Unknown Speaker 0:01 Do you ever think about how many athletes we know the names of, but may have never watched them play their sport? An athlete like Mark McMorris or Simone Biles, who many likely only watched during the Olympics or on her Instagram. In this day and age, many athletes are also social media influencers, which makes them more money from sponsorships, ads, and other endorsements. Our very own Alex Cyr looks at how the influencer market has made it easier for Olympic athletes in Canada to make money, but also much harder for those who choose to not promote themselves on social media. This is Same Difference. Unknown Speaker 0:43 My name is Melissa Bishop and like most of you and you're stuck at home with your kids right now so I have a great idea. Active For Life has over 200 resources with activities that you can do with your kids from the age of one up until the teenage years. It's physical literacy, it teaches them how to move and really just waste some energy. Go check it out. Unknown Speaker 1:04 Oh, jump again. As she speaks, Melissa Bishop-Nriagu looks down at a camera. She's wearing a long sleeve Nikey shirt and running tights. Her blond hair held back with a thin headband. She has that post workout glow of someone who just got home from the gym. The video she's shooting is not for her own YouTube page. She made it for Active For Life. The Canadian not for profit designed to help young children adopt a healthy lifestyle. The 50 second clip flows well and makes sense. Who better than Bishop-Nriagu is fit looking mom who is clearly active herself to deliver that message. The 31 year old may speak on behalf of Active For Life, but she technically does not work for the organization. Bishop-Nriagu is an online influencer, a person hired by a brand or organism to spread a message and endorse products. She's a good influencer. Her 35,000 followers on Instagram, make her a commodity for brands like Active For Life and Toyota, and RBC and Advil. But online marketing is far from her main focus, and it's certainly not her first love. Bishop-Nriagu is the fastest 800 meter runner in Canadian history. At the last Olympic Games in Rio in 2016, she missed a medal in the 800 meter final, like 13 hundredths of a second. That's about 1/3 the time it takes for an eye to blink. Unknown Speaker 2:42 Struggling the following tickets by Bishop for bronze. This official breaks the Canadian record and she misses a medal by about three feet. This is what we worked for for a decade and to be that close, this is tough/ Unknown Speaker 3:04 When she's not influencing or being a mom and wife, Bishop-Nriagu who is training to ensure that fourth place does not happen again when the next Olympic games take place in Tokyo in 2021. But training on its own does not pay the bills. The harsh reality of being one of Canada's highest performing athletes, is that it just doesn't cover the cost of a proper training regimen and raising a young family. Data from the Department of Canadian Heritage shows that Olympic salaries in Canada are not Olympian at all. In 2018, when the last Olympic Games were held, the average salary for a Canadian competitor was $28,858. That's why many Olympians like Bishop-Nriagu have turned to the world of Instagram influencing to make extra cash. Unknown Speaker 3:56 What we get from the government is it's someone at the point of their life that I'm at like we get enough, Alex, probably to cover a mortgage payment or rent payment and pay for some like I don't pay for facilities but it would be enough to pay for like facilities and equipment and maybe a coavhing fee if but it was not enough money to support, to support that a lot of my money and the funding came from what I had my sponsorship dollars and that's kind of what that's what pads your pocket a little bit. Unknown Speaker 4:32 Bishop-Nriagu is among an increasingly large group of elite athletes who were turning to influencing to earn cash. In addition to her long term athletic contract with Nikey she also has athletes influencing sponsorships with the likes of Toyota, RBC, Huggies, Dairy Farmers of Canada. Kellogg's and baby stroller company Bugaboo. She, like many other athletes needs those influencing dollars to support a life of training, travel, family building and career development. What many athletes are discovering, however, is that in this new and rapidly evolving influencing economy, you don't have to be stronger, faster or more skilled than everyone else to become an Instagram star with enough sponsors to earn a decent living. What matters more than being athletic, is that you are persuasive, attractive, and charismatic. Unknown Speaker 5:40 Local businesses in Bishop-Nriagu's hometown of Eaganville, Ontario, were her first sponsors. It was 2011. And back then, a major sponsorship seemed like a pipe dream. The young runner had little international racing experience, zero Olympic appearances and her social reach, like that of most people a decade ago, started at family and ended at friends. To raise enough money for training costs. Bishop-Nriagu had to get creative. She negotiated sponsorships with building supply shops, grocery stores, and health clinics around Eganville, the town of 1000, located 130 kilometers west of Ottawa. Unknown Speaker 6:23 I think in the summer of 2011, or 10, I can't really recall but I think that was the first time I sent out my sponsorship letters was kind of like a cover letter and my resume that but for athlete purposes, that's what I had sent out. I mean, I sent to my dentist and my Home Hardware store times two and the grocery store. And my, my pitch to them was to help me get on the 2012 team. But by doing that I needed to be able to compete internationally. And I needed to go over and I needed to experience what that was like. So Unknown Speaker 6:55 district reiatsu figured that if she could offer exposure to potential partners, they might be more likely to endorse her. But in 2011, that was easier said than done. Unknown Speaker 7:06 They wanted, they needed a spot to know how I was doing because social media wasn't big back then. I couldn't just post something and then it would get out. All I had was our local paper and this blog. I think I got like eight views a month like it wasn't anything like I don't know if people actually cared to go on other than my family. Unknown Speaker 7:24 Connecting with sponsors to secure extra cash was a time consuming endeavor. But it was also a necessary one. Before ever making an Olympic team Bishop-Nriagu was realizing that the job of an Olympian does not stop at any finish line. In fact, it has two parts. The first is to reach and maintain world class athletic caliber. The second is to find creative ways to support the first. In Canada, funding for elite athletes is a mixed bag with shallow pouches. Three out of four Olympians rely primarily on the athlete Assistance Program for financial support, which is managed by Sport Canada and largely funded by the Canadian government. At its most generous, this program pays top performers $1,765 a month, or $21,180 per year, which is approximately $3,000 more than Canada's basic standard cost of living. Unknown Speaker 8:24 There's a need there. We exist because there's a massive need for athletes that are underfunded. Unknown Speaker 8:30 That's Conrad Lineaman, the CFO of can fund the charity that raises money for Canadian Olympians, Paralympians, and hopefuls, based on both Olympic potential and financial need. Lineaman himself represented Canada at the Sydney Olympics in 2000, in beach volleyball, and spent much of his career strapped for cash. Now, he does his best to tackle the problem. Up to 1000 athletes apply to his charity every year. CanFund can't help every athlete who applies. But every time Lineaman calls an athlete to tell them the charity will support them. He has received with a sigh of relief. Unknown Speaker 9:10 I do most of the calls and you surprise the athlete. The number one response is the breath after I say that to them. The breath. You can feel like their shoulders are up by their ears with stress, and you hear the just like a release of tension and pressure and lik how the hell am I going to get to this tournament? How am I going to pay my coach? How am I going to get better equipment? Again, every sport is different. Some are more funded than others. And that goes by their performance. Like the winter athletes, most of them pay to be on the team. Let me say that again. Yeah, they're going to the Olympics. They pay a team fee to their Federation to be on The National Team. Unknown Speaker 10:16 It wasn't until a few years after she made her first Olympic team in 2012, that Bishop-Nriagu who stopped worrying about making money. She signed with their main sponsor, Nikey in 2013. But it's only by 2014 that her endorsement deals multiplied. It all started with the click of a button. Her agency encouraged her to make an Instagram account. Unknown Speaker 10:40 Things transitioned. I didn't know what kind of power Instagram had, I don't think anybody really did when it first came out or social media in general. Unknown Speaker 10:49 posting a few times per week proved a worthwhile time investment for Bishop-Nriagu. It got her more attention from sponsors than running by itself ever did. For athletes, the opportunities for influencing are plentiful. The exponential growth of social media from 2 billion users in 2015 to 3 billion in 2020 has made it a tremendously effective form of advertising. In fact, influencer marketing became an $8 billion industry in 2020. Last year in North America 1/3 of social media marketers said influencing was the social media tactic they used most and not only are opportunities plentiful, they are increasingly lucrative. The growing popularity of influencer marketing is making influencer value per post skyrocket. Influencer DB, a software that uses statistics to evaluate influencer post value and impact reported that an Instagram post from Canadian snowboarder Mark McMorris is worth 3,410 U.S. dollars. And one from the aptly named CrossFit star Brent Fitkoski is worth 2,856 U.S. dollars, one of tennis star Eugenie Bouchard 68 posts to her 2 million Instagram followers in 2020 was worth 10,593 U.S. dollars. Influencing works so well, that it raises an important question. Unknown Speaker 10:51 How does an athlete evaluate themselves? Like is it free performance? Or is it through social media or both? Unknown Speaker 12:27 That's Dave Korell, category manager at New Balance Candida. Korell's roll with the brand is to boost sales by promoting authentic storytelling around New Balance and its products. He says that the rise of social media has changed how brands or at least New Balance come to decisions about which athletes get sponsored, and which ones don't. Unknown Speaker 12:50 So I would say that 65-35, 65 being the online presence and 35 being athletic performance. There has to be a level of standard but the online abilities will, a brand will get more out of. No young athlete coming out that wants support whatever resource that may be, whether it's bonus or money or products or whatever, if they don't have a social media presence, it's kind of a non starter. Unknown Speaker 13:20 This is how Korrell describes the perfect athlete to sponsor. Unknown Speaker 13:25 The ultimate package is someone who checks the box on performance but on social ability and online ability is good looking, he has a significant following, is genuine. He Is, has a unique story. Unknown Speaker 13:44 In basing sponsorship decisions on much more than athletic ability says Korrell is not unique to New Balance. Unknown Speaker 13:52 Like I would say the only brand that is purely sponsoring on performance, at least at the highest levels is Nikey. Unknown Speaker 14:02 The fact that gaining sponsorships increasingly depends on social media presence is advantageous for charismatic and tech savvy athletes like Bisho-Nriagu. But this new way of making money doesn't work for everyone. Nate Brandon is a now retired 1500 meter runner and Olympic finalist for Canada who never gave into the new Instagram trend. Unknown Speaker 14:25 Could have been one of those people. I jumped on the bandwagon, just it wasn't my boys my personality to just do to ask for for some extra money. Unknown Speaker 14:34 Brandon turned pro in 2005. Five years before Instagram was even created. His marketability for sponsors back then, as far as he was concerned, depended strictly on his running performance. But over the course of his 13 year career, it became increasingly clear that simply running fast might no longer be enough to maintain a contract. Unknown Speaker 14:57 Isn't wasn't until my last couple of years where I saw that switch from performance based to how many followers you have on social media. Unknown Speaker 15:08 in 2016, Brandon finished a career best 10th in the Olympic 1500 meter final in Rio. No Canadian man had placed that well in that event in 16 years. Yet, when his contract with shoe brands sock and he expired four months after the Olympics, despite his top 10 in the world status, they chose not to re-sign him. When he was told he was being let go, Brandon said he just had to laugh. Unknown Speaker 15:38 It was very apparent that if you were a good looking female runner, and not as fast, you were going to get a bigger sponsorship contract and then somebody that was much better than than them, but didn't have a huge social media presence. So we suffered. A lot of those athletes that can make a final or at least a semi final suffered a lot more than obviously person winning a medal or someone that is making a U.S. championship. Unknown Speaker 16:28 It's not all athletes that want to be influencers. It's also not all athletes that can be influencers, says Euron Sue, a sport marketing researcher at Temple University in Georgia. It turns out, growing an online brand and succeeding in today's economy depends on things that transcend the playing field that cannot be easily controlled. Unknown Speaker 16:52 I don't think it is really lies about the sports you play. It's about whether you have compelling personal story to share. Unknown Speaker 17:01 Being a good influencer is a science in itself. Sue says that influencers are successful when they convey both expertise and likability. When an influencer displays the relevant knowledge, skills or experience to make correct and objective assertions, they earn what Sue and other researchers called cognitive source credibility. In other words, viewers trust influencers they perceive to be experts. So for example, people will trust an elite marathon runner more when he or she endorses a pair of running shoes than when he or she endorses, say, an electric guitar. So all else being equal, this marathoner would be a more valuable influencer for Adidas than for Fender guitars. But expertise is not all that matters. People are also more likely to believe a message delivered by someone who is physically attractive and similar to themselves. That is called effective source credibility. And according to sue, it's even more powerful than perceived expertise. Case in point in 2020, American internet users aged 16 and up, were more likely to accept advice about sports and fitness products, like protein shakes and dumbbells from Jennifer Lopez than from NBA superstar Dwayne Wade. And also, there were four times as likely to take fitness advice from Ellen DeGeneres than from Rich Froning, who was four times crowned the fittest man on earth. Sue says that in the end, viewers are drawn to influencers who are knowledgeable, trustworthy, and attractive. And none of those qualities require an Olympic medal, or even an appearance, or even a tryout. That's why athletic brands would sometimes rather endorse the attractive and the relatable, instead of the strictly athletic. It's all about the clicks, the views and the exposure that a sponsored person can bring to the brand. Unknown Speaker 19:00 If I asked you today, whether being an Olympian makes you any better positioned to become a paid athlete, influencer, that's someone than someone who just looks sporty and is relatable. Is that true? Unknown Speaker 19:17 It's hard to say because business like marketing is all it's very outcome driven. It's all boils down to how many likes and how many forums. Unknown Speaker 19:44 If sponsorships no longer favor, the most athletic, but rather than most charismatic, what does that mean for the future of elite sport? Charlene Weaving is sport philosopher at St. Francis Xavier University who researches the Olympic Games. predicts the rise of influencing will exacerbate the disconnect between athletic performance and sponsorship earnings that has existed for many years. Do you think that the world of athletic sponsorship was ever a sport based meritocracy, totally? Unknown Speaker 20:18 No. No, I don't think so. I think it's always been flawed and unethical and bias. Yeah. Unknown Speaker 20:26 Would you say that there was never that it was always like that, that it was always the marketable one succeed, and the less marketable ones fail, for lackof better? Unknown Speaker 20:36 Yeah, I think women have failed more so than men. Unknown Speaker 20:40 What do you think are that Yeah, okay. So that's a characteristic, what do you think would be some of the characteristics that's make someone succeed and makes others not succeed? Unknown Speaker 20:48 Gender. I think your overall for lack of a better word sex appeal, your your story and then you can you could add, like, you know, like your skin colour, race, ethnicity, apart and have already thecelebrity status. Unknown Speaker 21:08 Weaving said that an additional fear about the growing power of influencing is that it did get some athletes to capitalize on it in new and perhaps regrettable ways. Unknown Speaker 21:20 I think there's more opportunity, like based on my research, but my concern would be is that there's going to be for women athletes, it's all going to be going around this like stereotypical hyper sexualization, mode the masses of attention to get the sponsorship. Unknown Speaker 21:48 Over the last five years, influencers have become pervasive, a part of everything from the diet and fashion industries to gaming in photography. More recently, influencing accounts for parenting, real estate, are becoming increasingly common. Some people gain followings for posting about their ailments and diseases. In the world of athletics, influencing and sports are also already intricately intertwined. Companies like Open Doors and Influencer exist to help athletes build a personal following and connect with brands. The National Collegiate Athletic Association, or the NCAA, which historically forbade financial opportunities for its student athletes announced in April of 2020, that players will be allowed to become influencers by the 2021-22 academic season. This ruling could open the door to millions of dollars for the league's most followed athletes. Bishop-Nriagu says she expects influencing will be a part of her life, for as long as she's a professional athlete. Between training sessions, she works with an agent on content ideas, she negotiates new and recurring contracts with brands. And she spends roughly an hour per day creating new content. But she also understands the value of time, only like the mother of a young child can, or like a fourth place finisher, in the Olympic final can. Even though she sees its benefits, she cannot justify making influencing her main gig. Unknown Speaker 23:22 My gut is telling me that I'm more comfortable and confident on the track and competing and working hard and putting that kind of work in, then I would be with social media. But I think there's a lot of give and take with social media and I'm not completely invested in it, like I am invested on the track. And if I was to put all my eggs into social media, then yes, I think there would be an opportunity, a bigger opportunity to gain some money. I don't know how much more but if I was willing to be on my phone 24/7 and if you're my child, then I would probably try and do that as well. Unknown Speaker 24:00 Influencing, says Bishop-Nriagu has bought her time at the track. Time, she otherwise would have to spend fundraising or teaching. But it's just a means to amore important ends, the medal at the 2021 Olympics and a comfortable life beyond that. So she uses her tool carefully, unwilling to lengthen the rest between her intervals, or shorten a play time with her daughter to create perfect captions, fiddle with filters, or find the right combination of hashtags that will get her trending. Unknown Speaker 24:35 I feel more confident trying to get the money out of it attract sponsorship. I feel like I have more talents on the track. Unknown Speaker 24:42 She hopes that ultimately, it's her most elusive talent, the one of running fast, that will help her make a living. Unknown Speaker 24:51 I think a gold medal will speak more for sponsorship dollars, then social following. Unknown Speaker 25:19 Alex, influencer era is nuts. Everyone wants to be one. And so many people have these massive platforms. That was Alex Cyr with our seventh episode. And thanks to our executive producer Emily Morantz, associate producer Manuela Vega, artwork by Ben Shelley, theme music composed by John Powers. I've been your host Gracie Brison. And of course last but not least, huge shout out Amanda Cupido an Instagram influencer herself. Not really though. And remember, fitting in is overrated.