Digital & Dirt
00:45:07 · Ian Dallimore, Monica Ellingson
[00:45:07] S0: So obviously, tennis men... Mental toughness is key. I mean, fact that those women and men play four to six plus hours deep into the night sometimes is mind blowing to me. But I just wrote a note down, the mental toughness side on golf and then tying in that historical data of a golfer that's been at Augusta, you know, the last seven years and on this hole, they did this, this, and this. So for you guys to dissect that down, like, that's wildly exciting as a fan to be like, woah, I had no idea that Rory was at this hole four years ago and he eagled it. So today, statistically, what is his chances of eagling here and then watching the momentum and maybe it start sprinkling. See, look, my mind works like yours. [00:45:51] S1: See, you're already brainstorming. [00:45:52] S0: What else can we do? I know. Can I come intern for you? Let's do this. [00:45:55] S1: You just stepped inside my mind right there. I know.
00:45:57 · Ian Dallimore
[00:45:57] S0: Right? It's fun and terrifying as well as mine. But the thing that you talked about, which I love in shifting over to The Masters and and Augusta, when you open that app and, you know, I had the US Open app just because we met, and I was like, I'm gonna download this and actually see their work in life to at least prepare for the podcast. But The Masters, I've I've had that app downloaded. I've never been been invited a few times, haven't gone, which most people are like, you're crazy. I know. Trust me. We have a we have a Lamar office in Augusta. We have digital right outside of the gates. Like, it's... I don't want say it's easy for me to go, but I have had opportunities. But to your point, like, I'm looking to my left here because I have a little iPad stand where when you turn on and open that app, you're not just showing data and statistics and just the basic players when they tee off. To your point, it opens up. And maybe because I'm also a geek and I love landscape architect and all that thing, but it's almost like you guys have also captured the brand itself within the app and expressing each hole and the importance of it and the history of it. It... I feel like in that one, you're storytelling more than anything beyond just stats and data. Like, you're you're bringing to life. And to your point, like, the accessibility of fans to the Masters is extremely difficult to get to, but it lives right inside your your phone in such a meaningful way that that's more than just a typical sports app.
00:47:23 · Monica Ellingson, Ian Dallimore
[00:47:23] S1: Well, thank you so much for that on behalf of my team and also, you know, the... You know, Augusta National hires, you know, some of the very best photographers in the world. Their editorial teams are unbelievably talented. So I I feel so lucky to work around people who are able to capture, you know, such beauty and to put put it together in such an elegant way. I mean, it's... It takes an army to pull that off, to be honest. And, you know, so I'm I'm I'm glad. Thank you for that on the path of everybody behind me. [00:47:58] S0: Of course. Yeah. So let's pivot over. So as we kind of... The last ten minutes here, you know, your mind, as you had mentioned, your team is constantly bringing new things. But, you know, with AI becoming more prevalent, to your point, like, on the team needs to have some sort of use and the tool of it. But where do you see the biggest opportunities for AI and data in sports? And I know you're harnessing it already, but what are those new opportunities moving forward?
00:48:25 · Monica Ellingson
[00:48:25] S1: I think the biggest opportunity is we have with with AI and, you know, tools like Claude and Bob and others that enable us to be able to, you know, once you have an idea and to create a working prototype of that idea sometimes within hours or or or days at the longer end, which means that you can succeed fast and you can fail fast. You know, in the past, if you if you think about it, you know, we would we would have, you know, ideation sessions with, you know, Wimbledon and USTA, Masters, others, you know, after each tournament. And then, you know, we would... It would take, you know, weeks or months to pull together our proof of concept behind these ideas. And by that point, even that's a big investment in time and money and etcetera. And especially when, you know, the event's not gonna move. So you have to, you know, the idea that you have, if you're gonna bring it forward, you have to get it, you know, in development and test it out and hardened, you know, very, very quickly. So I think the fact that, you know, you can pull ideas forward and prove them out so quickly means that the speed of innovation is going to move lightning fast. And I think that's really exciting, you know, because, you know, again, just the investment in an idea and being able to prove it out so quickly. You know, it's always been certainly very disappointing in the past when, you know, you have an idea, you spend all the time investment on it, and then you're like, maybe it wasn't as, you know, great as we thought it was gonna be. And, you know, that happens. But now you can you can honestly abandon something, you know, faster without spending all that that time. And, so I'm really, really curious and excited to see, you know, how that's gonna affect not just the sports industry, but, you know, the entire consulting industry and technology as a whole. I mean, we've already seen just massive ripple effects, in this evolution of the speed of innovation. And I think that we're all trying to sort of figure out like, what does this really mean and how do we need to change the way we work, the way we work with our clients, the way we work as designers, as writers, as developers, it's going to touch and has touched every part of our lives.
00:50:47 · Ian Dallimore
[00:50:47] S0: Yeah. And creating those efficiencies has to be massive for you guys. We're downloading the event itself happens within moments, and you're probably able to run run analysis in real time Yep. To figure out as well. So same question around AI, you know, fans are increasingly expect that digital experience to adapt to your interests and behavior. I. E. Monica, why are you not reading my mind that I would love for this to be on my app? But where do you see that space with AI helping kind of better understand the consumers? It's almost like historically what is you know, worry done on the eighteenth hole of the Masters. It's like, well, what is user 1234 ABC utilize the most? So where do you see that space and personalization?
00:51:33 · Monica Ellingson
[00:51:33] S1: Well, I think that without AI, I mean, we've been using AI for... To assist with personalization goals for almost a decade at at IBM and, you know, within our sports portfolio. And so, you know, and I I think it's really almost become commoditized at this point. And, you know, but I think that in terms of personalization, you know, what what I struggle with is, you know, we don't want to, you know, have personalization crossover into a more invasive space with our fans. So being able to delight and, you know, exceed their expectations, but not invade their privacy at the same time. And that's a delicate balance and something that is extremely important to IBM and extremely important to all the clients that I work with. So I think that, you know, in a way, I'd like to... I definitely wanna know more about these fans and, you know, what they're what they're really interested in. I mean, especially looking at the younger demographic of fans that, you know, is... That's moving on, looking at the women as well and, you know, how they are watching and enjoying the sports and how that may be different. Just looking at these different demographic groups, especially when you're looking at a a sport like golf, which, you know, has traditionally been a, you know, older male demographic. You know, how do we appeal to different different groups of people? And so I think that, you know, that's an interesting and exciting space to be to learn more about these fans and how you can tell stories in a different way to to appeal to a different fan base.