Jordan Rue explains strategy behind Team Whistle’s social media A game

Jordan Rue is the Senior Director of Content for Team Whistle where she leads content department across Team Whistle’s social content agency, managing strategy and execution on all initiatives across influencer, social media, and content strategy. The Playknox spoke with her to find out more about Team Whistle’s content strategy.

 

What is Team Whistle’s content strategy?

 

Team Whistle is focused on a platform-first approach to content strategy. All of our originals focus on bringing audiences closer to pro athletes and entertainers off the court or field, in order to fulfill Whistle’s mission of making the audience’s favorite talent more relatable to them. Tailored social strategies are a critical component to any marketing program given the scale of audiences on these platforms. Content formats need to be organic to each platform’s user experience, and play to the strengths of each platform’s KPIs. 

 

What do you reach on TikTok?

 

We saw 4.4B views across all three accounts in 2022, which are up to a combined 13M followers.

 

Why is sports such an attractive vertical for brands to invest in? 

 

Sports are a relatively untapped area ripe with opportunity. At Whistle, we are not beholden to rights, so we can incorporate well-known athletes and spotlight their relatable characteristics, not only timed to major sporting events, but on an evergreen basis.

 

By creating personality-driven, platform-first content, the consumers engage with brands for longer periods of time, and in turn increase affinity for them. Creating a robust social plan with natural integration points that bring thematic messaging to life provides the best consumer experience and maximizes the effectiveness for the brand to hit on their KPIs.

 

 

How can brands increase their ROI across platforms, especially TikTok?

 

Think strategically with social integrations that cater to an already built-in-audience on the platform. Focus on creating platform-specific, intentional supporting content that’s customized per client KPI. For example, TikTok and IG Reels are used for video views and awareness, while something like IG Stories may be used to “click here” and drive conversations/sign ups.

 

A well-executed social strategy not only gives clients full distribution across the platforms they want to be relevant on, but also gives the client assets on those platforms that are organic to those audiences  and help fulfill client messaging and KPIs.  Social strategies can weather industry headwinds because smart clients understand that they’re paying for multiple working assets, each with different target audiences, KPIs, and formats within the umbrella of one custom, social plan to attract audience attention.

 

 

What kind of content is working for these brands on various social media platforms? Which social media platform is the first choice of brands?

 

Relatable, short-form video content takes the top spot across social right now, with engaging storylines at the center. People are craving content they can see themselves in. We see it across niche creators on TikTok to big celebrity talent that are comfortable showing their personal sides. 

 

This puts Team Whistle at an interesting crossroads. Our O&O strategy at its core is focused on driving relatability between our fans, stories, and talent. On the other side our in-house agency, MAGNET, has the experience building content strategies and formats that work cross-platform for brands. The combined expertise across both our verticals puts us in a position to bring both our brand and social-first expertise to clients resulting in engaging, relatable content that aligns with the platform and the audience.

 

Additionally, getting the right video format down is key. Audiences can easily point out inauthenticity from brands and content, so building formats that are fit specific for the platforms perform best. 

 

As far as how brands are prioritizing social media platforms, we’re continuing to see TikTok rule. Brands are eager to reach a new and younger demographic, and it’s our job to ensure they do it in a way that doesn’t feel forced. Along with TikTok, we’re also seeing a spike in interest across other short-form products such as YouTube Shorts. It’s been interesting to guide our clients as they decipher how to speak across similar formats (ex: Reels, TikToks, Shorts), but on different platforms and to different audiences.

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