What do you see when you see a race car? If you answered a race car, you’d be wrong! From the marketer’s viewpoint, you don’t see a car, you see a strategy!
A race car is a strategic marketing tool to be used to present the sponsor’s sales message to a targeted audience. The more people in that audience that are influenced to purchase the sponsor’s product, the more you can charge for this strategy. Other elements come into play like who makes up this audience. In racing, it generally reaches a predominately male, young, audience. If that is who the sponsor wants to reach, then sell him on this strategy!
Many years ago, I sold TV airtime for a living. It’s really quite the same. I didn’t view television as an entertainment option, I viewed it as a strategy to sell my prospects and customers. A :30 second advertisement time in the middle of a favorite show was strictly a piece of inventory. The popular shows cost more because more people saw the advertisement. The shows with the most "inventory" cost less because we had more ad spots to sell, the law of supply and demand. If no one watched the show AND the station had a lot of "inventory", you could be sure that the advertising time during the show was extremely CHEAP! If the show only had a few available "spots" and a big audience, you could expect to pay a lot of money for that advertising time.
The same strategy relates to racing, just a different form of media. The race car and TV advertising time are the same strategic choice. We charge more for better spots on the race car – more people will see it! We charge more for bigger sign on the race car – more people will read it!
But the important element to remember is that the race car is merely a strategy for the sponsor to use. He views the race car, not as a speedy vehicle that we, as racers, are passionate about, but rather, as a piece of available inventory. He wants you to deliver on the promise that many people will view his advertisement on your race car and that many of those people who see it will respond by buying his products or services. He is willing to pay an amount of money for you to deliver on this promise.
So now, how do you make your "strategy" sell? Well, rather simply, by making it more sellable.
Consider just increasing the audience size. Car shows, displays, etc. will instantly increase the size of your audience. A bigger audience means more people to see the advertisement! Get your team and driver published in media. Pictures, stories, television time. Again, more people see the race car and your sponsor. Let’s say that now instead of 250,000 fans watching your car at the race track over the course of a season, we have added an additional (example figures) 10,000 from car shows and displays and another 150,000 who saw your car on the local news and 50,000 more in the local newspaper.

Now instead of an audience size of 250,000, we have a strategy that will reach 250,000 + 10,000 +150,000 + 50,000 = 460,000!! WHAT A DIFFERENCE! Instead of trying to sell the sponsor on paying $X on reaching 250,000 people, we are selling him on paying $X on reaching 460,000!
Now, add in a focus on making those 250,000 at the race track respond more to seeing your race car. Devise methods to increase your car’s popularity among fans. Maybe it is driver appearances, coupons available, sponsor product samples at your paddock area, brochures, pamphlets, talk about your sponsor products on the public address system. The point is to sell, sell, sell your sponsor. When doing interviews, mention the upcoming cars shows and displays. Maybe more people will show up. With an increase in response among the audiences you reach, the sponsor will sell more product. That’s the key reason he sponsors you in the first place! He doesn’t car about race cars, he cares about the strategy.
So the next time you look at your race car, what you see should not be just a race car. When you choose to wear the marketing hat,you should also see a strategy! Use that strategy to convince the sponsors that with it, they can sell more products. I used to do it all the time when I sold TV. "Your spot during Good Morning America and the early news, plus one on ABC Sports will reach XXX people with the influential medium of television, it’s worth $XXX for you to advertise in these programs!"
A race car is the same thing. Just a marketing strategy! A pretty exciting one at that!