Deandra Duggans: The Art and the Science of Sports Marketing

Baltimore Ravens Manager of Advertising and Branding Deandra Duggans joins the show to discuss why she got into sports marketing, the challenge of creating unique visions and how to Ravens marketing mirrors the team and the community at large.

Hi everybody I’m Brian Clapp Director of Content for WorkinSports.com and this is the work in sports podcast…

A fan of the show said too me recently, I know you focus primarily on jobs in sports marketing and sales, but maybe you’d consider interviewing this person I know on the legal side of sports. Her suggestion was a good one, and I’m already connecting with her person and getting them on the show.

But I was taken aback a bit.

Have I been leaning too much into jobs in sports marketing and sales? I’m trying to be as diverse as I can – in jobs, in genders, in race – but maybe I have fallen into a pattern.

You can tell I’m kind of a paranoid person.

Anyway I went back and categorized our expert interviews and it breaks down like this:

• Broadcasting/Sports Media: 4


• Public Relations: 4


• Professor: 4


• Team operations: 3


• Sports marketing: 3


• Sales: 2


• HR/recruiter: 2


• Community Relations: 2


• College Athletics: 2


• Digital Content/Social media: 2


• Athlete: 1


• Student: 1


• Coaching: 1


• Security: 1


• Mascot: 1



 
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This made me feel a little better, our content and our guests are balanced. If I noticed any blind spot on my part it’s that only 9 out of our 33 guests have been women. That’s just 28% and that’s not really indicative of what is happening in the sports industry at large.

There are more women than ever in power roles in sports – Athletic Directors like Sandy Barbour at Penn State, Michelle Roberts the executive director of the NBA players association, Dawn Hudson the CMO of the NFL – the list goes on.

And that brings us to today’s guest – and up and comer in the world of sports marketing Deandra Duggans is the manager of Advertising and Branding with the Baltimore Ravens and shares some incredible career advice during our interview. She’s not just a woman in the sports industry, she’s one of the brightest minds in the business of sports.

Question for Baltimore Ravens Deandra Duggans

1:  On this podcast when I talk about sports marketing I get a lot of buzz – people love the idea of working in marketing for a sports team – but marketing is a pretty broad term, there are many roles within the marketing department. You’ve been with the Ravens for a little over two years now, tell us a little more about the specifics of your role with the team.

2: Prior to the Ravens you worked as a Marketing Manager for Events DC in the sports and entertainment division – how different was it working on the individual event side of marketing vs. a huge globally recognized organization like the Ravens?

3:   When I worked at Fox Sports Northwest, we had a mission statement posted on the front wall as you entered the office, it was basically our call to action, our mission and our brand identity all wrapped into one. How would you articulate the brand vision of the Ravens – who are you striving to be and how do you want to be represented in the public eye?

4:  We hear all the time about how coaches, right after a win, don’t take any time to celebrate it’s right onto the next game. Is it the same way in marketing – you come up with a great idea, execute on it…and them just have to move along to the next idea?

5: We have a private Facebook group and before every interview I ask that group what questions they have for our guest – you blew up the feed, lots of people had questions to ask. We’ll start with Kirsten Nelson, because her question pivots perfectly off of what we were just talking about… basically, Kirsten wants to know… how do you keep coming up with new fresh ideas and campaigns?

6: My guy James Price was very excited to hear from you, he has his eyes on getting into sports marketing at the pro level, so he had a lot of questions. He did his homework – he wanted to know What market research was done before implementing the Ravens “Just for Women" group, and what prompted your team to execute on this strategy to focus on female fans?

7: I tell these our audience all the time to have data points on their resume, key metrics that show how they impacted their current business, James wanted to know, what key metrics should I be considering when tailoring my resume to sport marketing roles?

8: Kaylah Jackson wanted to know how you connect and incorporate aspects of the local fan base into campaigns? You have a global brand, and a huge reach…but I would assume your local fan base needs a different type of attention?

9: I want to transition a little bit here – now that you are almost a decade into your career, if you were going to craft a college curriculum focused on the most important things you really need to know to thrive in the real world of the sports marketing – what would you emphasize?

10: Social media and digital engagement in general has cluttered up the conversation – there is so much being said so fast that attention spans have diminished – in this environment how hard is it to get your brand to stand out?

 

Listen to the podcast to hear Deandra Duggans, Baltimore Ravens Manager of Advertising and Branding discuss these questions and more!