The Marketing of Jamie McMurray (Your 2010 Daytona 500 Champion)

Full disclosure note: I write this as a) a huge NASCAR fan and b) as someone with personal (albeit limited and in the past) ties to Jamie McMurray.

This piece won't be a a recap to last night's exciting finish to the Dayonta 500, nor will it be a "get to know Jamie McMurray" piece or tidbits about the driver, although I would be more than qualified to write about any of this.

Instead I am going to focus on the marketing of Jamie McMurray that is in store for the next week on the immediate side and in the coming year(s)on the branding/advertising side.

There are some valuable lessons to learn from a pure marketing standpoint and I think this is a great case study to start monitoring now and with my professional and personal background I think I can gleam some interesting light onto it.

As mentioned above I first got exposed to Jamie McMurray in 1998 when I was the sports editor for a small newspaper in southern Missouri (the Lebanon Daily Record). Jamie (in his early 20s then) had done the unthinkable and dethroned longtime track champion Larry Phillips at the famed Lebanon I-44 Speedway. Phillips not only had rung up nearly 20 track championships he was also a 7-time NASCAR Weekly Racing Series national champion. This meant he had no only won his local track title but had gone up against other track champions and beat them (either in computer rankings or in limited heads-up races). When a young kid (McMurray) had done this it certainly got every one's attention on the national racing circuit.

Fast forward to now and McMurray wins NASCAR's biggest race in the Daytona 500. Because of my "ties" to Jamie I have followed all the steps of his career from Lebanon to ARCA to Trucks to Busch and now to the Cup series.

Jamie most recently drove for Roush Racing one of the premier teams on the circuit. Problem was Jamie wasn't one of the teams "premiere" drivers. New NASCAR rules limiting the number of cars on a team made Jamie the odd-man out at Roush during the off season. He was able to reunite with his first Cup owner in Chip Ganassi who had a car and a sponsor needing a driver. Jamie slid into the Bass Pro Shops car perfectly.

Now to the point of this whole piece. Last week, after the Bud Shootout, I searched for Jamie's new web site. It wasn't up but the team had redirected the URL to his driver info page within the Ganassi team page. That was a good move I thought. I found it odd that Jamie hadn't been tweeting much either, as I was following him on Twitter. His Facebook page had gone silent as well.

On Monday when I came into the office his web page was indeed updated and live (with a message about a "full launch coming soon," I thought this was worthy of props to the team that had it going. On that page were links to social media pages (Facebook and Twitter) which indeed weren't the ones I was following previously.

As I write this entry Jamie is en route to New York City for what will be a media blitz there (I know this because of his update on Twitter). I figured this would be a great case study in how Jamie will be marketed, presented, branded, and how his sponsors and partners will leverage him in the future.

Things to look for down the road and things learned from the past week:

1) He has resources to keep his online presence current as was proven with his web site being updated just hours after his big win.

2) I predict the interactive channel will play a huge part in how Jamie is marketed in the next year.

3) The story of Jamie and the raw emotions he wears on his sleeve are a marketers dream. In a world full of flash and glitz endorsers this is a guy you want on your brand.

4) Social media brings with it challenges for celebrities and sports figures. If they move from team to team, or management group to management group, they should think about how to transition their social media content (Twitter and Facebook) as well. I wonder how many other fans didn't know Jamie's Facebook and Twitter account had changed like I didn't?

5) The digital channel is all about engagement and if companies don't have the resources to truly engage their fans/followers on social media networks then they are missing the entire point.

I am excited to see what lies ahead for Jamie McMurray both on the track and off it. Seeing his rise from local track champion to Daytona 500 champ has been a fun ride for me as a fan and observer, I can only imagine how much of a blast it has been, and will continue to be, for Jamie himself.