What is Fuse Sport? A marketing agency, a media firm or a troop of agents for individual sports stars? A little bit of all three, reveals founder Mark Dixon.
How many times have you paid to get a job done and then thought ‘bloody hell, I could have done better than that myself’?
It was this realisation that led Mark Dixon, the then marketing director of the Telegraph Group, to kick start plans for a new breed of sports marketing agency.
“I don’t really want to slag off the competition” he says, perfectly teeing up the imminent slagging, “but there were an awful lot of mediocre firms sitting in with clients that were spending money with us. For me that just highlighted that the opportunity was there for an agency that really understood both sport and the media, rather then just one to the detriment of the other.”
Versatile players
Robinson
It’s this that Dixon now insists he’s established with Fuse Sport – a firm rapidly approaching its first anniversary and already boasting clients such as local boxing hero Ricky Hatton, AOL, Northern Rock, Paddy Power and Paul ‘king of the back-pass clearance’ Robinson. A rather bizarre mix of firms and individuals that we’ll get on to in due course.
“That’s where the name came from” Dixon continues at pace. “I thought we could really ‘fuse’ together genuine sports and media expertise.
“We (Dixon was joined at the outset by Adam Roland, previous head of talkSPORT sponsorship, former professional footballer Ben Haworth and fellow Telegraph director Tedd Walmsley) have great senior level contacts in the media, but also high-level connections in sport.
“For example with my life at the Telegraph and Adam’s at talkSPORT we were constantly making contacts with governing bodies, senior rights holders, football clubs and agents. That gives us a slightly different position from almost anyone out there in the marketplace and has given us some great ‘ins’ over this first year.”
Indeed it has. The offices at How-Do have been subject to a deluge of releases from Fuse over the past months, each one bearing tidings of a new premiership footballer, broadcaster or pugilist that has signed them up to ‘exploit commercial and brand possibilities’.
It’s impressive, but also slightly confusing.
Agents or agency?
If you take a gander at Fuse’s website, they seem to be selling themselves as experts at helping major brands align themselves with sporting opportunities. However, with the influx of sports people on their books, they ostensibly appear closer to some sort of personal management team operating at a tier below the typical agent level.
To the confused How-Do hack – who couldn’t make head or tail of the whole convoluted Tevez saga – it all seems a bit shadowy and ambiguous.
So, the simple question is; what does Fuse actually do? What’s involved in this sports marketing lark?
“We put brands and media owners together (for sponsorship deals etc) and we’re matching up brands and individuals as well” is Dixon’s reply.
“The reason we publicise the individuals we deal with is partly to raise our profile, but primarily so we can communicate to brand marketing teams that if they’re looking for anything from an ambassador to a one off involvement from a sportsperson, then we have very fast ‘ins’ to all these big names.
“Often when brands are looking to get involved in the sports market for the first time they may not know where to start, and that’s where we come in.”
Sealing the deal
The best way of getting a handle on Fuse’s work is probably to consider a couple of their recent successes.
Stelling
In the sphere of matchmaking brand and sporting personality they’ve just brokered a deal between Coral and Sky Sports’ Jeff Stelling. This will see the chirpy anchorman becoming Coral’s ‘brand ambassador’, popping up everywhere from in-store marketing to online at www.coral.co.uk in an attempt to give the bookie greater gravitas in the world of football (Coral’s traditional strength has been with four legs rather than two).
Dixon’s enthusiasm when describing this deal suggests he sees it as a pivotal one of for the agency so far.
Another development undoubtedly close to his heart is the deal the firm’s just finalised with the Telegraph and new online betting firm digibet – ably demonstrating their silky skills in the media arena. This is a sponsorship package where digibet (who are, incidentally, Man City’s betting partner this season) will sit alongside Setanta as the headline sponsors of the paper’s enduringly popular Fantasy Football league.
Loafers
Delving into such endeavours does make the operation slightly less opaque, but still leaves questions over its handling of individuals.
Namely, does it act as an agent when representing people such as Robin Van Persie, Andy Johnson or Jussi Jaaskelainen? And, if so, is that not treading on other people’s Italian loafers somewhat?
“Not at all” retorts Dixon. “The reality is we’re making their lives easier.
“With football agents, for example, their background and focus has been on football. So, they may have worked with sports brands in terms of getting deals for their players, but the chances are they’ve never worked with media companies or other big brands. They’re just not connected into those worlds.
“They might not know where to start when looking for deals with the marketing directors of x, y and z. So they can use us as a way of assisting them and bringing different kinds of deals to their players. It’s definitely a co-operative arrangement with the agents; we’re certainly not just bulldozing them out of the way. Not at all.”
Supporters
The reality of the situation then, is that Fuse is comprised of well-connected middlemen: brokers and strategists that can bring the media, brands and sportspeople together to realise a shared dream of increasing profile and profit. It’s a pretty sweet set up for all concerned.
And that includes Mediavest Manchester.
Although Dixon doesn’t talk much about the regional media powerhouse (or, for that matter, his brief tenure in between The Telegraph and Fuse at the ill-fated Sportsman publication, where he was also marketing director) they do hold an important (majority) stake in the business, along with himself, Roland and Haworth.
“No, we don’t publicise that too much,” he admits as our conversation draws to a close. “I suppose we could have launched as Mediavest Manchester Sport or something, but we’re a separate entity and always wanted to be. That way we can work with anybody and avoid being pigeon-holed.”
Something that, with Fuse’s range of services and sports personalities, isn’t likely to happen anytime soon.
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