Sb Weekly - The Sport Business Podcast

Brendan Taylor is Senior Vice-President at sports agency Wasserman and its Head of Golf for Europe, Middle East and Africa. Brendan has been working in the sport for over 15 years; for just under 10 of those he was at IMG, where he was Vice-President and Head of Recruitment for Europe, before he was poached by Wasserman in 2008 to join its burgeoning golf division that now represents the likes of Jason Day, Rickie Fowler and Zach Johnson. In this episode, he explains why Wasserman Golf is expanding from athlete representation into other areas of the golf business, the challenges in working closely with the sport's biggest stars, and why he thinks there's still a huge need for the creation of shorter-form events that attract new audiences to golf.

Steve Martin, Global CEO of M&C Saatchi Sport & Entertainment, has more than two decade’s experience advising on - and executing - marketing campaigns for brands, rights-holders and talent from across the sporting landscape. He cut his teeth in the sports industry at adidas, where during the 1990s he rose the ranks in the PR team to eventually reach the position of senior global PR manager before joining M&C Saatchi in 2004. In part two of this interview, he reflects on the most memorable sports marketing campaigns he's worked on, how and why he is taking M&C Saatchi Sport & Entertainment global and what developing industry trends he's got an eye on going forward.

Steve Martin, Global CEO of M&C Saatchi Sport & Entertainment, has more than two decade’s experience advising on - and executing - marketing campaigns for brands, rights-holders and talent from across the sporting landscape. He cut his teeth in the sports industry at adidas, where during the 1990s he rose the ranks in the PR team to eventually reach the position of senior global PR manager before joining M&C Saatchi in 2004. In part one of this interview, he discusses the best way to approach creativity, what makes a good sports marketing campaign and signing David Beckham to adidas in the mid-1990s.

Gareth Capon is CEO of Grabyo - the company that identifies itself as the “leader in real-time video” - and the man who formerly led strategy and product development for BSkyB's mobile app portfolio. He has also previously worked at Sony Music, BT and management consultancy Accenture. In this episode, he reflects on the dramatic shift in media consumption towards mobile, and what opportunities it brings to sports rights-holders, broadcasters and publishers.

Mike Lee, founder and chairman of strategic communications company VERO, is a man who has helped mastermind a number of bidding campaigns across the sporting landscape including London 2012 and most recently the FIFA presidential campaign of Gianni Infantino. He reflects on how telling the narrative of bid for a sports event or presidential position has changed over the last decade, the negative reputation bidding has in the wider public and his career working with several major governing bodies including the English Premier League and UEFA.

Warwickshire County Cricket Club's commercial director Gareth Roberts talked to SB Weekly about how the Twenty20 rebrand to the Birmingham Bears has helped drive "significant" increases in revenue. He also discusses how Edgbaston has evolved from a cricket stadium into an all-round leisure venue, reflects on his time at beer giant Carlsberg -  where he was director of UK sponsorship for eight years - and the evolution of sports sponsorship over the last two decades.

Sports industry commentator and Financial Times columnist Simon Kuper spoke to SB Weekly about how moving from country to country when he was growing up gave him a different viewpoint on sport, and how he approaches his writing on sport. Drawing on themes from his best-selling book Soccernomics, he also discusses the myth of the manager, and the growing impact of statistics in sport.

Ben Blanco, UK Head of Sport and Entertainment Marketing at Samsung, spoke to SB Weekly about how the electronics giant judges success in a sports sponsorship deal, how and why the School of Rugby marketing campaign with comedian Jack Whitehall and the England rugby union team became such a hit and how he went from a runner on the Harry Potter film series to one of sport's leading sponsor brands.

The SB Weekly podcast this week is an FA special: a double interview with two former senior sports executives from English football's governing body. Peter Daire (Group Head of Sponsorship, 2007-2014) discusses the ins and outs of setting up your own business, how generating value in sports sponsorship has evolved in the last decade and why too many rights-holders don't think enough like the brands. Jimmy Worrall (Head of Business Development, 1999-2001) talks about how and why he moved from selling pharmaceuticals into sport, why he turned his back on a career as a football agent and how he built Leaders into a must-attend event in less than a decade.

Riccardo Silva, founder of the MP & Silva agency and co-owner of new NASL team Miami FC, told the SB Weekly podcast why his proposed Americas Champions League (ACL) is the "biggest project in the world of football (soccer) in the last 20 years and the next 20 years". He also discussed the reasons for him launching Miami FC, the secrets of MP & Silva's success and who he'd like to play him in a movie of his life.

Matt Cutler explains why he is launching this new podcast for the business of sport