlete's narrative and the, their brand mm-hmm , um, is that content. So I always knew we wanted to do that for our clients, um, but pitched an idea of panini America for road to their rated rookie, which, you know, turns out was something similar that they'd already wanted to do had some great, you know, creatives that I could work with. Um, and we started to build this out and then COVID happens and the world shuts down. And ironically, that became the biggest thing for us as a production company, because you couldn't, nobody could fly anywhere. So you couldn't just hire your LA based creatives and fly them across the country to go where people needed creatives in every city in the country. And I've been fortunate to build up a great network with a ton of young, hungry, talented creatives across the country. A lot of kids at college programs, pro teams, freelancers. Um, so it kind of became a thing that, Hey, you gave us a budget in 24 to 48 hours. We could have somebody there. Yeah. Um, so it's been a lot of fun building that out.
Brian Bosche: (07:38)
Well, I was gonna ask with COVID it, you know, sports shut down. So kind of the sports industry overall, at least from a games and event standpoint went down, but I would think for like brand building, that might be a good time for athletes to reflect. So was that actually a nice timing for you cuz you started it before the pandemic. Yeah. And then it's like, oh I can't play. So let's build the brand
Zach Soskin: (07:57)
Exactly well it's it was kind of nice because look, unfortunately it was a great time for brand building, not a great time for brand monetization. So because there couldn't be as much focus on oh I'm, you know, cause if you think about economy slows down sports sponsorship or individual athlete, sponsorships and paid posts kind of relatively early to go for a little bit. Um, so it forced people to not just focus on the direct monetization or the, I should say the short term monetization. Yeah. That's my big thing. I think just
Brian Bosche: (08:29)
Take any deal that comes in
Zach Soskin: (08:31)
Exactly. People talk about athlete marketing and what they're really doing is athlete sales, right? There's not having that long term vision for building the brand. And um, one of the things that we do and so everyone that I've, uh, worked with and that we've hired on comes from the brand side of things, whether that's working directly for a brand or an agency that service brands, and we do the same type of intake for athletes that we would do. If we were, you know, doing a new brand direction or launching a new, um, product at a brand, you have a very clear and concise brand plan and like a kind of thesis, you know, I always tell athletes, and this is it's funny. The first time I got this advice was for a job interview. So it actually applies for like anyone's personal brand, not just athletes, but it's basically, Hey, like people are only gonna remember you by a sentence.
Zach Soskin: (09:17)
One sentence is all you get. So decide what you want that sentence to be and make sure your actions, you know, work towards that. So for interviews, it's like your, your question, your answers, but for an athlete, it's your social post, it's your brand partners, it's your, how do you wanna be known and how can you reflect that in your content and in your brand partners? So, um, we're big on, Hey look, it's the deals we say no to are just as important as the deals we say yes to. Um, and I think that's the thing that athletes too often get, you know, there, there truly is a negative of doing bad, um, brand fit deals. Like if you want to be in fashion, like, look, I love stuff Curry. He ain't gonna be walking in, in Paris fashion week anytime soon because he is the express guy. Yeah. And look, no problem of getting your bag, but it's just about knowing what's that individual athlete's aspirations. And I don't think stuff is someone who ever aspired to walk in Paris fashion. That's fine. But if you do, you gotta be cognizant of, Hey, I might need to take this short term hit because I'm working towards this long term goal that I really believe in. Um, but
Brian Bosche: (10:19)
It's so entertaining Zach, when, like I remember Isaiah Thomas, when the Sacramento Kings was taking like local pizza shop commercial deals and there's so much fun to find on YouTube. So you're taking away entertaining content for the masses. But yeah, that, that does make a lot of sense.
Zach Soskin: (10:32)
Well, no, we try to create more entertaining content for
Brian Bosche: (10:35)
The masses, with the actual aligned brand partners,
Zach Soskin: (10:37)
Instead of doing the local te pizza shop and letting their, so one of the things that's been fun is when we go to these local businesses or companies and they say, Hey, look, here's what we can make for you for not much money. Right? Like this isn't like the, like the funniest one, like some of these car dealerships they're paying
Brian Bosche: (10:54)
Way amazing.
Zach Soskin: (10:55)
But they pay more than you think. Like it's, it's not like they make a lot of money cheap. Yeah. So it's like, Hey guys, like instead of that, let us do some of these types of things. So, um, that's again, sorry. It was like the most long-winded seven different directions answer. But um, we do a little bit of everything very, but you have to like for an athlete's brand to, to really service them, right. You gotta have the social strategy, the voice, the brand partnerships, the content production, the it's it's so all income because ally nowadays, right. There's the other thing we always tells is, you know, in addition to the, Hey, you gotta pick the sentence. The reason why you gotta do that is for all replacement. Yeah. It doesn't matter if you are Patrick Mahomes, there's Tom Brady or LeBron Ja. Right. There's you know, there's Kevin Durant, there's Giannis.
Zach Soskin: (11:41)
If there's, you know, and, and you can be Lin Holland, but they could do a deal with Inba like, there's always another option based just on the sport side of it and the brands, they don't really care about the, okay. Maybe they're the second best player in the world. They're the second best position they care more about, Hey, why are you a fit? How do people talk about you? Are you a good person? Are you, can you be trusted? Are you not gonna get arrested? Yeah. All these other, are you showing a legit interest in their brand? Like, that's the other thing that's the, the worst is, you know, you see some of this sponsored content. It's like somebody just holding up a product like this.
Brian Bosche: (12:15)
It's like,
Zach Soskin: (12:15)
So that that's our big, and even on our content side and for what our athletes do, like you're never even, I'll never let someone do one of those posts, a little random candle you're next to, but it's like, you know, you want to keep it authentic. And it just, what I'm excited about is now brands obviously know that too. Um, for a while there's so many brand managers or brand director that just wanted their logo. They just wanted see their logo. Yeah. Which I get. And honestly, you still get that a lot of times with startups because the founder is the one in Baltimore. Right. Cause everyone, you know, you build something like, you know, you're the same. You and I both built something. You take a lot of pride,
Brian Bosche: (12:48)
Lot logo on things.
Zach Soskin: (12:49)
Oh yeah. Doesn't matter what it looks like. It's not, it's not about that. Right. It's about right. Um, but no, I think it's been fun. Kind of working with brands, helping them grow. We've done content production for a few different startups that have I say, startups, they're athlete kind of owned and helped finance business. So work with Mamba academy worked with artist sport, which is run a Kobe's portfolio company at the time. Um, goat fuel on Jerry Rice's companies. Um, so super passionate about not just helping athletes build their own personal brands, but eventually helping them own a brand of their own.
Brian Bosche: (13:19)
Yeah. You're right. Incredible answer. You did the whole pod in one response. Love it. Let's so me, that's say, I know, I love talking to founders though, cuz it's just like, you're so passionate about it that you just can go. You just love it. So let let's break it down. Let's start at the top of like what makes athletes unique? What makes you excited about athletes? Cuz you've been on both actually at Oregon. You're like one of the best universities for name, image, likeness for content production. You've seen it on the brand client sided Adidas and you've seen it now, uh, working directly with athletes. What makes athletes special? Why are they unique in getting these brand deals, working with brands?
Zach Soskin: (13:56)
I so I they's two that like for, I guess my reason is actually the same as why they're so important for brands. The emotional connection that people have to sports is just unlike anything else. Right. There's millions of studies on it, but like people love their favorite sports teams more than they love their favorite singers more than they love their favorite. Again, there's obviously exceptions and that's not true of everyone, right? Like,
Brian Bosche: (14:19)
Well moving UK, premier league here, it's a new, it's a new level that I had never experienced in the states.
Zach Soskin: (14:26)
Yeah. The only thing that can compare it all is S sec football if some of these big time college, right. Like, but pro sports, not in the us, it's just should not usually the same, especially, you know, you're an orange county guy, not, you're not getting that love of people. Aren't
Brian Bosche: (14:40)
Going no, we are not . Yeah, no, we are not.
Zach Soskin: (14:43)
Um, so I think it's right. The, for a brand standpoint, it's so cool to kind of capture that passion. Yeah. And look, it's a, you know, for lack of better term, you can kind of weaponize it, right? Yeah. You know, Hey, you get that halo effect from them and now they're gonna buy your product because this is their favorite athlete endorsement. And at the end of the day, like I'm a fan too. Right. I love sports. I love being around sports. I have the utmost respect for athletes and particular. Most of the athletes I'm working with or a lot of 'em are football players. And so there's also this idea that look not only do I love watching them play and are these incredibly gifted people, but there's real sacrifice and risk involved in, in tomorrow. Isn't promised. I mean, I guess tomorrow isn't promised no matter what this sport, right.
Zach Soskin: (15:25)
You can be a basketball player, pull out your knee. So it's, I'm super passionate about making sure that they kind of get it while they can. Right. And, and make sure they set themselves up for yeah, exactly. That's why I think I was drawn to ni L in particular, is that you're doing, you're set, you're laying the foundation at the most kind of pivotable stage. Again, it's never too late for like look at Tom Brady. Right. He's basically had a total rebrand at the tail end of his career. But imagine if Tom Brady was doing that at Michigan or early on in the Patriot. Yeah. How much more built out it would be. Um, so giving these athletes, these tools to succeed long term and then also doing it while they need it. Right. They're, you know, they're working their ass often families aren't again for sorry for the, uh, the foreign listeners or, or abroad. I know you're in the UK that, um, they're like, what the hell is ni L why what's college sports? Why do they do this thing? Why don't they,
Brian Bosche: (16:13)
No, they aspire a lot, a lot of the, um, maybe outside premier league, like academy programs, club programs, but a lot of athletes here are aspire to play D one sports, um, especially in the basketball community. So yeah. I name image likeness is something that's, uh, awesome. Spreading more around here. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Zach Soskin: (16:28)
And it's, it's funny. It was a hot button issue at first that, uh, international athletes, because of some of the visa rules were left out of ni, which is horrible and, and needed to be addressed, but yeah. Um, yeah, no, I think, but I, I'm guessing a lot of the reasons why it's a huge job abroad is they want the education, right? It's this platform, they can use sports to accomplish something in their life. And I think that's what it all comes down to. That's what we're all passionate about.
Brian Bosche: (16:49)
Yeah. That's yeah. I, especially with the loyalty to the teams and also just the, the athlete commitment to like excellence is something that a lot of brands want to associate themselves with. Like they are constantly pushing the dedication, so totally get that. Um, so when an athlete comes and works with you, you mentioned that you go through kind of personal branding exercises. You really want them to understand what they're going for. Can you go a little bit more into actually kind of how you start that conversation? Cause a lot of, you know, especially the younger athletes now have social media profiles way younger than any of us did. Um, how do they kind of, I guess, rebrand or kind of, kind of redo kind of what their, what their brand is moving forward and how do you start that process with them?
Zach Soskin: (17:32)
Um, so it's, it starts with like a conversation really, right. It's kind of that intake of, we ask them first, like, what do you like, what are you? Cause if it's not authentic, it won't last and brand, everyone can see through it, right. It needs to be authentic to who the athlete is, what they're hoping to accomplish. Um, so it starts with a, on zoom like this or in person and with our team and we'll do kind of a intake. Um, and then we'll all kind of work together, um, lately. So hired a super talented young woman and Kaylee Edwards. Um, she's been leading a lot of the kind of social auditing now. So we all sit down, we have the meeting, we have the call, um, we come up with our own kind of thoughts and kind of, yeah, right. Cause we're basically doing as a pitchback. Right. So then Kay will look at their social media and sometimes she'll do this on the front end too, of like here's some things we like, here's some things, you know, do more of this,
Brian Bosche: (18:23)
Delete these old tweets when you' 15. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Zach Soskin: (18:27)
Well, yeah. That's, that's goes the whole other idea. Thank I'm fortunate enough to say that we don't work with anybody. Who's had to worry about that. The caliber of human being that they are, but yes. To always check your own tweets. But, um, so yeah, we really, again like intake their input, give 'em kind of our thoughts, what we're seeing, what the opportunities are and then we kind of land on it. And I think it's super important because then once you land on that direction and that roadmap, it lets, you know, it makes it easier for the athlete to follow, but it also helps keep us accountable. Right. So the athlete can always look at, oh, this is what they said they were gonna do and they're going to do it. Right. And we're kind of big on, Hey, we know we can deliver. So we want you to be able to track it and understand this is why we're doing these things. Right. I think, yeah. Um, you know, like we're confident in our work. So I say the more educated informed our clients are, the happier they're gonna be. They'll understand why we're doing what we're doing. Um, again, you need a plan like it's, I think two,
Brian Bosche: (19:23)
What would a goal be? What would like a typical goal you Seeb or an example of like an athlete's?
Zach Soskin: (19:28)
So, so I mean, this is like a, it's a relatively generic one, but a lot of athletes wanna be known as fashionable. Right. They wanna be viewed as on trend premium. Like I used the, we had an athlete who said their long term goal was to walk in Paris fashion week. So I kind of came to mind. It's just like, okay, look, I can't get you a Louis Viton deal tomorrow. As you're starting your career, it's not realistic. Like right. I think that's an, you know, expectation setting. Um, and then, you know, if you're the talent or the athlete, like being realistic with yourself, like you're not gonna get a Gatorade deal at 18 for, you know, for most people. Right. Unless your page factors or some exceptions, but right. So it's how do you build towards these different things? Um, and how can we take this? Okay. We're not gonna be able to get you a Louis Vutton deal tomorrow, but we can get you these higher end companies or these accessories or these things that are gonna be well produced, content of you and streetwear and build towards that. Um, so that's kind of, it's, it's having that roadmap and being able to accountability for it. Um, and it can be anything.
Brian Bosche: (20:28)
Yeah. It could be like, I was gonna say, it can be fashion or e-sports or whatever their interests are. They kind of align towards those and you can kind of direct the plan towards that, whatever passion they have.
Zach Soskin: (20:40)
Yep. And sometimes it's a cause. Right. Hey, I I've, you know, I had a family member that had cancer or, or something horrible similar like that. Like I wanna make sure I'm raising awareness and raising funds for this. Cause like, it, it doesn't need to be a specific brand or, you know, again, there's, there's so many ways to do it, but you just wanna make sure you're you're honestly, this is just good life advice. Like yeah. Have intention in what you do. Right. If you, everything that you do in life is, or not everything. If most of what you're doing in life professionally is for a reason mm-hmm, , it's amazing how much better the results will be. Right. You're not just going and doing a deal. You're not just going and taking a job. You're you have a plan and a goals that you're sticking to and, and you're building towards those things. I think, um, it's super important. Um, there, and I think that's, what's funny, like with, especially in today's job market, like almost everything you'd say to an athlete about building their personal brand applies to a young professional building their personal brand and building out their career. Right. Like be known for something, have an expertise, get your out there on social, like
Brian Bosche: (21:42)
Personal branding. Yeah,
Zach Soskin: (21:43)
Exactly. It's it's all the same. And, and I think that's, I think sometimes people like overcomplicate certain aspects of it or they try to make it sound more difficult, you know? Oh, you need to learn from me. I'm the expert because no, it's, it's not that hard. It's just having a plan sticking to it, being intentional and then adding some creativity here and there. But I think it's one of the most important things in, in my world is you gotta be, you gotta put it in terms that the athlete understands and can follow. And I think, you know, advice to athletes, like if somebody is trying to seems like they're trying to confuse you or use too many big words or not show you the contract or, oh, we'll handle it. Like that should always be a huge red flag, right? Yeah. They should be having like the open and honest dialogue and educating you along the way.
Brian Bosche: (22:29)
So athlete comes to and says, okay, my goal is to be at Paris fashion week or it's Hey, after my career is over, I'd like to get into fashion, maybe become a designer or whatever their career, maybe I wanna be a broadcaster, you know, I'm a CJ column or I'm whatever, you know, Draymond green. Um, when you put this plan together, what are some of the things that you do to help them get those initial brand deals or, or help them kind of achieve those goals, whether it's short term or long term in terms of content production. So you're producing content for them. Do you put together like a content calendar? Do you pick the channels and content types? Do you get their buy-in like, how do you kind of approach that? Totally,
Zach Soskin: (23:06)
Totally depends on the athlete. Right. You have, okay. You gotta be able to like, so there's some athletes that will literally do the posting for, and there's some that will just schedule the shoots or there's right. It's kind of the, every we'll give our recommendations and let, let them decide how right. Not every athlete once you logged into their social media accounts. Yeah. But a lot of athletes they're like, I don't care. I just, I, I trust you guys go right ahead. Yeah. Right. Um, so for us, it's more like, you know, we obviously have certain brands that we do a lot of work with or certain content folks that we do a lot of work with. So,
Brian Bosche: (23:38)
So you build your kind of network of brands. You're like, Hey, we have a bunch of these athletes. Okay,
Zach Soskin: (23:42)
Cool. Yep. So it's, here's who we can do. Here's the, uh, I don't wanna pan guess what you call it, say it. Yeah. Yeah. Like again, panini is, you know, they're pretty aspirational in that world, but like some of these product companies, or a lot of times, if we're doing content for a brand, right. We'll, we'll just use our athlete to get them the content and get them tagged in those pages and help build their followings. And then the brand partner loves it because they just got this athlete for free or cheap, or they were able to get more time with them or whatever it is because, so there's, there's ways to bring it all together in a way that benefits everybody. But yeah, we super important to get athletes comfortable in front of a camera, comfortable taking advice from a videographer photographer. Right. They need to be, you know, we tell 'em, Hey, look, you gotta be coachable on and off the field. Right? Yeah. So the more reps they get doing podcast, like I'll always encourage athletes to do as many podcast interviews as they can, especially that aren't about sports because they don't need to be as worried about someone trying to trip. You know, if someone's talking about their personal brands, it's not gonna try to exactly. Exactly, exactly. Um, and just again, like I said, like it's, there's not really like a secret sauce. It's just getting out there and doing it.
Brian Bosche: (24:49)
So if an athlete wants to, uh, do more professional work, when it comes to content or, you know, up their social media game, how, and they do actually wanna schedule a shoot or something with you, how do you like get the most bang for your buck when you do like a photo shoot or video shoot or something like that.
Zach Soskin: (25:05)
Okay. This is actually something we're huge on and, um, really good take. If you are doing a shoot for one brand or for one purpose, find three more to do, and it, you might not even have paid, you know, it's not like, oh, you gotta go find four more paid post deals before you go to the shoot it's oh, who would I like to work with? Or what's a message I'm trying to get across or what's other things coming up. So when we do a, or, you know, if you're gonna have somebody, uh, this is an athlete trick that some people have even tried to play on their coaches. But if you have someone coming to shoot a workout of yours, bring three outfits, bring four outfits, change, mix, match the shirts and the shorts and keep yeah. Cause now in, you know, for two hours you now have six months of content because you can cycle through all these different, um, you know, outfit per mutations.
Zach Soskin: (25:52)
And I think it's, you know, that's, we're super, super cognizant of being as efficient and respectful of the athletes' times, right time they have so much going on in their life. They can only dedicate so much to this. So make sure you're maximizing it right. And you can only do that, honestly, if you're, if you're in control of the shoes, right? So that's the other thing. And this is actually good advice to athletes. Like if you're a young athlete or a, like an up and coming athlete, that's not gonna be doing seven figure deals, build relationships with content folks, not just so they can do random stuff for you for free, but then you can go pitch brands and say, Hey, look for this. You know, one cost I'll do, I will create the content and post the content and kind of give you my endorsement.
Zach Soskin: (26:35)
And so then it's just you and your friend, who's a videographer, a couple friends and you guys can then cycle through these things and be more efficient. And then you can pay that videographer. Right. Don't ask your creatives to do it for free. Yeah. Um, but use, you know, use that leverage you have with the brand or use that because I always tell people, these brand directors, they have more time and, or sorry, they have more budget than they have time and energy. So they're actually more likely to do it. If you say, oh, this is an example of what the content will look like. Here's, who's shooting it, give us a brief for some initial direction and we'll knock it out. And you can do that for a few people at a time or, or organic content or ask, oh, you know, I don't have a deal with them yet, but you know, imagine like, if you're a brand and someone's like, Hey, went and bought your product at the store. Here's some sample content we made. Like, it's certainly gonna get their attention.
Brian Bosche: (27:24)
How do you get their attention though? Are you emailing them? Are you DMing them? How do you actually get in touch with the right people as an athlete?
Zach Soskin: (27:29)
Yeah. It's that like? I think it, you know, like, oh, there's the, Hey have great representation. Um, but if you're right, if you're not someone who's in a position to have representation, it's literally as simple as finding away on social, tagging them in posts, DMing that like, it it's like someone's reading those DMS, right? Whether like it's the social manager or somebody that they pay, like it's gonna get seen. And especially if you do it multiple times and the, I would say this, the biggest mistake that athletes make is, Hey, I would love to do a paid deal with you. Don't no, no, no. Hey, huge fan of your company would love to, you know, work with you. Like, you know, could you send me some product or like, you gotta build it. It's like, it's a brand
Brian Bosche: (28:10)
Here's stuff I've done. Like here's some shoes. Here's the quality of the content I've made.
Zach Soskin: (28:14)
Yeah. You don't, you don't meet a potential spouse and ask them to marry you on the first day. Yeah. Right. You gotta kind exactly show the value on the first date. Exactly. Show them you authentically like the products. You're not just looking for a cash grab, things like that. Yeah. Um, so yeah. Build building it out. Like a normal pace is, is super important there.
Brian Bosche: (28:33)
And then on the brand side, what are any best PR I mean, you've done this for years. What, what are some best practices in working with athletes, reaching out to athletes? Uh, if they wanna work with them,
Zach Soskin: (28:43)
It's the authenticity, right? Ultimately like consumers are, they, they get hit with so many ads, so much social content. People can tell what's real and what's not. So I think both the brand and the athlete are better off if it's authentic. So don't, if you don't like a company's product or if you're not in, like don't hit them up for deals, right. Like, cause eventually you're gonna have to, you know, drink the product publicly. Or like if people, right. If you, if, if you sign with one brand and you're seeing wearing their competitor or using their competitor, never using that one, like it's not gonna go well. Um, so just be honest with yourself and make, you know, being a good partner. Isn't that hard. Like, um, when I get like Patrick Mahomes is so great about this. If you look at him, every chief's skin he's coming in, he's got his essential water, his Oakley glasses, Adida shoes, like yeah.
Zach Soskin: (29:31)
Everything is for a reason. And Bo's headphones. Like every partner is being wrapped. And I think it's, it's so funny. Like being a good partner is so important. Like I cannot overstate this enough. What a difference it makes. Because again, like the person who's signing the deals, like they're just human beings doing jobs. And if you can make their life easier and making their life easier is being on time to a shoot, right. Athlete to understand that if they gotta pay overtime, like that's time and a half, then yeah. It might only be 30 minutes. But if there's 20 people on set, all of a sudden that's six figure bill because, you know, yeah. Or if you are, if you're an athlete and you're scene wearing competitor product, your sports marketing manager, whoever signed you to that deal is gonna get reamed out. Right. And now they're man, I don't wanna worry about that person again.
Zach Soskin: (30:18)
Um, so just make their life easier deliver for them. Right. Um, and then honestly, uh, on the brand side, one of the kind of tricks to the trade we learned is like, if there's something that, you know, damn well that the athlete's not gonna want to do, or it's a difficult ask, you've hopefully you've built up enough credibility with the athlete because you've delivered for them on different things. Right. Sent them some extra product for someone's birthday or whatever took care of their charity camp. You can say, Hey, I know this is kind of dumb. If, if it was up to me, you wouldn't have to do this, but I'm gonna get crushed if you don't do this thing. Right. Yeah. Like I'm gonna get fired if you don't do it. So I'm not gonna be able to deliver for your next charity camp. Like you're gonna have to deal with somebody else.
Brian Bosche: (30:58)
Do one for me, we'll do one for you. Do it. The exchange. Yeah.
Zach Soskin: (31:02)
It's all about the right. As much as athletes and brands have a relationship, it's really the athlete. And somebody at that brand have a personal relationship. Like they can only love a logo so much their loyalty is gonna be with that human being.
Brian Bosche: (31:14)
Yeah. And on the brand side, have you seen, you know, you are obviously at Adidas, can B2B brands work with athletes? What's like a craziest industry company. Oh,
Zach Soskin: (31:25)
You absolutely can. Cause think about it. Like as long as someone's creative. Right. I, so B2B stuff is actually athletes are great for, and a lot of times it's not for social, right? Yeah. Not every partnership is a social media post. Right. So like B2B for athletes is, Hey, you're a bank. Why don't you have an athlete out for a round of golf and they're gonna play with some of your big, you know, partners, or you're gonna, you're gonna get tickets to the game. And then they're gonna come and say hi to you after the game. And you get to provide that amazing experience. Like that's gonna matter more. So it's all about, you know, focusing on the result. And I think, you know, I think sometimes too often people are like, oh, I'm gonna do a paid post. Cause it's visible. And it's like, that's not the best use of the resources. If you're, if you only need to land three, four clients a year to really take your business to another level, like have an athlete, play golf, the
Brian Bosche: (32:16)
Intimate,
Zach Soskin: (32:17)
Whatever. It's exactly.
Brian Bosche: (32:18)
Come to an event, go to a conference. Yeah, yeah.
Zach Soskin: (32:21)
Or have 'em record a video like somebody very quick, like had somebody record a video for someone's their kids' wedding. Like, and it just meant the world to them. Like it there's things like that.
Brian Bosche: (32:31)
Ooh, prospecting emails, you can have an athlete go, Hey, I'm, you know, I'm LeBron James, you should use this pro. That would be incredible. Like a little can for a big enterprise client.
Zach Soskin: (32:41)
And then the other thing that's super underrated is using it internally. Right? You say, you're a company, that's got a sales force and you need to help motivate them. Have that athlete record a video, Hey, whoever sells the most this month, like you're gonna come hang out with me and you know, you're kid, whatever it's right. Like you can always use that carrot in a variety of ways. I think too often people, people look at what they've done before and oh, this has worked for me. So let me keep doing this. Like always be thinking of new and innovative ways, ask the athlete, ask the brand, right? Like on either side, like, don't be, Hey, how can I be a valuer? Like what's something you've done for a brand that you enjoy. Um, right. Cause the truth, like a lot of times and a brand might not think that an athlete is willing to do those personal things. But if you're telling them that one of their appearances is gonna be going to an event or, you know, a playing a tennis match around a golf or a pick, whatever it is. Right. Like, um, you know, uh, and I think it makes it more impactful. Right? If it's
Brian Bosche: (33:41)
Connections for the athlete, you know, after their, after, after their sports career is over, they have all these connections at all these, you know, businesses. Oh
Zach Soskin: (33:48)
Exactly. Yeah. There's, there's so much upside. And, and again, now if you're the athlete and you've actually met that CMO in person and their biggest clients in person, they're gonna do another deal with you. Right. Cause it's most, pretty much everything in sports is about the second contract, right? Yeah. Rookie pay. Isn't that high, your first initial, you know, unless you're LeBron James or some of these people, like your first deal with the brand, usually isn't gonna be the app big it's about re-upping and building it and, and then word gets out. This is the thing that people, I think underestimate how much the brands talk mm-hmm like to each other, even competitors. Yeah. Everybody know if someone's a, oh, they're they, you know, they complain about their cleats every week and it doesn't matter. They won't work with us. They're just, they're just gonna be a problem child.
Brian Bosche: (34:32)
I mean, you're all on the Portland bars, right? Like things cross over. Yeah.
Zach Soskin: (34:36)
But it's even the other companies like, you know, like whether it's, um, world cup or super bowl or the, like these things are basically industry conventions where you have everyone together and they're talking and oh, what's so and so like, and then the other thing is people go from brand to brand like you, if you screw somebody, when they're the social manager at Reebok, what are you gonna do in, you know, six years when they're the head of sports marketing at Nike or whatever it is, right.
Brian Bosche: (35:01)
Yeah, exactly. Yeah.
Zach Soskin: (35:01)
You've gotta, I mean, it's also just good advice not to, you know, screw people or leave people hang in like that and anything you do, but it'll, it'll usually come back around professionally eventually.
Brian Bosche: (35:10)
Yeah. All right. This, these are, uh, for my soundbites for social here. What, what social media channels are you liking right now? Are you seeing a big growth in TikTok? Instagram? Instagram's dead. Instagram's actually not dead. What are you seeing on the, uh, on the social side?
Zach Soskin: (35:25)
I'm old and I like wor and I'm, you know, better with words than I am looking. So, uh, I'm still I'm OG Twitter. I just, I like conversation. I like communicating back and forth with people. Right. I'm not, that's
Brian Bosche: (35:37)
Hard for athletes though. It takes a lot of work to put your thoughts out there.
Zach Soskin: (35:41)
Oh, okay. Whoa, whoa, whoa. So that's this
Brian Bosche: (35:42)
Is for athletes. We can get into your personal brand later side. Yeah. We're talking about the athletes. Like,
Zach Soskin: (35:49)
Um, yeah. I don't know why, how dare I think it's about, I mean, I'm saying, um,
Brian Bosche: (35:54)
This whole podcast about you,
Zach Soskin: (35:56)
Uh, in like it's TikTok is where the growth is, but it's, it's also like a, you're not gonna be authentic to it. Right. So like when I'm dealing with college athletes, I love talking about TikTok. Cause they're young, they're, they're native to the platform. They're but I think it's go where it makes the most sense for you. Right? So for most athletes, Instagram is still probably gonna make the most sense and you have the reach. But if like, there are a lot of athletes who are great on Twitter or obvious. I mean, again, the TikTok examples are obvious and people see them like, yeah, you super easy to go viral there and, and are relatively easy and build a big audience. Um, but it's also more crowded, right? Every young Instagram influencer is moving over to TikTok and there's a whole new, you know, uh, sphere of TikTok creators that came up there that didn't have a platform before. So it's no matter where you go, there's gonna be the drawback. So go where you are more, most comfortable. Right. So like, I kind of joked about the Twitter thing for me, but like that's where I'm gonna be. And so there's, there's, it's probably
Brian Bosche: (36:55)
Where your best it's where exactly you like. Yeah.
Zach Soskin: (36:57)
Yeah. Um, like randomly, like, so Marlon Humphrey is the cornerback for the Baltimore Ravens, like got really into crypto and crypto Twitter and NFTs. And he's just got active talking about NFTs on Twitter and now he gets all sorts of opportunities through his Twitter account. So it's yeah. It's really, wherever is gonna be best for you. And then understanding the different uses. Right? Like what goes like yeah. One thing that I think athletes sometimes fall in the habit of is like just post the same thing across every channel and you gotta make sure you understand each channel and what content performs best there and you need to, you know, kind of behave natively to that channel. Right. Like, yeah. So it's, it's, it's understanding that, right? If you, if on Instagram, all you do is post a photo on, you know, every two weeks or sorry on Twitter. I mean, yeah. Like that's not gonna work.
Brian Bosche: (37:44)
Probably not gonna be super effective. Yeah.
Zach Soskin: (37:46)
Um, but it's, and I think the other thing too is if I could give advice to an athlete, you don't need to be active on all of them. Mm-hmm, find your one or two and just crush it on those. Right. And, and then maybe like your backup plan is you just share that content across. Like you're not really in the Twitter. Okay. You might as well throw that Instagram and TikTok content on Twitter.
Brian Bosche: (38:05)
It's not a focus or growth channel or
Zach Soskin: (38:07)
Anything for exactly. But like, if you're really into like day in the life content, like just do TikTok reel or, you know, tos and reels and just do that type of thing. And maybe you don't need to do the super formal shoots for the most part. And like, you know, that's with all the influencer generation, right. They do just do the day in the life and the use case and, and testimonial stuff like, yeah. But if that's not you and you'd rather just knock out the photo shoot, or you're not really comfortable speaking on camera, don't try to speak a ton on camera. Yeah. Like play to your strengths. Like if you can just look the part and, and that's, you know, again, everyone has their skill set and I think the same way that like your team is gonna ask you to do the thing that you're good at. Like you should be doing that for your own personal brand. Um, and again, don't try to force it. Don't feel like you need to be everywhere. Right? Like, yeah. It's cool. When some of these athletes have a LinkedIn or, or are super active on
Brian Bosche: (39:00)
Facebook. I love the LinkedIn though. The Duncan Robinson, Luca, Don is like fully built out LinkedIn profiles. I love it. Right.
Zach Soskin: (39:06)
It can be great for them, but if you're not, I think you don't, you don't want to do is like create these things then never use 'em and it's, you know? Yeah. Um, just have a plan, be aware of what you're creating and, and be native for like the CRA like for TikTok, like it's crazy. Like the well produced 4k video does not do as well as there as the, you know, first person, iPhone stuff,
Brian Bosche: (39:28)
The Sean White, just like eating breakfast while watching snowboard clips like that stuff works and it's easy. Like you can just do 'em over and over and over again. It's good.
Zach Soskin: (39:35)
That's so that, so actually that's the big thing with TikTok. Like it got such a bad rap early on because of the dances. Right. And that's all, I don't wanna be dancing. That's not what TikTok is. Like, you can literally do anything on that. Um, so I think that's, and like give it a chance don't be stuck in your ways. Don't think that, you know, like maybe you don't want to be on Twitter cuz you don't like writing. Well, like you could do Twitter spaces and that might be something that plays to your strength or just be open to it. Try it. I think that's kind of the other thing is like, you know, really take, have fun time to learn. And, and I'll say this, if you don't want to take the time to learn, that's okay too. But just understand it's going to cost you money, right? Mm-hmm you can't say no to a bunch of deals or never use social media and then ask your agent, why aren't you making more? Right. If you don't post to Instagram, you can't, you're not gonna grow your following. You're not gonna be able to. Yeah. Like what we always tell
Brian Bosche: (40:30)
And your deals go down. Like you just won't make as much money for posting
Zach Soskin: (40:33)
And it's twofold, right? Not only are you having less followers, so you're getting less per post. The more you post organically, the more inventory you have for paid post. Because if you're only posting once every two months organically, can't do a bunch of paid posts in between. It's really bad.
Brian Bosche: (40:49)
You're right. You're right. Yeah.
Zach Soskin: (40:50)
But if you're posting three times a week organically, right? If you do three infe, Instagram posts a week organically, you could do two infe paid Instagram posts a week. I mean, that's insane. Like that's so much money that an athlete can be making relative to their earnings. That's a good point. Um, that,
Brian Bosche: (41:06)
So it's like programming, like what's your programming look like?
Zach Soskin: (41:09)
Oh
Brian Bosche: (41:09)
No. How many slots are there? Yeah, that's a great point.
Zach Soskin: (41:13)
100 like look at it. So Instagram is television. Now TikTok is television now. Right? People are going tuning in. If they know what they're gonna see, when they tune into your channel, it's gonna be more effective and you're gonna build more of a targeted following and, and it makes it more appealing to brand. So I'd like we, I encourage out, like I was like, look, if you, if you post three times a week for this long, like you're, you know, we'll kind of give them how much they think they can grow and how much, you know, extra revenue that is. So I think it's under, you know, if you want to have the revenue and you wanna have the brand deal, you gotta put in the work, there's just no shortcuts or, or you gotta let someone else do it for you. But yeah. Um, yeah. Sorry. This is so many different tangents and options.
Brian Bosche: (41:50)
No, I love it. That's podcast or four. It's just the, the stream of conscious. No, that's great. Um,
Zach Soskin: (41:56)
And flown up and like, oh, call me problem. We're good. We gotta focus on this.
Brian Bosche: (41:59)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Brian Bosche: (42:02)
I love the LinkedIn. I love you're right. Such a good point for TikTok too. Cuz that's where I see the most, most growth personally. I love doing TikTok videos. Twitter's a little exhausting now for me just writing out, I think I'm just burnt out of the, the constant Twitter threads and the, the thought thought leaders and think I, you that yeah, yeah, yeah. So I'm just like, oh, I just like every time I try to share something I've learned, I'm like, oh, I don't want to be that like that thread monster or who, you know, whatever that is. Um, but yeah, I'm also very bullish on athlete, LinkedIn. I think that's hilarious. And I love it. And I think Duncan Robinson was, was really early on it which was great to see
Zach Soskin: (42:37)
There's who's I there's been a couple ones where like they had, like, they were actually looking for a job at one point in their career. Like they were a free agent for full season or something like those are also the funniest humor. Yes.
Brian Bosche: (42:46)
It's for real LinkedIn. Yes, exactly. Yeah. It's not a, it's not a marketing channel. It is. They're trying to get a job through LinkedIn. Yeah,
Zach Soskin: (42:52)
Exactly. Exactly. Um, no, so I love it. I think it's look, there's gonna be another one that pops up soon enough. So actually here's one. We haven't talked about that. This is actually the most powerful one right now, discord. Oh, if you were
Brian Bosche: (43:06)
Ask, I thought you were gonna say that. Yeah.
Zach Soskin: (43:07)
Start, start a discord channel. Like, and if you're a, if you're a young, you know, professional or you're in college or high school and you're thinking about where can you take your career, learn how to manage a discord channel. It is the direct connection you can have with your it's kind of it's what Twitter used to be. Yeah. Right. Yeah. Where you could have. So
Brian Bosche: (43:25)
You build your community.
Zach Soskin: (43:26)
Exactly. And there's like, if you talk about like being able to move product, it's not about the millions, right. It's about the thousands that'll actually buy. And you know, the people use the word influencer and influence it's about influencing purchase intent. And the way to influence purchase intent is to have that, that die hard close knit community and discord is the best place to do it right now. It doesn't need to be for just NFTs or crypto or gaming. Like you can have a discord community around anything. Um, so high. Yeah. And that's where a lot of young kids are moving to for like the conversation side of things. Yeah. Um, so I think definitely would encourage people to at least from get familiar with disc quarter, hop in some other things and go from there. Um, but yeah, that's, uh, that's a great, I can't believe, I didn't say that sooner, but yeah, no, that's
Brian Bosche: (44:13)
Great.
Zach Soskin: (44:13)
Great shout up. And anyone that is a discord community manager, please DM me at Z SOS. K I N constantly hiring disc card managers for different things.
Brian Bosche: (44:23)
Yeah. Uh, so this was incredible. I don't, we've gone on, I think long enough. Uh, I don't wanna take too much more of your time. Um, but I learned a ton. I, I really like some of your, uh, you know, your insights into these different things too, which I haven't thought about, but anything to plug before we go, anything you wanna shout out?
Zach Soskin: (44:39)
I guess I need to encourage people to, uh, do, as I say, not as I do. Cause I feel bad that I was told to try to have these like real direct takeaways and I ended up just rambling. I get excited
Brian Bosche: (44:50)
About, no, you got, you got you. We have a, there's a ton of great takeaways. I'm gonna create at least three Twitter threads from these different things. We appreciate. Awesome.
Zach Soskin: (44:58)
Um, no, I mean like, I, I like I'm a relationship person. So get in contact with myself. Uh, Ryan, Lacey Kay Edwards, Steve Clarks. I knew all, you know, the people that I work with, um, don't be afraid to ask questions, hit up Brian, like subscribe, give them five star reviews. Yeah. All that like do, okay. So this is actually a serious thing. Like if there's little things like that, that you can do for people just do it right. Like, or if you that's totally
Brian Bosche: (45:23)
Makes a big difference.
Zach Soskin: (45:24)
Athletes. If you have a teammate or a friend who is another athlete and they do a brand deal, like the photo comment on the photo, save the photo,
Brian Bosche: (45:34)
Boost it, share,
Zach Soskin: (45:35)
Engage, share engagement, share story. Like it's the most basic thing that you can do for people. And like, you know, uh, one of my friends, a joke, like it's not about how many likes you give it's about how many likes you give. Right? Mm-hmm like just it's the, it truly impacts people's earnings. Like it's so be a good person, engaged
