Pivot Point

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Welcome to the Pivot Point where we talk about all things pivot, all things business, and all things Vegas. I'm your host, Bardea. Let's get the ball rolling. All right. Hello, everybody, and welcome back to another episode of The Pivot Point. I've got a really special guest today calling in all the way from Las Vegas, Nevada, if you can believe it. She is a distinguished professor at the UNLV College of Education. Some of her expertise includes sports management and marketing, development of women's leadership, and improving gender equity and diversity in sports. Dr. Nancy Lo, thank you for joining me today.

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Thank you for having me, Bardia.

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So, I would like to hear kind of this journey. Sounds like a really cool journey you've been on. Tell us about your story and how you got to UNLV.

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It has been quite a journey. So, I started off as a student athlete, a scholarship student athlete, which that in and of itself was a little bit of a big deal because I was kind of what we call a Title IX baby. I was a beneficiary of the Title IX legislation that mandated gender equality in educational settings and so becoming a student athlete on scholarship was something relatively new frame and as I had the opportunity to compete in a very elite level program, I was inspired to actually become a coach myself and so from there I actually coached at the high school and college level for a number of years which was also really fortuitous timing for me in the sense that because Title IX had come into being, there were a lot of new women's sport programs being started at colleges, universities, high schools, etc. And the word I heard as an undergrad was if I was being a woman that I would have a job in a minute as a coach. That was perception, not necessarily reality because the truth is there were far more men coaching women's sport once they started paying people to be coaches of women's sports. So I however was fortunate I did get an opportunity to coach at the college level in Colorado, Texas and California but also because it was the early days of Title IX I had the experience of experiencing gender discrimination and even some things people don't like to talk about in the sport environment which would be led me to become disillusioned with intercollegiate athletics and the leadership and that was when I decided that the best path forward was to become an educator and that's when I pursued my doctorate. So this was right around the early to mid 90s and if you ever take a class from me on Title IX, you'll hear that while Title IX was passed in 1972, I believe that it really wasn't until 1992 that it had any real power behind it and that's because that's when the legislation started. That's when women started suing under Title IX and so that's when things really started to change was in the early to mid-90s. So that period of time was very exciting. We're heading right now into the Women's World Cup in Australia and New Zealand for FIFA. And to give you a little bit of history and kind of the timing of my career, 1995 was the first time that Nike actually sponsored the US Women's Soccer Team on a world tour, right, to become the quality type team that could compete for World Cup titles and as we know they won the 1999 World Cup title but again to give you a little bit of history during that period of time you know hosting the World Cup in the United States the word on the street and the media and everywhere else was you know there's no way these women are going to fill these stadiums right they just couldn't imagine and what ended up happening just blew the minds of the business world in particular, the sport media world as well. I say still to this day, those who got behind the women's team, and in that case, I mean sponsors, right? Companies who jumped on board and broadcast companies who got involved were really the most forward-seeking and also fortuitous because as most people know, that World Cup ended up being a sellout. We had over 100,000 people in the stadium. The impressions worldwide were phenomenal. Like nothing had ever happened like that before. So it was a watershed moment for women's sport in particular, right?

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And that's inspired. How did that affect your career? I feel like that's such an important point. So how did that affect where you are today? And I feel like you already answered this as well, but what are you most passionate about right now in your career?

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Yeah, well, so what that inspired for me was my research line. So my research line has always been more on marketing women's sport. I was the first to do a study looking at the corporate sponsorship of women's sport and actually kind of still the only one to do it. Because I could see that in the way that sport is promoted and the way that sport has grown to be a $2 trillion industry globally is through the media and the investment of brands, okay, in the form of sponsorship. And even now today, only 1% of the sponsorship of sport in general, 1% is given to women's sport, right? So, and even still to this day, the number that we always repeat, it's getting better, but the research shows that it's less than 5% of media coverage is given to women's sport. That's finally starting to change, but think about that, right? That means that 95% of every time you turn on anything sport, whether it's reading a newspaper or looking online, turning on ESPN, what have you, it's going to be men's sport. And that works against the value proposition of women's sport in a way that we have just recently been able to get people to understand. So, you know, when you ask me like, where am I now today? I've been at this for what, 30 years, trying to make the case that there is a value there. There's a business proposition, a business case to be made for women's sport. The reality is because, and this is all full circle, because of Title IX for the longest time, up until really the last, I would say five, six years, even COVID, the case that was made for women's sport was always gender equity, right? It's the right thing to do, it's the morally responsible thing to do. And that never moves the needle in business. We just know it doesn't. Even though we want it to, it just doesn't. So we're now to the point where we've got the data to back up the story that there is value in women's sport, that this is actually the place where you're going to get the greatest return on your investment at this point in time because of the increase in viewership, followership, engagement, all of those metrics. And so for me, it's incredibly rewarding right now to see brands investing and sponsoring women's sport on a whole new level, endorsements for student athletes and professional athletes that are at a whole new level and the media finally catching on and realizing that they've got to value the women's sport properties differently. So when about a fraction of that. There's room for broadening the perspective on what the WNBA broadcast should be worth and those are real game-changing sorts of aspects that are happening right now that keep me engaged and excited about what the future looks like.

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Have you seen these mostly in Vegas or mostly at UNLV or more like a global scale or things like that?

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This is a global scale, yeah. Vegas has not been great. They're doing better, but Vegas is very much like the rest of the media world out there. They, you know, if you ask probably any of our sports editors, you know, about to talk about a championship team at, uh, in Las Vegas, they'll talk about the golden Knights. Of course, well, the Las Vegas Aces were the first to get a professional sport championship in the city. Possibly the first to have two with, you know, what's happening this season. Um, but the default is always NHL, NFL, MLB, et cetera, right? So it's a constant fight. It always has been for women's sport, for those of us in it, the women who are athletes, the women who work in sport, you just go into it knowing that you're always going to be fighting for airtime, right? For visibility, for recognition, it's a constant fight. And you gotta be up for that fight, right? A lot of times people will say, well, you know, Title IX, I mean, it's been around forever. We celebrated 50 years last year. Do we even need it anymore? And the truth of the matter is, absolutely, we need it. The minute we take our foot off the gas pedal, we go backwards. And anyone who doesn't believe that needs to only look at the fact that last year, we celebrated the anniversary of Title IX on January 25th. And I'm sorry, June 25th. And on June 26, the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, which was a huge, huge loss for women's rights. So, you know, on one hand, we're celebrating this incredible legislation that has opened so many doors for women in education. And then the very next day, we're watching our country go backwards with regards to women's rights. So, you know, that's that's just the world that I've lived in for my entire career and I don't think, I think it's very

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unwise to take our foot off the gas pedal ever. Right, I was going to ask, I mean it just seems like such a struggle sometimes. How do you personally stay motivated and continue to inspire yourself? I imagine it's quite the journey. Yeah, it's,

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that's not hard. I mean I am passionate, I've always been passionate about sport, all kinds of sport. You know, I just watched Wimbledon this weekend and I'm as thrilled to see an incredible match between Djokovic and Alkara, you know, the new generation of men's tennis, as I am to watch the Tour de France, which I watch every single year, you know so I'm, I'm a global consumer and fan of sport, not just women's sport, not just American sport. You know, the FIFA World Cup is gonna be phenomenal and that's largely because, you know, the US started it in so many ways, but now France and the UEFA League, you know, England, I mean, the number of sellouts they've had, the increase in their followership, the way that brands and companies have been investing in them, and all around the world, it's just been a game changer. And that's why we do what we do, right? Is to see change. And so on so many levels, it's incredibly rewarding. Sometimes, I mean, at a WNBA Aces game, I was at the All-Star event this last weekend and I have the history, right? I know the history. I was there when the first, when the Houston Comets won multiple championships for Houston in the WNBA back in the early days. And it's like, for me to look around and see this happening in Vegas and to just see how celebrated Asia Wilson and Chelsea Gray and Kelsey Plum and all of them are, Jackie Young, it's just like so rewarding, even though I didn't have a direct impact on their careers. I feel like everything I've done to try to educate people over all these years, all the advocacy I've done around marketing and sponsorship, it just it feels like, you know, okay, change can happen. It's slow, it's really slow, but you know, it's my job to, at this point, to educate the next generation so that they know how important it is to keep, you know, keep at

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it. Absolutely. Something that you really opened my eyes to, and I didn't know this before I came to you and LV. I came to you with kind of help from my startup, and I think what you talk about in research really does trickle down to the corporations and also their products. So the research that I have always seen on sports, soccer, football, whatever, really was geared towards men and the male performance and the shoes that they wore. So when talking about my own product, my own cleat, it was so interesting that there was a really, a lack of, you know, a lack of focus on women's research, women's sports. So something that I really wanted to do when we researched our product was to equally cover both men and women in our product. And you sent me a really interesting article recently about how women's soccer cleats maybe less, are less like better for them because of these reasons, that they're mostly geared towards men. So I think that going forward, it's important to have that conscience. It's important to be aware of where your research is going, I think.

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You know.

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Yeah, Marty, I'm so glad that you came at it with an understanding that you do need, there is a phenomenal market for girls and women's soccer cleats, right? And that's just not something that you would think would be the case in this day and age, right? You would think, everybody thinks, well, surely Nike, Adidas, all the leaders, Umbro, that they have made cleats for women. And the truth is, they haven't, right? There's a huge percentage of women who are like, my cleats are so uncomfortable, right? And it's mind-blowing. I, you know, to give you another example of something that I saw just this last weekend, Nike had a huge activation going on at the WNBA All-Star Game and of course they've made a shoe for Sabrina Ionescu, which is wonderful. But I'm looking at her branding and they're using S for Sabrina, which is awesome. But you know what, Serena, the legend Serena, was a Nike asset athlete who never had a shoe, right? And she had her own S that she used with her foundation, her nonprofit. You know, it's just like to figure out, okay we've got to make shoes for women basketball players because there's a market in basketball but why haven't we done this you know with soccer cleats? Why haven't we done this with everything? And the reality is you hit on it, Bardia. It's this default mentality and it's happened in marketing. It happens in sports science way too much. I had to caution my colleagues just this last week. There was a study released about some research being done on brain health, right? CTE, we're all aware of that. And one of the things that I saw in the study is they use the word people, right? Generalizable term, people with regards to these findings and what they're learning about diagnosing CTE and athletes, this huge database on fighters in particular and MMA athletes. So I knew just because I've been in this field forever, this is going to be a really small number of women if any at all in their sample. So I reached out to them and asked, they said how many women were actually in your study? And they said, you know it was probably like 10%, maybe 15% whatever. I'm like, then you can't use the word people. You cannot generalize from that small of a sample to women, right? And the reality is women's brains are different. The way that women are injured is not always the same, right? The way that women fight isn't the same. So why would the injuries be the same? And so

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this generalization to women has been a problem forever. In the marketing realm, we used to call it pink it and shrink it,

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shoe right and you would make your size 7 for a guy a size 5 for a woman which is really tiny but you put a pink swoosh on it or sorry pivot mark on it and call it a women's shoe. Absolutely. It doesn't work. Women's feet are not the same as

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men's feet. Right. But this is where I have been trying to help people

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physiological, you know, it doesn't really matter. Women are not little men.

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Right, right. I don't, I truly don't like that because it makes me think of a cookie cutter. And if your cookie cutter is just based on a man's foot, that's completely like ignoring everybody else. else? Like it's just, I'm curious if there's any way, especially in studies like that, where you can address that by having them disclose their participants or disclose the percentage of, you know, their study, you know, cohorts. Is there,

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have you heard of anything like that? Well, I mean in peer-reviewed studies, right, if you read into it, you're going to see exactly what the sample size was, what the composition of gender was, if you look at it. But the reality is, the people who read peer-reviewed scholarly research are usually the people who are doing peer-reviewed scholarly research or students. And so even then, something gets picked up by a media source and it's like, oh, here's a really interesting study on CTE and athletes brains, you know, then they, the media are often the ones that are saying people, right? They're using this generalized term. It may not have been the researchers at all who did it but it gets generalized that way. So it's something, it's an educational piece, it's an awareness piece just like in marketing where I have been doing this entire career, I will never stop where I ask the question, right? You just ask the question, is this actually generalizable to women as well as men, right? You know, the easiest test that I always suggest that people do and this is a really cool example in my mind, there was a group that did a hashtag campaign a few years ago called cover the athlete and what they did because the gender bias in sport media coverage of women was like just so grossly gendered, right? So sexist, honestly. And so what they did is they filmed a video of a reporter asking male athletes the actual questions that had been asked of female athletes, right? And the male athletes are just at times saying, like, I'm not going to answer that. But it's just the flipping of it, right? All we have to do

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is say, like, well, if we did this study and we had 90% women in the study, would we

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generalize it to men, right? Would we just say people? I don't think people think about that. I really don't think that they do. And it's really important. It's such an important field. I'm learning

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We need to really focus on female athletes more.

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Yeah, I mean, if you made a shoe for Megan Rapinoe, right, and then you said, okay, here's the Rapinoe cleat, let's just make it a little bit bigger and we'll sell it to, you know, the guys, nobody would go for that. They'd think you've lost your mind, right? But it's okay on the flip. It's okay on the flip. I know. That's my test. I know. Just flip it.

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I think it's so important to bring just awareness of topics like this. I really do. So, bringing it back just a little bit to you and LV, how can someone follow in your footsteps? How can someone learn from your research and like get started in sports marketing or

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anything like that? Yeah, I'm glad you asked. We started the intercollegiate and professional sport management program in the fall of 2021. We have grown rapidly this fall. We are, we've met our, the number that we can accept. We're over that. We're, all of our classes are full, which is not to discourage anyone from applying, but it is going to get even more competitive to get into the master's degree. We also have an undergraduate certificate in sport leadership and management. And so that's a way that any undergrad student at UNLV in any major can take classes and get experience in sport management, marketing, and then prepare to come to our graduate level degree program. It is such an exciting time in Las Vegas. There is no better place to be if you want to get into the sport industry. I mean, just this right now alone, we've got the number one team in the WNBA. We have the Stanley Cup, you know, Golden Knights. We have Formula One in November. We have the Super Bowl in February.

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And Jay Vickers came on recently and talked all about how the NFL is coming and the internships as well. It's a crazy time. I, if you asked me five years ago, I wouldn't have seen any of this coming. Yeah, well five years ago was the very, very dawning of it,

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which is what's so amazing is how quickly Las Vegas has become this sport mecca. And I think the next five years is gonna be even more incredible because now we have a foundation upon which to build. The last five years has been the foundation building.

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Absolutely, absolutely. So I've got a bit of a fun question for you, my fun question of the day. So what has been your most favorite recent Super Bowl ad? And what about the marketing made it memorable for you?

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So yeah, when it comes to Super Bowl ads, I look at things like that with a very different lens, as you can tell, right? I always look to see, again, you know, how many women are in the ads, who are they targeting with the ads. I think some of the things that are really interesting about Super Bowl ads is when you have a company that spends basically their entire marketing budget on one 30-second commercial because they're so expensive, right? I mean, I can still tell you, and the example I make for my students is one that, you know, it'll never leave my mind. Master Lock, which is just a good old-fashioned padlock, that's what they did. They spent their entire marketing budget on one 30-second commercial where the lock closed and you saw a bullet go through the lock and it didn't open and that was their marketing campaign but it sticks with me right to this day I can tell you like that lock that branch very successful right so I mean you can make a profound impact with one commercial during the Super Bowl if people see it right yes it's kind of gotten to this place now where there's competition to entertain, right? There's competition on a lot of different levels. To me, the real measure is like, is it memorable, right? Is it memorable? The things that stick with me the most, honestly, because this is me, not a general consumer, but I love all the Budweiser ads with the horses and the dogs.

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I know, I know.

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I'll tune in to see those every year.

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That's awesome. Oh my god. Yeah, definitely a really cool Such a such really cool because I feel like that's Sort of where you where a lot of companies show up It's important what their messaging is especially during a really important moment like the Super Bowl Yeah, I mean if you can get if you need a placement if you can get it in a point where people are don't disappear

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Right, they're staying tuned in and they see your ad and you do something that's memorable, like I shared with Master Lock,

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that is a marketing home run. Absolutely, absolutely. So, what are you most excited about in the next five years in Vegas? In Vegas? Oh man, I can't even imagine,

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to be honest with you. I know for a fact our friends at the LBCBA put in over 100 bids for NCAA events the minute that the door opened for us to be an NCAA host. So we weren't allowed to do that right until sport betting was legal in multiple states. So we will have a men's final four. I want to see a women's final four. If I got to have things my way we would always have the WNBA All-Star team in town or All-Star game in town because I love that event and I'm a huge women's sport fan as you know. I think we'll get the Super Bowl back. I think we're going to blow the roof off the Super Bowl this year and they're going to want to come back to Vegas. Awesome. Yeah, every time they do it'll be amazing. We've had the CONCACAF events so I would not be surprised if I think we'll have more global type events coming as well. You know, the thing about Vegas is we've demonstrated like Formula One, you know, I don't know how many people know that Formula One is building a headquarters in Vegas, right? They've never had a headquarters before. They have been an event-based organization where the event that was happening in a certain location was, you know, there was an operational team that put the event on in that city. And they're now building a headquarters. Is that it? Well, it's a different business model. It's a very unique business model, right? And so, it's shifting now because Liberty Media bought them. And when Liberty Media bought the company, they're shifting the model to be different. And that's why they're going to have this headquarters here in Vegas. So, you know, that's being built. It will be accessible to the public. And that in and of itself is another big game changer. The fact that we're home to the UFC is something that so few people really understand. The UFC is incredible in what they do. That's another sport property that people are so focused on the NFL and NHL, etc. But the UFC has grown that brand from nothing literally to a global prominence. And the company that bought them recently also bought the WWE, so that's going to be a fascinating thing to watch as the WWE moves to Vegas under the watchful eye of the UFC. So, I mean, you know, there was Tina Quigley, who's the Las Vegas Economic Global Alliance head, the other day was reading a sarcastic article, but it was really funny, about like every single sport team moving to Vegas, right? Because that's just where we are, right? We are being...

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It's incredible.

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Vegas is where everybody wants to be, you know? So I just look for it to continue to grow. And I think what's really super exciting for people who are locals to Vegas is we now have our own teams. We have our own identity. Even if you're not like in the price range of the Golden Knights or the Raiders, you can go to Dollar Loan Center and go to the Silver Knights and go to some incredible sporting events at a small venue. You can still get behind our Rebels. We have phenomenal teams. Lindy LaRock and what she's done with our women's basketball team here in Vegas has gotten national attention. So it's just a fun place to be. There is not a better sport market, I would argue, in the world right now. And that's why we like to say we are the global leader of sport and entertainment. Not just entertainment, but now sport is part of that equation. So I don't know what the next five years is going to look like, but man, I say buckle

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up. It's going to be exciting. I know, that's what I would say. So there's also a really cool event that I just heard about. If anyone is who's listening and would like to go to it, I'm sure you've heard of this Dr. Lowe, the Sports Entertainment Innovation Conference held next summer, also known as SEI Con. So, you can also learn more about that. That'll be July 16 through 18, 2024. You can go to sei-con.org, that's sei-con.org. And you can learn more about the Sports Innovation Department as well at UNLV by going to sportsinnovation.unlv.edu. So just closing out the show here, thank you so much for being here, Dr. Lowe. I had an incredible time.

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Thank you, Bari. Just as a quick note, I'm also a co-director with the Sport Innovation Group here at UNLV. Seacon is going to be another global changing event. So thank you for this opportunity. Love every minute of it and happy to see how Pivot grows.

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I hope that it's a success.

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Oh, I appreciate that. Thank you so much, Dr. Lo. And thank you all for listening. You can find us anywhere you find your podcasts, including Spotify, Apple Podcasts, by just looking up The Pivot Point. Thank you so much. Thank you all for listening to the Pivot Point. You can follow us at PivotPointUNLV on Twitter, Thank you all for listening to the Pivot Point. You can follow us at PivotPointUNLV on Twitter, all one word, and hope you enjoyed the show.