Elevating USA Track & Field’s Social Media at the 2024 U.S. Olympic Team Trials - Track & Field

What a time to be alive for our team here at thunder::tech! Our Social Media Team spent two weeks in Eugene, Oregon, capturing history in the making at the 2024 U.S. Olympic Team Trials - Track & Field. With our team racing around the track documenting the country's best track and field stars, our Social Media superstars leaned in to our long-standing partnership with USA Track and Field (USATF) at full speed. 
 

The Goal 

After hitting a plateau in their social media strategy, USATF’s goal was to grow their presence to extend further than the Track & Field community and reach a more engaging and impactful audience. They turned to thunder::tech to unlock the untapped potential of showcasing athletes as people beyond their sport and from there it was off to the races. This allowed for traditional athletics information to be featured on USATF's social media pages along with engagement-based, audience-focused content. 
 

Behind the Scenes 

The Social Media t::team met with athletes during practice times and after events to learn more about their personalities and interests, giving audiences a glimpse into their lives beyond the sport. Through sharing this side of Track & Field household names, the t::team created lighthearted content encouraging audiences to join the social media conversation. Tattoo tours, nail art inspiration, nostalgic memories of first track meets and even a debate on how a dog should wear pants were just a few content topics used to encourage athletes to chat with the t::team.

Athletes appreciated the t::team's white board questions as it was a welcome change of pace in the media line. Traditional outlets frequently ask how an athlete feels post-performance and are only concerned on the sport, which can get tedious to handle. The t::team soon became friends with athletes given the fun, lighthearted and interesting questions asked and the conversations had with them!

The Outcome 

Our team of social media trailblazers sprinted past KPI expectations based on initial forecasting and created exclusive content no other media outlet was covering for USATF to own. USATF’s total organic social media reach for Olympic Trials peaked at 20.8 million, which was more viewers than the 2024 NBA Finals! Our platform-specific social media strategy focusing on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook and X lead to unprecedented results.   

After our t::team started posting on USATF’s Instagram, they gained nearly 23,000 followers skyrocketing their Follower Growth Rate to almost 4%. Instagram’s best-performing posts were ones that made the audience feel not only included in the USATF experience, but also “in on the joke”. One of the crowd favorite posts was an “excuse from work” letter for fans, signed by the USATF CEO as a shoutout for supporting Track & Field. This introduced an entirely new layer of personality to USATF’s social media brand.

Our TikTok strategy mirrored Instagram, giving the audiences a new perspective of their favorite athletes The top-performing TikToks were ones where the athletes were able to chat as the people they are. For example, Yared Nuguse shared he is a “Swiftie” while Noah Lyles and Tara Davis-Woodhall explained what they would do in a zombie apocalypse. 

These talking points have absolutely nothing to do with split times or how they placed in their event, but that's exactly the point. Giving the USATF fans an opportunity to know their favorite athletes and see the USA Track & Field experience beyond their events created an entirely new perspective to know and love. Over this two-week period, TikTok followers increased by 1.6k and total engagements for USATF’s TikTok from Olympic Trials exceeded expectation. The forecasted Engagement Rate was 4-5% and the updated content strategy resulted in a 7.55% Engagement Rate. 

Athletics took center stage on X during Olympic Trials with engaging content as supplemental content for a well-rounded strategy. All event results were posted in real time to keep fans and media outlets in the loop as soon as possible. Although we used a different strategy to be customized to a different audience, it still went off without a hitch and produced increased engagement and follower growth.

Paid social media was also at play during this time to promote USATF merchandise. Ads on Instagram and Facebook resulted in a 4.46 Return On Ad Spend (ROAS), leading to incredible ad revenue for the brand! Every endeavor our talented team here at thunder::tech has undertaken in our partnership with USATF has yielded impressive outcomes, so we were thrilled when our t::team exceeded both forecasts and expectations once again.  

Our Social Media t::team is always up for a challenge! Whether it's across the country or in our own backyard, we’re ready to make social media magic. Contact our team today and see what we can do to make your business’s social media thrive!