From starting gun to season-long story

The situation

All the attention — and all the budget — sat in the two weeks around the start. For the rest of the year nothing happened, while the team was training, testing and travelling every single week. Partners saw a spike and then silence, which turned renewal into an argument every year.

What we did

We began by laying the team's calendar next to the partners' calendars. There were more overlaps than anyone expected: a rig test, a crew change and a refit are each a story in their own right.

• Rewrote sponsorship propositions from "visibility" to "access and story"
• Built a content calendar around the real season, not around race days
• Put a permanent crew member on board with a camera, so footage comes from the inside
• One meeting a month with all partners together instead of separately

Mostly it saved us time. We no longer had to explain what was going on to everyone individually.

What it delivered

Partners got something to show for eleven months a year instead of two weeks. Three of them renewed for two seasons, and the team no longer had to deal with five different contacts.