Latest / The Racer on Demand Show / Episode 20 | The G.O.A.T. of Sponsorship (ft. Alex Striler)

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Episode 20 | The G.O.A.T. of Sponsorship (ft. Alex Striler) · The Racer on Demand Show

• Alex Striler: the sponsor is not paying you to necessarily race. your approach to them is always, gee, I want your money and this will help me race, That's not the way they're looking at it. They're looking at it as they're using you so that you can go to more events and market for them. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Hello, everybody, and welcome to the Racer on Demand show. I'm Amanda Vandenelsen and I'm joined by my co-host, as always, Megan Meyer. Hello. we have a very special guest today, somebody that has been a mentor and somebody who has really pushed both of our programs forward. We have on with us Alex Streiler. Alex is the author of this book. Megan: Hello. Amanda Van Den Elzen: That we have talked endlessly about motorsports marketing and sponsorships. This is really what pushed our program forward. My husband is not a reader and he read this cover to cover and then came to me and said, Amanda, we're doing it wrong. And that was the catalyst for us growing our program. And I'm sure that many others have been touched by Alex's books, Alex's sponsorship summits. Megan: Bye. Amanda Van Den Elzen: And the information that he's brought to us at places like PRI and just out in the world in general. there are a lot of things that Alex is up to outside of those sponsorship summits these days. We're gonna get into what Alex has seen, what he's done, where we are going from here, but we're gonna pick the brain of arguably the GOAT in the sponsorship space. So, Alex, thank you so much for being here with us today. Megan: Mm-hmm. Yes. Yeah, thank you. Alex Striler: that's my pleasure. Thanks, Amanda. Hi, Megan. Good to see both of you. And thanks for showing the book, but I gotta be honest, the book is now 10 years old. And it was something like that. As I took a look at it and I threw the original copy into AI a few weeks ago and I said, you know, tell me what's outdated in this book. And AI came back and it was pretty interesting because it said, Hey, 60% is still evergreen. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Likewise, yes, we're so excited to have you here. Alex Striler: Which is the concepts, the theories, the fundamentals. But forty percent, such as Ken Block has passed away and Torque and Core don't exist anymore, and this company doesn't exist anymore, 40% is outdated and needs to be updated. And it said you have no mention of TikTok, it didn't exist back then, no mention of streaming video, too much mention of things like Facebook and Instagram. And so I decided to ask AI, well. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Alex Striler: What do I need to change? And it came up with some ideas. And then in my words, I'm making those changes. And I'm hoping to have a new edition ready for PRI. So second edition with updates, make it current using AI. And I guess it's time to make a second edition of a book that's ten years old, right? It's probably about that time. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. I am so looking forward to that. We will be your first customers. Megan: Yes, for sure. Alex Striler: Well, I'm hoping maybe the both of you can be in the book and offer some advice on podcasting. And, you know, you're both experts at racing and marketing racing and securing sponsorships. So hopefully I can get some quotes from both of you as well. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah, I'm in. Megan: Heck yeah. Alex Striler: And here's what's cool. So if you use AI as a tool, don't use it to write. and in fact, what I specifically said is use only the points and words that I wrote. Do not go outside onto the internet and look for for anything related to sponsorship. Only use things that I've talked about. And so it keeps it focused on sort of my theories and thoughts, because sponsorship people have different opinions. But because we now have I think Megan: Mm. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm. Alex Striler: 500 videos, most of them are shorts, posted on YouTube. I think there's about 70 hours worth of summits that Megan and I have done over the past few years. I can have AI, or I had AI, go to review all those videos, take transcripts, find content with certain relevant topics, and then update that chapter, like the chapter on networking, is updated based upon sound clips and video bites that sound bites, video clips that. People during summits have said, and AI takes it and can insert it and say, you mentioned Andre Jackson in the original edition. This is what Andre said back ten years ago. Here's what he said last year on one of your summits. Would you like to add that? And so now I can add that. So the new book will have sound bites and words of advice from almost every marketing director that we've interviewed at the different summits. So Megan: Interesting. Amanda Van Den Elzen: yeah. Megan: I love that. Alex Striler: Not my words, this is in their words. This is how you get sponsored by their companies. That's what AI can help you do. Is you know, I don't have to go back and watch 70 hours and write down the sentences. AI can do that for me. And then it gives me those sentences and says, Would you like to use it? Yes or no? And I pick those. So it's it's a very useful tool. I encourage everybody to do it. And that's just you know, that's with an old book that I wrote. Here's another thing that AI can do. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Megan: Mm-hmm. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. That's so powerful. Alex Striler: I I took chapter, I think it's 12, whatever the the chapter was on decks and proposals, all right. I believe just decks. And I said, using the principles just in this chapter. I wrote this, I wrote this chapter. I told AI it's this is my original content. I wrote this chapter. Use only the principles in this chapter to create a generic sponsorship deck that race car drivers can use to solicit sponsorships. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Alex Striler: Boom, it did it. And it I want to say it was probably, I used Claude on that one. It was probably 90% really good. 10% needed some tweaking. So I changed it, I tweaked it 10%. And then I said, Well, this is great. It's a generic sponsorship deck for generic motorsports, any racer. I said, now customize this for off-road, customize this for drag racing, customize this for sports car racing, customize this for drifting. Using Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Alex Striler: content and the advice from the videos that we've hosted where marketing directors of drifting and drag racing and off road tell you what they're looking for in a deck. And it did. That's what AI can do. Pretty incredible. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Megan: That's awesome. Amanda Van Den Elzen: That's really cool. Now, Alex, you had mentioned from your book that AI found 60% was still evergreen, kind of unchanging, at least right now, still relevant, and that that other 40% needed some tweaks in order to really be updated. I think something that's really powerful to think about is just how quickly this has changed. You said the book is 10 years old and There are still people racing that were racing 10 years ago. And to think about the fact that 40% of what was at the time, you know, the paramount knowledge space is now obsolete. But, you know, what what is that 60% you think that racers should know that's going to continue to support their programs throughout? What are some of the main points that you think racers will really need to know and stick to for a long time coming? Alex Striler: Yeah. So that goes back to people who've watched some of our summits and and have heard me speak are gonna get really bored by this because I say it over and over and over. And Megan, you could probably put the words in my mouth on this one, but when you are a sponsored athlete by a company and a brand, you become an extension of their marketing. You're you're now an employee for that company. They're paying you because they're hiring you to do something that they don't have the resources themselves in-house to do. Megan: you Alex Striler: that might be traveling, going to different geographic locations and helping them spread the word. Well, if you're a race team and you travel and you go to different events and venues, you can help them spread the word. You can be their traveling marketer. sometimes it's reaching a demographic that they don't reach because maybe the company's let's say an East Coast company started by a bunch of older people who wear suits, they want to reach younger West Coast hip action sports crowd. Well, they can't do that with directly, so they have to use an intermediary. They have to use somebody to be that middleman. They call them influencers, athletes, sponsored drivers. You you can be that representative for a brand, but you have to think about it, the sponsor is not the company and the sponsor is not paying you to necessarily race. So your approach to them is always, gee, I want your money and this will help me race, I'll be able to go to more events. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm. Alex Striler: That's not the way they're looking at it. They're looking at it as they're using you so that you can go to more events and market for them. And that's the fundamental principle is the marketing hasn't changed. Brands are marketing in order to sell products, in order to gain visibility, in order to increase brand equity value. They're they're sometimes doing research in areas to see what new products should come out. They're trying to establish distribution channels. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm. Alex Striler: That way they can sell through these markets if they're not selling online. and then they're also looking to create marketing material like content. So if you can do any of those for them, they don't have to hire employees. You said it in one of your last podcasts, Amanda, instead of sixty thousand dollars for sponsorship, they can go out and hire somebody full-time for sixty thousand dollars. And that's you know, you can get a full-time employee for a year for that, to do, let's say, videography or editing. Well, why would a brand sponsor a race team? Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm. Megan: Yeah. Alex Striler: versus hiring somebody full time. Well, if the race team can do more than that full time person because they can go to more events and they're already scheduled to do so, that's that's why brand sponsor is they're the race team or the sponsored property is satisfying a need that they can't do and at a better cost than if they were to do it on their own. So you have to just be like a marketer. That that's the number one thing. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm. Alex Striler: I was actually really surprised when it came back and said only six or sixty percent was evergreen and only 40% was outdated. Cause I was thinking it was going to say 80% was outdated. it was mostly the valuations. The valuations and the media chapters. Those are the two that are changing most because valuations are changed. You can look at the concepts of valuations. You have your tangible assets and your intangible assets. Some you can quantify. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Megan: Yeah. Alex Striler: And others just man make the brands feel good and put them in the right environment with other professionals. So some you can quantify, some you can't. Those those those chapters need to be rewritten. when it comes to media, wow, it's changed a lot. we all consume media differently. I've started consuming media differently just as I'm slowly retiring, working now with a nonprofit versus working full time at racing. So I'm not on Facebook or Instagram or even LinkedIn as much as I used to be just a year or two years ago. I'm probably down to less than 10% of what I used to be. But that doesn't mean that I'm not reading the news and watching shows and enjoying entertainment. I still am. That's just it's changing. So what's really key is to understand when you are racing or when you're an athlete, if you have fans or if you have spectators that Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Alex Striler: see you at venues performing your sport, who are those fans? What is their demographic? And how do those demographics line up with brands that are trying to send a message to that demographic or reach that demographic or sample to that demographic? So knowing how your brand, your personal brand, and you guys talk a lot about race brand, you know, your brand is a racer, knowing how that aligns with sponsors and brands and companies, that's also critical. And that's pretty much evergreen. Megan: Yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Yeah. I love that you touched on, you know, that demographic piece and and how to differentiate yourself as a racer. Why would somebody hire you instead of a full time person? Right. And I think racers really have the unique opportunity that they have a demographic that a lot of other influencers or, you know, like a full time employee off the street, they just wouldn't have access to. You know, when I think about talking to like for example, Megan, we we had talk to Blaster. I know obviously three year gunk partnership, you know, the Blaster space as well. And they were talking about how their current demographic is aging and they need to reach a younger demographic. Well, you know, we could turn around and say, well, guess what? You know, 60% of our Megan: Yeah. Yes. Amanda Van Den Elzen: fans are within the age range of eighteen to forty five. So they are really in that space of buying power. And and to be able to say, This is my audience, this is the value that I bring with the buying intent from this audience, that's that's way more powerful than what they're gonna get from somebody they hire off the street as a content creator, right? Alex Striler: And yeah, that's what you said about aging out. That's that's key because all brands, especially fashion brands, have to make a decision at some point. Does the brand age with its demographic, or does the brand let that demographic move on and continue serving its existing demographic? Like fashion's a good example. A clothing brand, as as let's say Vans. Vans is the one that does a really good job of it. Quicksilver didn't do as good of a job. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm. Mm-hmm. Alex Striler: I'll go back to Quicksilver, let's say. Quicksilver was a board short brand. And people in their 20s and 30s would wear Quicksilver. Well, guess what? That company was founded many years ago. Now those 20 and 30-year-olds are 50 and 60 year olds. So does Quicksilver make clothing for a 50, 60 year old, or do they continue to make clothing for a 20 to 30 year old? They tried to do both, it didn't quite work. Vans, on the other hand, they realized that their young demographic was starting to age. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Alex Striler: So they just started to make products more relevant for that age group. And so they continue to sell to youth, but now they also sell to older people. You'll see 60-year-olds wearing bands all the time, especially here in California. brands have to make that decision as their demographic, as their customers age. Do they age with those customers? And then that changes the look of the brand and the feel. Lucas Oil, I think, would be a great example because it's Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Alex Striler: traditional red, white, and blue, very old school, very middle America look. are they gonna try to reach youth and have more progressive looking packaging? I don't know. Or do they continue to to cater to their current customer by using that that same look? Brands have to make those decisions. you had said something interesting on a prior podcast when you were talking about networking as well because the networking which you were just speaking of Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm. Alex Striler: It it goes beyond just networking with marketing people, but anybody at a company and anybody at a track. You know, you're talking about you market or you network with media people. Well, they can add value. You you network with the officials, they can add value. You network with maybe the the person at the concession stand, somebody selling coffee. Well, those are all contacts that network that you're creating that could have value to a sponsor trying to reach those. same contacts. You know, sponsors aren't just looking for customers, they're looking to grow their business. And if they can grow their business by meeting more professionals and others who have complementary businesses, that if they partner with them, then they can grow. So those are some of the fundamentals that haven't changed. The relationships, you two speak often about that. And you know, having a good relationship. Definitely not trying to sell on I think that's one of the biggest problems is Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm. Megan: Mm-hmm. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Alex Striler: Most racers when they send out a proposal or a deck or whatever it is that they're sending, they're asking for money from somebody who doesn't even know them. And when have you ever given somebody money, a lot of money that you didn't know at all? It doesn't happen, not even in businesses. They have to know you first. So those are some of the things that are changing. And today we think we know people through social media. I mean, I remember when my daughter was just a Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Alex Striler: She's 30 now, but when she was a teenager, at one point she had like a thousand friends. And I'm Lexi, you don't have a thousand friends. Come on. It's that sharing our personal lives with these strangers. And and you know, we we live in this world where we think that we have more friends than we do in relationships, but the ones that are real, the ones that you can call someone on a Sunday afternoon and they'll pick up the phone and have a conversation with you, that's how you want to get. Megan: Ha ha ha. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Ha ha. Alex Striler: To the point with sponsors, because then when you call them and propose an idea to potentially become part of their marketing team, they might hire you. You know, if you're gonna work for a company, they're gonna hire you, you're gonna see them every day, you're gonna go into an office or into a building, and you're gonna get to really know the staff, you're gonna get to know the people that you work with. Your race team has to be like that when it comes to your sponsors. You have to know them as if you work there on a daily basis and see them every day so that you're comfortable with this personal relationship. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm. Mm. Alex Striler: Not just this professional relationship where they're paying you to do something and that is to circle the track and go around in your car and hopefully get some media. So Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Megan: Mm-hmm. Amanda Van Den Elzen: I love the point that you're making here about, you know, your marketing contacts need to be basically your friends. You need to feel comfortable enough with them to talk to them about their families and, you know, their vacations and what's going on with them as a human being. And I was just thinking, reflecting back, we had a call with Nexon's marketing team yesterday. So Nexon Tire is by far our largest partner and we've been with them for now five years. Megan: Yes. Amanda Van Den Elzen: and it's time to renew our contracts for twenty twenty seven. They're starting their budgeting process. So we wanted to make sure we got that to them ahead of time. And so we put together a a proposal for them. And when we presented it to them yesterday, we sent it to them ahead of time so they could reflect on it and come with questions and stuff. But we sat down and walked through it yesterday. And one thing that I thought about the whole time I was there was that, you know, it wasn't Nexon and VDE Racing coming together head to head and we're gonna negotiate this out, right? It was Nexon Tire and VDE Racing going in the same direction towards the same goals. And we were talking about what solutions, what solutions are going to best fit them and how can I help sell that to their corporate team that they need to get the budget from? So, you know, as we were walking through it, it was not questions of do you want to buy this? It was questions of how can I help you push this solution that we've already talked about in the past through the corporate budgeting ladder? How can we get this budget? Can we pull this from the sales team? Does RD have a role in this that maybe their budget can come into play? What data do you need to be able to sell this forward? And and I think that that kind of conversation only comes from the relationships that you're talking about, Alex. Alex Striler: I think so from that's what I've seen. before sending a proposal, I'll usually have a deal worked out verbally. And then when it's written, it just confirms what we've spoken about. So in order to have that that verbal confirmation, you have to have this in-person relationship. You have to sit there and either over the phone or in person work out the details and say, This is what I can do. What do you need? That's what's worked together. Here's what you're blah, put it all together and boom, it works. And then If you're all look each other and say, yeah, that's a great idea, then you write it down and send it over and they just sign. but but what you send over as the proposal to be signed has to be written in a way that the higher ups who were not part of the conversation will understand because they want to see value, you the CFO, maybe the VP of marketing, the CEO. So you're you're selling something many times. That first time you sold the marketing director who likes you and the experiential marketing person who says, Yeah, great idea, let's do it. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Exactly. Yes. Alex Striler: Well that was the first sell. Now you gotta sell their boss. Then you have to sell their boss. And the selling doesn't end with that first call. That's why a lot of racers will get frustrated. They think that they had a deal done with a marketing director who liked their idea. And they really did. They got a handshake, they got a yes, you know, it sounds great. Let's do it. I I've had that happen so many times I can't even count. And then somewhere along the line, after a week, after a month, after a couple months, you know, it's not happening. What's what's going on? Well Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Alex Striler: That person couldn't sell it through up the ladder to their bosses. That's what happened. So as you're creating these proposals, create them in a way that it sells to the CFO and the CEO, not just to the marketing person. That's always a challenge. That's it's never fun. And if you can get to know the the financial people, hey, you know, like I know Tom at Monster, that that helps a lot because I can ask him, say, Tom, what are the Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Mm. Alex Striler: What are the objectives this year with the money that's being made? You Monster has X amount of revenue. no, we're gonna acquire brands. Well, if they're acquiring brands, they probably don't need more teams. no, now we're gonna expand into Europe. that's interesting. They might have money for European marketing. So get get to know more people at the company than just the marketing person because it has to be sold through to everybody. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. And you have to have a certain level of understanding about how business works for that. Like I cannot stress enough. People people will ask me, especially some of the youth youth racers will ask me, you know, what should my education look like? What should I go to school for? Hands down, one hundred percent of the time, I tell them, get a business degree, get some corporate America experience, because that will not only build your network, but it will build your understanding of how the behind the scenes works in these businesses. Megan: Yes. Mm-hmm. Alex Striler: It I agree with that, man. It's funny. It's I the the number one topic I hated in college was accounting. Hated it, absolutely hated it. But that's the one thing I recommend every racer to take. And in fact, with my son Cole, Cole's now 28, when he was 16, I think. He had a 14 to 16, he had a shoe company, juja socks or a sock company, Zhuja Socks. And I said, you know, Cole, I'll support this, I'll help you with this, I'll we'll make this happen, but only if you take an accounting class. Megan: You Alex Striler: So while he was a middle schooler and a high schooler, I'll say. I I can't remember if it was middle school or high school, but it was right around that time. He was also going to the local community college and took an accounting course. So that kid knew accounting before he graduated from high school. And guess what? It helped with his business. It helped all along the way. So I highly recommend that to everybody. And I hated accounting. I thought it was the most boring topic in the world, but it is. It's it's just it's the damn language of you know, finance. So you gotta learn it. Amanda Van Den Elzen: That Megan: That's awesome. Amanda Van Den Elzen: It's 'cause it's terrible. Megan: Yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Megan: Yeah, I am not a numbers person. So, but I do have an example of what not to do. So actually last night I received an email from someone. It's this little girl and I think the email came from her mom and I've never heard of her before and it has a picture. It looks like she's into like the big diesel show trucks. And so I'm not involved in that world at all. So my apologies. I don't know who she is. But it was very, I mean, straight up just unprofessional. The email that I received, it was one sentence and it just basically said, I'm wanting to get her to be an ambassador or sponsored. And, and I remember it spelled sponsorship in two words. And then she listed out five bullet points with like one or two words about, Amanda Van Den Elzen: No. Megan: like her daughter and then that was it. There was no, no question or no like, Hey, like I need advice. Like I think she's asking me to sponsor her, but it was just, it was just very straight up and like came from an iPhone. So not very well thought out. So, I guess Alex, what would be your advice for someone in that position? Alex Striler: Hmm. Never cut and paste a single message and send it to a thousand people because that's probably what you got. You got something that 30 other people are going, 30 other people listening right now are going, I got that same thing. Yeah, I I know who I know who she's talking about. No, everything has to be customized now. You have to be very specific with every conversation, every brand, every marketing person. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Megan: Probably. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Ha ha ha. Megan: Yeah. Alex Striler: And do a little research, do a little homework on that person before you have that conversation. Figure out what they like, what they don't like. You know, do they have the time? Are they going anywhere? Have they been anywhere? Have they posted anything? If they post, what do they post? You know, get an idea of what they like so you can start a conversation. Most business people and most professionals know that you're approaching them when you're a racer. They know that you're approaching them because you need or want something. They know that. So too much small talk gets annoying because. You know, small talk is good to make that introduction, but if the small talk lasts an hour, now you just wasted an hour of my time. And that was the only hour I was gonna allocate to you, so you're done next. it's best to use small talk to start a conversation quickly, but then maybe schedule time with that person so that they have a 20 or 30 minute part of their schedule that's allocated now to just speaking business. And then you can speak all about your program, what you're gonna do. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm. Alex Striler: before you do that, before you actually make your presentation, make sure you understand what the brand is looking for. So ask enough questions during the initial meet, the the small talk meet, so that you can then approach later and have a more organized conversation. And I think in the other failure, I think of the young lady that sent the email or the the lady that sent the the the phone text to you. Is that it was written. It was not in person. It was not voice. It was not over the phone or face to face. I think you have to start relationships in person. Otherwise, like I said, my daughter with a thousand friends on social media, I don't really think she knows a thousand people, at least not back then. So to know somebody, you have to to meet them in person and get to know them. Do that first. Amanda Van Den Elzen: I completely understand that sentiment, Alex, but I'm gonna challenge you on that one. I think that things are shifting quite a lot. I think an email is probably not the best way to meet somebody, but you know, I think that things are shifting on social media, especially where a brand can really feel like they know you if you're in front of them often enough. And I'll give you an example. we have a brand that Consistently at the track, they've been sending a videographer or a photographer to our pits to get pictures of their product that we are not sponsored by, we're not partnered with. but they recognize our brand. And I think that there may be something in the future there eventually, right? But they were posting about us and interacting with us on social media before we ever met anybody from this brand. Eventually they came to our pits and introduced themselves. but this was kind of in conjunction with a marketing company that they hired that we had never met before, as well as the brand that we had never met before outside of purchasing their stuff. And I think this is. transitioning to the point where a digital relationship is becoming real. Alex Striler: Okay, so I should have clarified, and you're right, you're 100% right. Chris is very well known, and you're very well known. You two are public figures, heatles so so people know you. They already feel like they know you. I guess what I'm saying is if you're approaching someone and you're not famous or well known and they don't know who you are, then let them get to know you first. If if a well known tenure championship racer, you know Megan: you Amanda Van Den Elzen: We're getting there. Alex Striler: Lots of media, I'm not gonna name any names, but we know many of them, approaches a brands, they can do it because more than likely that marketing director will know who that that racer is. But I'm speaking for, I'm speaking of the amateur racers, the the people I wrote the book for, a race car driver who is really good at racing but doesn't quite understand business or the nature of business and wants sponsors and is trying to find sponsors. The best way is if you're not already famous and well known to that sponsor, is to meet that sponsor in person. and also I'm speaking from a sixty year old perspective. And you're less than half that, I'm gonna assume the most of your audience, a lot of the racers. So we are we are we're using media differently in this case. So with me it's it is personal relationships because I'm not on the phone. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Well over half that. Megan: You Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Alex Striler: I'm I'm really not on social media as I mean maybe two percent of my day I check check things now versus a few years ago it's probably twenty percent. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. I think that makes a difference too on who you're targeting, right? The brand that you're targeting. How how involved on social media are they? You know, if there's a brand that isn't, you know, the marketing people are not on social media, maybe they hire an agency, the agency takes care of everything, but they're not making the sponsorship decisions or any kind of, you know, contact actually with the athletes in the field, then Megan: Yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: You know, if those people are not living in that space, they don't know you. So I think it really is brand dependent as well. Alex Striler: Exactly. Yeah, really good point. No know whether or not the marketing director and the CEO and the owner of the company if they're active or not. If they are, that you can approach them that way. If not, don't. Megan: Yeah. Well, in one of Yeah. Well, so when I first read your book years ago, one of the things that I remember that stood out the most to me was your, definition between endemic and non endemic, because I had never heard of that before. And for us, like being so involved in the drag racing world, we always went for those endemic brands, you the ones that give us the oil and the fuel and our pistons and rods and cleaning supplies, like everything we would need to actually run the car. And never once did I think about trying to reach out to a company that was someone local or regional that was a retailer or, you know, anything like outside of, of racing, whether it's like, you know, food or fashion, like you'd mentioned. So for our audience that's listening, how would you say would be the best way for them to approach a company that is non-endemic, but They have no contacts there. Hopefully they're a user and they love the product, but they don't know who to reach out to or how to go and meet them in person. Alex Striler: this is where AI makes things much easier than in the past. when I started in sponsorship and for the first at least 20 years of my career doing so, I had to research everything myself. I had to, I mean, literally, you're using Google searches, you're going into blogs, you're you're looking people up, you're trying to figure out who is who and what do they think, what are they like, and just getting into the mind of the person that you're going to be meeting with or approaching. And even, you know, what is the culture of the company? Is this is there a fit here with with my branding versus the branding of the company? Because in many cases, athletes will approach brands and they really shouldn't. Not everybody should approach Monster Energy. Not everybody should approach Red Bull. Not everybody should approach, Rolex. You know, there are different demographics and different types of cultures for for different brands, but AI helps you do that. And in fact, AI's gotten so good. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm. Alex Striler: You can s you can upload and populate it with all of your demographics, everything about you, about your team, about your history, about your future, about the racing series, even about competitors in the series and the brands that sponsor those competitors in the series. Upload all that information into AI. It's just an input. It's just, you know, I don't even type anymore. I do it verbally. So I can just speak into the computer and it populates the data set with what I say. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm. Alex Striler: You can say things wrong, and AI fixes it now. So you don't have to make the exact correct sentences either. and then once AI knows who you are, you can prompt it to say, find all the local companies and all of the regions in which I'm going to race that have a customer profile similar to my spectator profile, and find those companies that have new products or publicly excess marketing funds from publicly available financial statements. Find a fit and find a way for my race team to help that company sell its new product or blah, blah, blah, blah. You can have AI do that for you nowadays. And it can do it within s within minutes. I wouldn't say seconds, but the average inquiry I do now probably takes two minutes when it thinks and it it and it populates with different options. so AI can do the screening, which saves a lot of time. And then I'll go back and I'll look specifically company by company by company by company, whether I think it's a fit. and I think that's how racers should do it nowadays. I think use the tools available to you. Use the tools that you have, because the tools that we have today are are so much better than what we had just six months ago, which are exponentially better than what we had a year ago. it's crazy how fast the functionality and the the productivity of the tools that we had that we all have on our laptops are making us. So Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Alex Striler: If you're not using AI, you're getting behind, further behind those who are using it. I highly recommend use it as a tool. I know both of you are using it all the time. Most people do, but I'm speaking to the racers, the amateurs who are focusing on their racing and the program and haven't yet thought so much about the business of the racing. If they want to make money from racing, they can win races. Go for it. I think that's great. If you want to make money from sponsors, I think you have to understand the business of sponsorship. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Yes. Totally agree with you on using AI. And I think a lot of people, when they start using AI, they use AI for everything. And I know, Alex, you've already touched on like, please, for the love of God, don't just copy and paste from AI. Make it your own. Use the ideas and the research. But one of the things that I've used AI for really successfully is helping me plan content that's true to our brand and to Megan: Yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: the voice and story that I want to tell for VDE racing. And I do have I did a an online webinar on how to A, build a brand. That was one of them. But the second one was how to use content pillars to build a 30 day calendar using Chat GPT. And it, you know, it it will get to the point where it just writes the post for you. I still think we should be really careful about making sure that that's actually representing us in a way that sounds authentic. But in the steps that we walk through in that webinar, we go from what are the differentiators for our brand, what makes me me, what makes my voice my voice and my story, my story. And then what are those content pillars that I want to talk about? and it helps really kind of take a step back. It's like working with a branding professional, asking the right questions and getting down to you know, the pieces that we might not know as racers because we're not branding professionals, but it's like having it's having an expert in your pocket in any aspect that you want to work with, whether like you're talking about like a research partner or like a branding agent or or like somebody who will help you just draw the lines between you and the right brands to work with for your brand. You know, I I think A lot of people are using AI at a really surface level instead of really digging down and using it as those kind of experts in your pocket. Alex Striler: Yeah, you want to use it as an assistant. You don't want to use it to do the work. It it's not gonna write the report for you, but it'll assist you in writing the report by drawing all the relevant information, putting it into a recommended format, asking whether or not you want to approve of it, and if you have any other edits that you can add to it to make it better. but if you use it solely for doing the work, now now you're losing the whole context of what AI is all about. It's an assistant. And you can have several assistants running at the same time. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Alex Striler: using AI. So one can be literally building a website if you prompt it enough, while the other one is generating reports. The other one's doing research. Now I have three assistants. I actually have my my my son when Cole was here last week for 4th of July, he set my computer up and I have no idea what he did. So please forgive me for not being able to explain how he did it. But I can speak into Claude Code now and Claude Code accesses folders on my laptop Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Ha Alex Striler: I can say go into the folder, blah, blah, blah, blah, find this other folder with images of the races, find all the images in the races that have happy fans, generate a 30-second blank using these videos of the photos of the happy fans, and blah dah And it does that. It accesses folders on my computer, runs applications on my computer, it can create an Excel spreadsheet and then take the the data in that spreadsheet and make a graph and put that graph into a PowerPoint and then print the PowerPoint. AI is not just answering questions and you know, you you type an inquiry and it gives you a response. Like there's a there's a dot on my leg. What could it be? Here's a photo. that's probably just a work. No, AI is way better than that. It can actually do the work for you now. So you don't have to touch your computer. And that's where it's getting crazy. Megan: Mm-hmm. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah it's It is. As long as you're putting in thoughtful prompts. And I think that that's something that comes with a lot of practice and a lot of knowing what you want that output to look like because it's one of those garbage in, garbage out things for sure. Alex Striler: Hundred percent, hundred percent. And and you know, going back making to what you were saying earlier is when you're approaching a marketing director, here's something that's really interesting is if you reverse roles and think about it like there's a racer and a marketing director. And the racer doesn't know marketing, the marketing director probably doesn't know racing. So for that racer to understand the marketing director's demographic and target market and sales goals and whatever it is, they have to learn to think like that marketer. And they usually don't. But at the same time, the marketers don't think like racers. Take a marketing director and put that marketing director in your car for a day and see how that person does. Okay. Now you prep the car, you drive around the track, you qualify, you race. That marketing director will have no idea what to do. Well, that's where you come in educating them on the racing, just as allow them to educate you on their marketing. if you think in the mindset of they don't know your job just as you don't know theirs, but if you two work together, you're now a powerhouse, you know, a pitcher and a catcher in a baseball team. They do different things, but they have to work together. So think about it like that is a lot of times these marketing directors don't understand. If you put them behind the seat of your race car, they would have no idea what to do. And that's often how they're viewing you. They're they're saying, Well, this is just a race car driver. This this person doesn't understand my goal, what I'm doing on a daily basis. Well, ask them. Ask them and and get to know them and learn from them as you educate them on your program. Because as you educate them on your program, Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Alex Striler: they become more proficient and better understanding where the opportunities are. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Yeah. I think that's really important. And, you know, a marketing director doesn't want to know how to drive your car, but they do want to know what benefits them about your program. So I think educating yourself on what is it that makes your brand stand out, your program different from the people you race against, the the ins and outs of, you know, what kind of benefits you bring as a racer, and then educating them on that is super powerful too. Alex Striler: Yeah, agreed. That's right. What you two are doing with the podcast is outstanding. Keep it up. You know, I've been telling Megan for years I'm I'm gonna be out soon. I'm retiring having grandkids and I want to spend more time traveling, visiting family, have aging parents and a a growing slew of grandchildren. So that's that's where my focus is. I I also help a nonprofit now. I work with Dave Cole at Ultra Fournext to help make students employable. So that's sort of what I'm doing when I'm not working in sponsorship. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Thank you. Alex Striler: And I see, you know, it all it is is education. It's it's helping to educate others to make them better at what they do so that there are more opportunities in the future. The world's full of opportunities, you just have to be prepared for Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. tell me more about the nonprofit that you're working with. I I know we've talked like super high level about it, but I wanna know a little bit more what what you're doing and and how that's making an impact. Alex Striler: So it's called Ultra 4 Next. A couple of years ago, a high school shop teacher, auto shop teacher, Sean Cattrell, approached Dave Cole at King of the Hammers about bringing students into the King of Hammers Ranch and letting them learn some hands-on skills, how to weld, how to fabricate, how to work on cars, race cars, primarily the off-road cars. And they started doing that. So for a couple of years, students came in once a month from Silver Valley High School. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm. Alex Striler: after the first years, students started coming also from Hesperia Unified School District, the Hesperia High School, and then it expanded to Copper Mountain College. These are all high desert community, either colleges or or high schools. So underprivileged. You think about high schools in the desert, there's not a lot of opportunities, job opportunities in the desert, the high desert. So we go in and we teach them through them coming to the ranch. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Alex Striler: certain s basic skills, you know, how to hold a wrench, how to use a tape measure, how to how to weld, how to fabricate, just, you know, planning and and and working on vehicles. Then we started bringing in media students from the same schools so that they could film the shop students. And they started making media from that. Well then we thought, well these are great. Now we have students that are learning skills, both in media and hands-on trade skills, because there's a a huge trade skill shortage in the the US right now. Then we started taking them to companies. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm. Yeah. Alex Striler: And taking them on company tours. We've toured King Shocks, IBOx Springs, we've been to Raceline Wheels, we've been to Monster Energy, we've been to Curry Enterprises, we've been to you know One Nine Industries, the Terrible Herbs Race Shop. So students now go behind the scenes, get a tour of the factory, like Ray Curry from Curry Enterprises took a group of students and showed them around for a couple hours. So students are meeting potential employers, hearing from those employers exactly what the employer needs. I remember King Shocks, they said, you know, before we let someone work on the CNC machine, we want to know that they know how to use a lathe and actually use hands-on skills before they do the programming. So students were enlightened and awake. And when we went to Monster Energy, Tom Kelly, who's the CFO, Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Alex Striler: Tob is now 71. He's the oldest standing employee at Monster Energy. He's been there since the 80s when I worked there. That's how I know he actually sat down for 45 minutes in a closed one-on-one environment, students on one side, Tom's on the other, and he gave them life advice. Not life advice, I'd say career advice. And then they could ask questions. You know, you don't get a frequently a one-on-one with the CFO of Monster Energy, one of the biggest companies in the world. But these students were able to do that. Then they got a tour of Monster. Amanda Van Den Elzen: that's wild. Yeah. Alex Striler: So we're putting them in environments where they can see new things, meet new people, and be exposed to new opportunities. The concept is simple. It's, you know, mind expanded by new ideas never goes back to its original boundaries. Once you teach somebody something and they learn it, it's hard to unlearn that. So it just makes them better and they become more productive. good news is the first two students in 2024 that graduated from the program, both were women, in fact, young girls, they Both were placed in the automotive industry. So right after high school graduation. So two girls got full-time jobs from the program in auto. I don't know yet how the 2025 roster is. We'll find out soon. But we have more students, we have more schools, and we're spreading the word that if you are a race shop and you want to bring in an intern or provide mentorship to students who are interested in learning skills, especially fabrication, starting with off-road and also media. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Alex Striler: Starting with motorsports. We're looking for partners to give industry tours of the factories, to give, we're looking for in-kind donations, you know, if you have welding machines, camera equipment, anything that students could use to learn, donate those to the high schools and to the shops. So it's it's a fun project. I really enjoy it. And again, with AI now, AI is teaching me how to work with a nonprofit because I've never done that. I've also worked in profitable ventures. And this is this is new to me, but I love the educational aspect. So it works out really well. I I think we're gonna officially announce some of our next objectives. We got some pretty neat things happening. We'll announce those at PRI. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. I can't wait to hear about it. That is just such a powerful platform to be involved with, Alex. I I commend you for, you know, focusing on the youth. And, you know, that's something we've been thinking about too. We now we've got a full crew, but a couple of years back we had an opening for a crew person on our team. And we we really don't have a big budget. it might look that way. We we do a lot of dressing for the job that we want, not the job that we have, but we don't have a budget to pay a crew person. So all of our crew is volunteers and and they get food and board and entry and they get to hang out doing professional race car stuff. So that's that's our you know, our offer on the table, which doesn't appeal to many. But that being said, we were looking at how do we involve the trade schools around here. How do we go and say, hey, can I get an intern to be a crew person for our race team so we can kind of help mold them, teach them how to fabricate, you know, get the the skills in there that they're not gonna see in every internship that they're gonna do elsewhere? And fortunately for us, we did end up with somebody who is an amazing crew person that volunteered to be on our team before we got that far. But I think there's a lot of opportunity both on the fabrication side and on the media side to embrace those students who just need the experience. And I think it would take a powerful team to be able to lead somebody who's still learning. 'cause a lot of teams don't even know what they want. but once you do know what you want, I think being able to bring somebody in as an intern would would be really powerful. Alex Striler: I think so. I I really do because anybody with access to a computer can now get a college degree. And anybody with access to a computer can learn virtually anything textual or through videos, anything theoretical that they want to learn. There's there's really no reason to go to certain colleges anymore. but you can't watch a video and learn how to work on a car. You can't watch a video and learn or read a book and learn how to work on HVAC or electricity. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Megan: Mm-hmm. Alex Striler: We we need hands-on technicians. I mean, that I think is going to be the future. There's a shift in this world happening, and it's going in two directions. It's the hands-on technical trade skills that are going to be the most valuable in the labor force. And then it's the creative online artists who are good at spreading words and and projects and ideas virally. There's there's an online universe that I think has a lot of opportunity, and those is where the creatives are going to excel. And then there's a physical universe that we live in, you know, the the things that we touch, and that's where the technicians and people skilled with trades are gonna excel. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Yeah. And as we're talking about AI, you know, where is AI going to make the least impact? It's in in that physical world, in the realm where people are using their hands to do work. And, you know, I think we're gonna see a pretty radical upheaval of the skills that people need in order to succeed in white collar work, but blue collar work is largely going to be unchanged, at least in the time being, by AI. Alex Striler: Amen to that. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Well, we've talked a lot about, you know, what what the future looks like, what what the past looks like. What would you say you see as the biggest shift as motorsports marketing and sponsorships move into the future? How do you see racers best preparing for that shift? Alex Striler: I I think the biggest thing is the competition for attention. and and that's just in daily life as well, not just in racing. It's just all the time. Where where do you focus your attention? Do you read a good book? Do you watch some really cool videos? Do you look at one of endless number of social media platforms? or do you do something? Do you create something? Do you work on a card? Do you write a song? Do you play music? You know, how do you spend your time? And When you're soliciting sponsorships and you're looking for money, then maybe you can help brands save time. So brands are also crazy. They're they're going in many different directions with pulled in many different opportunities. Someone said to me once, you know, there was a like this, I want to say it's like a $50,000 opportunity. sponsor this. And then the guy said, Well, why don't I just buy 50,000 Google search engine results for a dollar each, and I can get Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Megan: Hmm. Interesting. Alex Striler: For the fifty thousand dollars, at least I know that there's fifty thousand people on Google who've searched this term and found my site versus me just randomly investing in in marketing hoping that this logo works. the options that we have are endless. And I think with with technology, they're gonna become even greater. And endless is becoming a bigger number, which is sounds crazy, but focus is is key if Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Alex Striler: If you know and have an objective and you can focus on doing a certain thing that that that achieves that objective, like for example, do I finish motorsports marketing and sponsorship edition two? Do I do the the cut videos right now, put them on sponsorship tactics? Do I do a business plan for Ultra 4 Next? Do I create videos? Do I get on this podcast? Do I hang with my grandchildren? Do I go see my parents who are in their 80s? Well, where do I spend my time? Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Alex Striler: If we can use technology to do some of those things in the background while we're spending our time doing the physical things that we want to do and need to do, then technology is a tool that we can use all the time. And I think that that's the biggest shift is that we have the ability now to do more than one thing at one time. so our focus can be on what's important that you can't scale technologically while we have that scaling in the background. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Alex Striler: While AI is finding all of the answers to all of the inputs and questions I asked regarding certain brands and certain racers and certain properties, I can visit my mom and dad and have lunch with them, or I can babysit my grandchild and AI is doing the work for me. So we can do more than one thing. And I think that's where the world really gets interesting, is you know, we used to call it multitasking. You're watching three screens at once. You know, watching the big screen, you got your cell phone, you have an iPad, whatever it is. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm. Alex Striler: Well, multitasking in the past was multi-watching several different things at one time. Now multitasking can be doing something or watching something while there's processing going on in the background. So you're still getting things done, even though you're enjoying yourself. and that's the biggest change. I don't think that people realize yet, or that a lot of people do, but I don't think that everybody realizes yet just the level of productivity. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm. Alex Striler: that comes now from the technologies that we have at our disposal. it's pretty crazy. It's what's keeping me from retiring. You know, the opportunities are so huge. It's like it it's too tempting to come back in and and and you know have some projects. It's so tempting. It's who who can resist? Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Ha ha ha. Yes. Yeah. No, I love you kind of hit on a couple of points there. And you're you're talking about the the attention and focus of the people we're trying to reach, whether we're talking about fans or partners, potential partners. And I think that that's a big one to hit on is the fact that our fans and our partners, they are not just moving money, right? Fans are not just buying products. And sponsors are not just giving us money, but they're they're moving resources and time is as valuable or maybe even more valuable a resource than money is in both of those fronts. If we can if we can put out content and connection that our fans value enough to give us their time, then we're winning. And if we can make a connection with a partner that Alex Striler: Mm-hmm. Yes. Amanda Van Den Elzen: not only moves money in our direction, but also saves them time or earns the time to build that relationship with them. I think we're also winning. So I loved that you kind of brought that to the forefront. I think the other piece of that is making use of our own resources, our own time and money and putting that in the places where it matters most. And, you know, Alex, for you, you mentioned that's time with your grandchildren. you know, spending time with your aging parents and and things like that. But for a lot of us, we're trying to do a lot of things with a very finite amount of time and we're trying to run a race team and we're trying to build a business behind the scenes that pays for our race team in supporting the partners that we're working with. And if we can assign some of those tasks to AI or to lower cost resources, even if it's, you know, like I said, Having an intern come in to do some of our social media, right? The the technology and the resources are there to start focusing on the things that are going to make the biggest impact in our race programs. So if you're really focusing on your racecraft, what's going to allow you to focus more on your racecraft? Well, maybe that means that you are hiring somebody behind the scenes to do your social media. Or maybe it means that you're using AI to do the research for your partners. so that you can step in when the human element is really important. So, you know, I just I love the distinctions you made about time really being a valuable resource. Alex Striler: Yeah, 'cause that's that's how you focus your attention. And it's that's not easy. When you're pitching a sponsor, you're trying to get their attention focused on you so they'll listen to your pitch. And how do you do that? That's that's the hard part today. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm. It is, it is. And it's gonna get harder and harder, I think. Especially, you know, one of the downfalls to AI is the and I'll put this in air quotes, the AI slop, right? You know, when people are just copying and pasting what's coming out of AI or AI is cold calling partners without that human element. people can see it. I get probably fifteen emails a day through my Racer on Demand inbox that Are almost identical, but they're tailored to me. I I get them about the podcast all the time. People trying to get on the podcast as guests. And it's very obvious when I have people reaching out to me that are clearly not good fits for our podcast. You know, I've had people reach out to me. One of them was a psychologist that wanted to come on and then had nothing to do with racing or marketing or any of that. Another one was a guy who is trying to, I don't even I don't even know necessarily what this is, but trying to create some sort of racing in space or some sport of like space racing. I don't know. I don't know. But you know, it's clear that AI is going out and farming this information and creating a a very tentative string between my podcast and their venture. And Alex Striler: Yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: You know, it's creating this communication that generally just doesn't make sense from the human eye. And I think, you know, we we are right now spending a lot of attention on trying to figure out what's real, what's not, what's valuable to me and what's not. So I think using AI is great. I my day job is literally teaching people how to use AI in their jobs. Like it is absolutely the way the world is changing. But We need to be careful that we're not putting out things that are not providing value because that's just draining attention and it's gonna get worse the more of that we have. Alex Striler: Yeah, I couldn't say that any better, Amanda. You're right on. A hundred percent. It's a tool that people need to use, not replace themselves with. And too many people are replacing themselves with it foolishly. It's just a tool. It's a tool to make life a little easier, more efficient and productive. That's all it is. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Yeah. Yes. And we can use it to become smarter or we can use it to become dumber and the choice is ours. Alex Striler: Or work harder, that's true. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. All right. We are approaching the one hour mark. Is there anything that you wanted to talk about, Alex, that we haven't hit on yet? Alex Striler: can't think of anything. I don't have anything on the schedule other than PRI. I'll be there Friday the eleventh. I go on stage at three. If anybody wants to join, love to have all your viewers and listeners come. this year I'm gonna talk about using AI for sponsorship. And I'm gonna hang out a couple days. So if anybody wants to get together during PRI, reach out to me. let's set up a little time to get together. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes, yes. That is always a packed house. So if you are listening and you're going to PRI and you want to go to Alex's session on AI with sponsorships, get there very early because if you want a chair, if you don't want to be sitting in the aisle or lined up across the back of the room, you're gonna want to get there early. Alex always draws quite the crowd and and I have enjoyed every single one that I've gone to. I I will tell you, even though we've read the book, we've been to Megan: Yes. Amanda Van Den Elzen: probably every sponsorship summit you've offered since we discovered you, Alex. every time I sit in the room at PRI, I learn something new from you. So it is well worth attending. Megan: you Alex Striler: Awesome. I learn new stuff every day too, usually from the people I surround myself with, including yourselves. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Well, thank you. Thank you. That's the way to do it. You know, we talked on our last episode about building your network and how your network supports you in way more ways than just getting new sponsorships. And one of them is knowledge. and surrounding yourself with people who are exposed to other things than you are is the best way to build your knowledge. Alex Striler: Yes. Well keep it up. We two are doing a great job and hi to Adam and Chris for me. love to see you guys at the next race. I'm not sure which the next one you're going to, probably champ, right? Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Yeah, yeah. We'll be next weekend is a low-key one for us. It's pretty close to home in Lena, Wisconsin. our next big ones, we've got Bark River coming up up in the UP. And then I just got word today though from Bark River. And by the time this episode's released, it'll be public knowledge that the class 11s are no longer racing at Bark River. So I was super excited. To be able to get that out there, but they just couldn't make the logistics work in that short time frame. And it ends up being the same day as Vegas Torino. So that's a huge conflict for the Class 11 folks. and then Labor Day weekend, of course, we've got Crandon and their fall event, which is going to be Madness as usual. And then the first weekend in October, we're gonna be out in your neck of the woods, Alex. Maybe we'll see you there at Glen Helen. I think that's the second and third or first and second of October. so we've got some big tracks coming up on our on our leg here I'm really looking forward to. Alex Striler: Glen Helen for sure. I this I'm gonna miss Crandon this year because I'm gonna go to Germany for the Ibach seventy fifth anniversary. Wilfred's throwing his company seventy fifth at in Finnendrup, north of Frankfurt. And it's gonna be the same time as Crandon. the travel time will be anyway. So I'm gonna miss that unfortunately. Dang. But Glen Helen. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. yeah. And I saw he just wrote a book too, it looked like. I'm I'm looking forward to seeing that. Alex Striler: His story, history, his story. So I I can't wait. Yeah. I I I was supposed to have a copy and I wanna read it because I think I know what's in it, but I think he's gonna surprise everybody at the event and we're gonna get books there. So I can't wait to read he has such a good story. I I know so many of that if some of those made the book, it's gonna be amazing. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Yes. Yeah. I'm really looking forward to it because I don't know a lot of his stories. I see a lot of stuff on LinkedIn because we're connected there. But beyond that, yeah, I'm really looking forward to it. I think it'll be fascinating just But Alex Striler: He's an adventurous, fun loving guy. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Alex says people are listening. I'm sure that they especially the ones that maybe haven't attended your sponsorship summits or maybe haven't read your book or haven't been exposed to you in the past. How can people find the information that you have out there? Alex Striler: So I'm gonna I have several websites. I'm gonna get rid of all of them and just focus on one. I don't know which one that is yet. I think it's gonna be sponsorshiptactics.com, but right now don't go there because it's that site is dead. but but there is a site that has been developed, a new one that is offline that needs to be uploaded when it's ready. It's not quite ready yet. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Okay. Alex Striler: Best way would be let's say alexstryler.com. I try to keep everything up to date on that as to where I'm going, what I'm doing, or what I've done. And that will link to my sponsorship stuff. Alexstrailer.com is also more personal, it has family stuff on it, but that will be the starting point to get you to the sponsorship stuff. Amanda Van Den Elzen: That's fantastic. Yes. And if you haven't ever gone to any of these sponsorship summits or seen the information that Alex has out there, I I will tell you if you are a grassroots racer trying to grow from the ground up, it is the best place to start changing your mindset and looking at sponsorship partnerships and growing your program in an entirely different light. and that doesn't come lightly because I like to think we're a good resource. So Alex Striler: Guys will go great. Take the ball and run with it. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes, yes. We're trying. We're trying. We've got big shoes to fill, Alex. You've left some big footprints behind you. So All of our guests, when we have them on, we ask them the same question at the end of our episode, and that is What advice do you have for our listeners, those grassroots racers who are trying to grow their programs? Alex Striler: It's it's a slow process, but it doesn't get started until you take that first step. sponsorship is not about an initial contact with a person and then getting money from them or forming a relationship with them after a meeting or two. It's not about that. It's a long-term process. It takes years. So meet everybody you can, get to know everybody you can. Sometimes the videographer becomes the head of production, becomes the head of marketing, becomes the CEO. And that person after 10 years works their way up from what seems to be a low-level position to all of a sudden now they're running the company. And that doesn't happen overnight. That happens over time. So it's a long process. Just stay in it. Just like anything, the more you do, the better you get at it. And you only have to do a few minutes a day, 15, 20 minutes a day, every day, working on building relationships and working on improving your knowledge as to what makes those relationships more valuable. What skills do you need to learn for that sponsor? Just 15, 30 minutes a day, every day over over a few years, you will be successful. It's the people who Do a little bit today and then do nothing for six months and then do a little bit in six months and then do nothing for a year and then send out a bunch of letters for a week and then do nothing. Those are the ones who never get results. 30 minutes a day, every day, be consistent. And then 30 minutes is just reaching out to people. Quick follow-up email, quick follow-up call. Meet someone in person. If you know there's races are attending somewhere within an hour or two drive from where you where you live, go to the race. Go meet the marketing people in person. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm. Alex Striler: Bump into people, go to SEMA, go to PRI, go to trade shows, go to off-road expo, go to Sandsport Super Show, go go to wherever you need because there's a lot of people there. But it it takes time. And realize if you give it that time, it's like to be good at anything. Think about any sport, any skill, any trade. You don't learn it on the first day or week or read a book and suddenly you're an expert. You practice it over and over and over and over and you get better at it. So take that step. Keep taking those steps, don't stop. And over time it will happen. I promise it will. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. That is great parting advice. Thank you so much, Alex, to our listeners. We do have a new episode every other Thursday. So stay tuned. We'll see you in two weeks. But until then, we love you. Bye. Alex Striler: Thank you. See ya. Thanks, Amanda. Thanks, Megan.