In March 2020, I joined the Arrow McLaren SP team as the sole social media and content team member. As McLaren Racing built its Commercial Team, I was the first in-house person hired to focus on digital marketing for the brand and partners involved with the organization.
The role quickly changed as the global pandemic began in my first week. After the season halted until June, the team and NTT INDYCAR SERIES immediately looked for opportunities to encourage fans to stay engaged until racing resumed.
One of the first opportunities was broadcasted sim racing, where AMSP drivers Pato O'Ward and Oliver Askew and Formula 1 driver Lando Norris competed from the comfort of their own homes.
Arrow McLaren SP's social channels showed its ability to adapt quickly and hire a freelance in-sim photographer to share live updates during each race. As the only team to cover events in this unique way, the team led the series in impressions and engagements during the shut down period.
McLaren Racing created a behind-the-scenes, up close and personal video series for its Formula 1 program called "Unboxed" and saw great success through the years of its existence.
When the IndyCar operation started, "Unlocked" was born to cover our drivers in a unique fashion that no teams in INDYCAR paddock were doing. The objective is all for fan engagement, bringing fans another level closer than they receive watching a TV broadcast or following along with every social post.
A fan can watch these 2-minute, 10-minute or 30-minute episodes to feel better connected to the drivers, crew members and leadership within McLaren Racing and Arrow McLaren SP.
The Indianapolis 500 is the Greatest Spectacle in Racing. The biggest automobile race in the world. The event that will put any winner on the map and have their face etched into history on the Borg-Warner Trophy.
In 2020, the Indy 500 would be raced for the first time ever in a month outside of May, but also without fans in attendance. While fans waited outside the gates, listening to their personal radios or streamed on their phones, none were allowed inside the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in August 2020.
Where the venue is typically filled with more than 300,000 fans, the only noise was the sound of 33 cars on track. Arrow McLaren SP created a campaign called "Together Wherever" so fans could be as close as possible to the team during our biggest event of the year.
