“IT performance increases across the board when CIOs are involved in shaping business strategy, ” a McKinsey & Company survey report recently concluded. At International Speedway Corporation (ISC), Craig Neeb demonstrates that CIOs can race past their IT constraints to do just as much to rev up business performance.
ISC, the $650+ million promoter of motorsports-themed entertainment activities, owns and/or operates 13 of the nation’s premier motorsports entertainment facilities, including the home of the famed DAYTONA 500 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series motor race.
Neeb joined ISC in 2000 as CIO and since has taken on expanded responsibilities including marketing services and business development. In his current role as executive vice president, chief development officer and chief digital officer, he oversees ISC’s IT, integrated media, the Motor Racing Network (MRN) radio programming operation, and business and corporate development.
At ISC, like most of the businesses surveyed in the recent CIO Tech Poll: IT Economic Outlook, technology projects are increasingly focused on external customers. Customer engagement is a particularly critical issue for ISC because the organization in one sense is competing with broadcasters that contribute a significant portion of its revenue.
“Fan engagement and retention is very important to us because the at-home experience has become so terrific with the growth of high definition television,” says Neeb. “The creativity that our broadcast partners have been able to develop is really making the at-home experience almost as good as being there,” he says.
But being there is a unique experience, he adds, and the company is finding ways to leverage technology to enhance that on-site experience, from large video displays to mobile to connecting fans with drivers virtually. Social media is also at play, he adds, as in, “How do you get fans that are here to share experiences that hopefully will get people jealous enough to want to be here with them?”
A key business strategy for ISC is expanding beyond its core motorsports-oriented business, such as its joint venture with Penn National Gaming in the Hollywood Casino at Kansas Speedway. While the Speedway hosts two high-profile NASCAR Sprint Cup Series events annually, it formerly was vacant for much of the rest of the year. With the casino located on Turn Two, it has been transformed into a year-round, multi-use entertainment center.
“What really makes our facilities unique compared to a football stadium or basketball arena in professional leagues is they really only get used for big fan events two or three times year,” says Neeb. As chief development officer he’s now charged with finding new revenue opportunities and facilities use opportunities for ISC properties.
Those efforts culminated recently in an announcement with the live entertainment division of sports and entertainment promoter AEG that will result in large music festivals at several ISC venues.
Early on, Neeb demonstrated to ISC how even relatively basic technology could have a substantive impact on business results. At the time, he recalls, each racetrack had its own ticket office operation, open Monday through Friday, 9 am to 5 pm. “We were spending all our advertising dollars on upcoming events on Sunday races, and we looked into the phone logs and noticed this huge volume of calls on Sundays when nobody was there to answer them.” He set up an experimental centralized call center operation focused on nights and weekends, which quickly exceeded operations.
As a result, he says, “The leadership team realized that while technology played a small part in that, it really was a business initiative that drove incremental value, and so they gave me responsibility for it.” Subsequently, he added responsibility for ISC’s creative and print distribution team and other assets focused on marketing execution. “In essence, every consumer touch point that we had, when it came to operational execution, fell under my responsibility.”
Neeb’s assumption of marketing responsibilities preceded the 2012 Gartner, Inc., prediction that by 2017 CMOs would be spending more on IT than CIOs. Today, though, there’s growing evidence that externally focused marketing projects are garnering larger shares of the overall IT spend.
But in Neeb’s view, it’s not an either-or proposition. “There’s probably not a single business strategy that doesn't have an element or thread of technology woven into it, because that’s just the world we live in.”
Craig Neeb serves as International Speedway Corporation's (“ISC”) Executive Vice President, Chief Development Officer and Chief Digital Officer. In this role Neeb is responsible for leading strategic business opportunities positioned to help ISC’s growth within and beyond the traditional core business. In addition Neeb is responsible for the company’s overall digital strategy identifying unique and innovation solutions to deepen customer engagement. Specific areas of oversight include Motor Racing Network (MRN), Information Technology, Integrated Media, Business and Corporate Development.
