Transcript

The transcript below has been lightly edited for readability and clarity. Click any starting timestamp to jump to that exact point in the YouTube video.

Podcast Introduction

[00:00] Don Costante:

Welcome to the Rundown Podcast, hosted by Don Costante, a sports and event management expert with over 25 years experience. This unique podcast provides an opportunity to hear from some of the best professionals in the industry. You’ll get valuable insight and perspective on what it takes to deliver authentic experiences, activate brands, and most importantly, connect with audiences. All on the Rundown Podcast. Let’s get started.

Meet Diane Ferrante

[00:26] Don Costante:

There are a few people who can actually say they’ve spent their entire career with one company, let alone a professional sports franchise. Well, my guest today has done just that. She spent her entire 29-year career with one organization. In fact, she’s only missed six games over 30 seasons. That’s incredible. Her keys to the longevity, being adaptive and having the ability to bring someone else’s vision to life. My guest today is Diane Ferrante, who currently serves as Vice President of Programming and Production and Broadcasting and Game Operations for the Detroit Pistons and Palace Sports and Entertainment. Her responsibilities include overseeing all video production, including television and radio commercials, digital content, marketing materials, broadcast programs, and production of all Detroit Pistons live events. Diane also oversees all elements of game operations, including the Pistons Entertainment Teams, which consist of the Detroit Pistons Dancers, Drumline, Extreme Team, and a kids’ hip-hop group called The Minis. Diane is an Emmy Award-winning producer who was recently inducted into the Information Display and Entertainment Association’s Hall of Fame.

[01:39] Don Costante:

I am proud to say that I have known Diane since my early days in San Antonio with the Spurs, and I consider her a friend as well as a rock star in the sports industry. In this episode, Diane shares her best practices in four key areas of event presentation. Managing people, team introductions, contest development, and digital production. I think we’re ready to get started. Let’s meet Diane Ferrante. Hi, Diane. Thanks for joining me on The Rundown today.

Diane Ferrante’s Career With the Detroit Pistons

[02:09] Diane Ferrante:

Thanks for having me.

[02:10] Don Costante:

I’d like you to take the listeners on your path on how you became vice president of programming and production and broadcasting and game operations for the Detroit Pistons.

[02:19] Diane Ferrante:

Well, it started a long, long, long time ago back before sports production really, I want to say, was even an industry, right? And you joined me in this. We all kind of came up through this newfound industry of game presentation, starting with the video boards, really. So I started as the first video board director at the South of Auburn Hills, which opened in like 1988, actually 1989. And I just kind of grew from there. You know, I moved then to the live side of the game, and then I moved over to the broadcasting side of the game. And eventually it got to the point where I kind of done all of the jobs underneath that are underneath me now. And I just kept growing and growing and growing. So it really, I really just kind of started in the mailroom, if you will. But for our industry, it’s kind of where, you know, where it began with a really, really small show. And it grew from there.

Overseeing Programming, Production, Broadcasting, and Game Operations

[03:13] Don Costante:

So talk a little bit about what does being the vice president of programming and production and broadcasting and game operations entail?

[03:20] Diane Ferrante:

As I always explain it, it’s like everything that happens during the basketball game that’s not basketball, right? So it’s the lights, it’s the cameras, it’s the live performers out on the floor, it’s the sound, it’s all of those sensory things that go on during the game that, you know, really enhance the game. That, including being the liaison with our broadcast partners now, I spent some time in the truck, but now I’m not so much in the truck doing the broadcast, but working with all of those entities to make sure that we all kind of come together as one. That’s really what my job is.

[03:56] Don Costante:

Okay. Let’s talk about philosophy for a second. Teams can definitely have different philosophies. I tell people all the time, you know, what we do with the Royals isn’t necessarily the same as what they do with the Chiefs. It’s not right or wrong, just different. Talk about what your philosophy is towards event presentation and if that’s consistent with your organization or if it’s your philosophy.

Event Presentation Philosophy

[04:16] Diane Ferrante:

I think it’s a little bit of both. So philosophy is a little bit of both. It’s certainly something that after years and years I’ve developed my own personal thoughts, but it’s always been driven by the basketball side of things, right? When you come to a Detroit Piston game, you’re coming to see the world’s greatest athletes play what I feel is the best professional game out there in basketball. So in the end, specifically in the NBA. So they’re not coming to see our dance team. They’re not coming to see the show. Although I think a lot of people will tell you that they have their favorite part of the game. But really, they’re coming to see the best football game. So my philosophy is, A, you never want to be a distraction. So you never want to pull away from the game. People are coming to see the game, A. And then, B, you want to educate, inform, or entertain. And if you’re not doing one of those three things, you really shouldn’t be putting it into your presentation. So it’s a philosophy that started back in the Chuck Daly era and has served me well until the present day.

Alignment With Ownership

[05:18] Don Costante:

Is that consistent with what ownership has in terms of what their philosophy is? Or sometimes have you conflicted?

[05:25] Diane Ferrante:

No, I think ownership would agree. Our ownership, our new ownership in Tom Goros and the Platinum Athlete Group, they really are focused on the game that are keen. And they want it to be a party. They want everybody to have a good time at all times. And I’ve been fortunate because they have provided so many resources. And they’ve said, okay, we want this to be the best show in town. Not only in town, but in professional sports. Like, what do you need? So I felt really, really fortunate. But they share that. They want it to be a very high-value entertainment experience based around family. And there’s something for everybody, from the music that we play to the uniforms that the dancers are wearing when they perform. I mean, they really have been engaged in a good way, in a really good and really positive way.

[06:14] Don Costante:

It’s good to hear you’re in a great situation.

[06:17] Diane Ferrante:

I am. I am. I will say it hasn’t always been that way, though. I mean, there have been times when I’ve had this dream that I laugh about it now. But when I was very, very early in my career in Detroit, when the bad boys were there, you know, we were probably the only club in the world that hated Michael Jordan. We hated Michael Jordan. Like, our fans hated him. Our team hated him. I won’t say our team hated him. But they definitely wanted to keep him down. So one night during a game, I will tell you, we thought it would be really smart to put a headshot of Michael Jordan up while the visiting team was taking a free throw. And I will tell you, it worked. It worked almost too well because the crowd immediately, everybody started booing. But I will tell you, I’ve never seen our general manager move faster to the courtside table than that particular night. So they shut me down pretty quick. But I will tell you, it hasn’t always been a bed of roses. But right now, I feel really fortunate to be in the place I am.

Learning From an Early Michael Jordan Promotion

Managing People and Building the Right Team

[07:19] Don Costante:

Let’s talk about staffing and management of staffing. Disney, I’m a big fan of Walt Disney. Obviously, I’m here in Kansas City. This is where he was rooted, born, and came up.

[07:31] Diane Ferrante:

I didn’t know that.

[07:31] Don Costante:

Yeah, he came up through the ranks here. It was actually nice to be here and have some type of tie with him. But he has a great quote. His quote is, you can design and create and build the most wonderful place in the world, but it takes people to make the dream a reality. And I always keep that in mind. You can have the best plan. If you don’t have the people to run it, things can fall through. Talk about your management philosophy and the type of manager that you are and how you like to manage your staff.

[07:57] Diane Ferrante:

Well, first of all, it’s funny because that quote, somewhere downstairs, I still have the framed picture. I had that quote on my wall in my office.

[08:06] Don Costante:

Oh, awesome.

[08:06] Diane Ferrante:

Probably for 10 years.

[08:08] Don Costante:

Oh, that’s awesome.

[08:09] Diane Ferrante:

Yeah, that exact quote. As a matter of fact, I will tell you, we did an anniversary video and I opened the video with that quote. So it is a great quote and something that I believe in wholeheartedly. I think the best managers are very nice early on that they don’t work for, how do I say this? Their staff don’t work for them. They work for their staff, right? So my job as a manager is to make sure that my staff has every tool that they need to do their job. That they have, you know, a good work environment. They feel free to create, that they feel good. And I think when you’re a manager and you realize that that, that’s when you become really good at what you’re doing.

[08:49] Don Costante:

Well, and that’s why you have longevity. I mean, that’s why a lot of people love to work for you. How many people report directly to you on game day versus non-game day?

Staffing and Department Structure

[08:58] Diane Ferrante:

On a game day, there’s probably between 100 and 125 people that fall in under me. On a non-game day, our full-time staff, I want to say, so full-time as freelancers, we’ve got about 20 people that are either, you know, full-time or they’re kind of full-time seasonal are with us in the office doing office work. So somewhere between there, somewhere around there.

[09:20] Don Costante:

So you have a big title, so you handle a lot of different areas. But I think for those people who are listening, there’s a lot of people who are new or people like myself who have been in the industry. I’m always interested to know how your department’s structured. Can you talk a little bit about your department’s organizational chart and specifically how you’re structured and the number of staff in each of those areas?

[09:40] Diane Ferrante:

I will. And this is a way that it’s been laid out as long as I’ve been involved. I think it’s a really, really good way to lay out the game presentation. So there’s me and then I have two department managers. One oversees the video production side of things and one oversees the live side of things, right? So Sean Martinez, you may know that name. He runs everything on the floor. So light dancers, mascot, performer, DJs, all of those kind of live, non-video-based elements all kind of roll up into Sean. And then Jeremy Smoker, who is in charge of our production staff, he oversees all of the editors. So the editors, the production staff, our camera operators, our studio operators, he oversees that side of things. Then I kind of make sure that those two worlds are working together and that we’re all on the same page between their staff. Sean, on the live side, we have five full-timers. And then on the production side, we have, there are probably 10 full-timers.

[10:45] Don Costante:

Wow.

[10:46] Diane Ferrante:

10 full-timers plus two like seasonal broadcast coordinators that come in. So we have a really, really robust content distribution program as well outside of our games. So we push out a ton of content. So Jeremy’s staff really kind of does double duty. They create everything that plays back in game, but they also push out a ton of content daily based on around our team.

What Diane Looks for When Hiring

[11:11] Don Costante:

Now, when you’re hiring staff members to join your group, what are you looking for in a candidate? Outside of experience, of course, everybody wants experience. But what are you looking for outside of experience?

[11:22] Diane Ferrante:

I think it’s disposition. You know, sports is a tough industry to work in. And you have to really, I always tell people, you get out of it what you put into it. You know, and if you want to come in and you want to learn and you want to understand and you want to know why you’re doing what you’re doing, as opposed to just kind of getting through it, you know, I’ll use logging a game as an example, right? There is nothing worse in this world than logging, than having to sit down and log a basketball game, right?

[11:50] Don Costante:

Right.

[11:51] Diane Ferrante:

I know you’ve been right. We’ve all had to do it. I did it for years. But if you’re going to come in and go, oh, no, I got to log another game, then you’re not going to enjoy it. You’re not going to enjoy what you do. And if you don’t enjoy what you do in this industry, you should leave immediately because the hours are too long. The days are too long. You know what I mean? There’s too much going on to not love what you do every single day, including logging.

[12:16] Don Costante:

Yeah. Do you have a go-to question that you like to ask candidates during the interview?

Why Do You Want to Work in Sports?

[12:21] Diane Ferrante:

Well, it’s funny. You know, I coach a lot. I almost said kids, but they’re college students. I coach a lot of people who are coming out of college when they’re starting to look for that first job. And I’ll always ask just, why do you want to work in sports? There are no holidays in sports. We work nights. We work weekends. We work. We play on Christmas. We play on Easter. We play on New Year’s Eve. Like, why on earth would you ever want to do this? And that, I think, brings on really interesting answers. I find, though, if they say, well, I want to work in sports because I love sports, like, they’re probably barking up the wrong tree.

[12:55] Don Costante:

Right.

[12:55] Diane Ferrante:

So if you love sports, then you should find something else and then just watch sports. You know? So I think that’s kind of my go-to answer is why on earth would you ever want to do this? You know? And if you find somebody who can figure out what their role was in that industry. Like, for me, I wanted to create videos. I didn’t know that I wanted to create basketball videos. I just know I wanted to work in the broadcasting side of the world. When I went to work for the Pistons, I had seen two live NBA games. That’s it.

[13:25] Don Costante:

Wow.

[13:25] Diane Ferrante:

Yeah. Now, I’m not saying that sports fans can’t be really good in the industry. I’m not saying that at all, but I find that you have to have more than just I really love sports.

[13:35] Don Costante:

I totally agree. I totally agree with that. Does your company conduct any type of personality evaluations on either new employees once they’ve been hired? Or is this something that maybe is conducted during your interview process? And you use that kind of information to determine who you’re going to select?

Evaluating Candidates and Team Chemistry

[13:50] Diane Ferrante:

You know, we really don’t do personality reviews. We did them once a few years ago, but that’s not really a part of the protocol. We tend to cross-reference with other departments. So once we find that person that we really think will be a good fit, a lot of times we’ll have them speak to someone. Like a lot of times I’ll have the people that I want to hire talk to our community relations people. Just because I, you know what I mean? Like, make sure that I’m not like missing something here. Tell me what you think. And it could be just a really quick conversation. But what happens a lot when we bring people in for the final interview, they’ll have like four or five stops. One with each person. Like, and CR has done the same thing with me. They’re like, you know, this is Diane. She does this and I want you to sit with her for five minutes just to kind of get that. Okay. What’d you think? So we do that a lot.

[14:40] Don Costante:

Yeah. I mean, people who came in, even for an internship interview, I would bring them in in San Antonio. And I had a large staff there with three sports. And so I’d had 15 people at a conference table with this one intern sitting at the end. And they’d look and I wanted everyone, you know, sort of like what you’re talking about. I wanted everybody to be invested in it. I wanted everybody to have their opportunity to talk to this individual, even though it’s an internship. And it could have been a coordinator or manager, but, you know, it’s an important piece to our puzzle. And it’s all about chemistry. And I wanted them to be a part of that process. So I am in totally, uh, in agreement with you. The, in San Antonio, we also though did personality tests or evaluations, but it was after the candidate was hired because it was important to ownership to know, uh, in terms of communication skills, how to relate with individuals. If they had a dominant personality or, or whatever it may be. So it was, yeah, yeah, it’s good.

[15:34] Diane Ferrante:

It’s really good to get those second, you know, thoughts. My best friend from middle school will tell you that the best thing about me is the worst thing about me. I tend to only see good in people and I don’t see the negative sides of people, but, and which can be a real attribute or it can be a real deterrent.

[15:50] Don Costante:

Right.

[15:50] Diane Ferrante:

So I don’t want to, yeah, I get too flowery about people.

[15:53] Don Costante:

Right.

[15:54] Diane Ferrante:

Yeah.

Setting Expectations and Guiding Careers

[15:55] Don Costante:

When you do bring somebody in or even with the people you have on staff, how do you ensure that they have a clear understanding of their role and the expectations that you have for them?

[16:04] Diane Ferrante:

You know, I think we do a really good job setting that in the interview process. Like I said, I do really try to let people know what they’re getting into. You know what I mean? Because sports is all consuming. It really is. You know that just as well as I do. Right. I always tell people working in sports is a lifestyle. It’s anything but nine to five. In the off season this year, we had a really, really busy stretch, really busy stretch. And then some news came down on a Sunday. Our PR director is Kevin and Kevin lives not too far from me in our community. We have a pool. And I think we both thought it was an open free Sunday. Finally, the season had just ended and everybody’s going to be hanging at the pool. Kevin said to me so much for the pool, you know, because when sports happens, it happens and you have to react. You know, just yesterday we were fortunate to enter our mascot van on a trip down to Cleveland. And it wasn’t expected, but we had a son of videographer with him. So all of a sudden you’re dropping everything that you’re doing and you’re on the road and headed that way.

[17:02] Don Costante:

But when you’re bringing these people in and they obviously know what their job description is because they applied for the role. But how do you make clear your expectations for them?

[17:11] Diane Ferrante:

You know what? I think you reverse it. And I will tell you that I kind of pride myself on this. I always tell the people that work with me, I’m like, tell me where you want to get to. Tell me what part of this industry you like. If I’m bringing a new producer in, you’re going to learn so much in the first year and you’re going to see parts of this job that you love. You’re going to see parts of this job that you don’t love. And then at the end of the first, you know, six months, I’ll check back in with them. Six months to a year, I say, okay, what part of this did you love? And I always try to guide people to where their passions are. As opposed to saying, okay, here’s the expectations. Now here’s, there’s good and bad, right? There’s stuff that you have to do. And there’s stuff that you want to do. So in the first year or two that you’re working for me, it’s like, here’s what you have to do. Now tell me what you want to do. Right? And I think I’ve always done a really good job of like guiding people’s careers like that, which has made all the difference. And which is why people tend to stay on with us for really like that. Like I have a person right now, he came in as a junior producer.

[18:12] Diane Ferrante:

And now in the next couple of years, he’ll probably move over into the engineering world because he’s just, he’s very talented there.

[18:18] Don Costante:

That’s what makes you a good manager. I mean, I too take that type of an approach. I think it is our responsibility to help these individuals get to where they want to be. I mean, they’re coming in and working for us. They don’t always want to be an intern. You know, a lot of them want to be a director. So it’s our role to try to help them to get to that point. And so I love that you meet with them. Do you meet with your staff weekly? I mean, or do they just come in and see you on a daily basis? Or how’s that work with your staff in terms of meetings?

Staff Meetings and Open Communication

[18:44] Diane Ferrante:

So we meet as a full staff weekly, and then we meet as individual staff. So our full staff meets once a week. Our production staff meets twice a week. And then our game up staff meets once a week. So that’s four total meetings that we have and that we interact. You know, because we’re talking about different topics and really kind of digging down into what we’re going to do. But I do make it clear all the time that my door is open and that they are welcome to come talk with me one-on-one anytime they like. And I will tell you, a lot of my staff, most of my staff, I would say, feel really comfortable doing that at any time. And I do make a point to check in with everybody because a lot of times, you know, I’ll be kind of once removed. I was working last year. We were opening up the Pistons practice facility, and we built a beautiful broadcast studio, which you should come see, by the way. And I was pretty much, I was kind of all consumed with that and felt like I kind of lost touch with the staff a little bit. So I kind of made a point once we got that up and running to sit down in the studio with them and say, okay, you guys, now we have this.

[19:48] Diane Ferrante:

What do you want to do with this? What do you see when you look at this? So I think that’s really, really important to have that one-on-one time with everybody.

Giving Employees Latitude to Make Decisions

[19:56] Don Costante:

How much latitude are you giving your employees and making decisions?

[20:01] Diane Ferrante:

Here’s what I tell my employees. You can make the decision, but you kind of always want to loop me in because if it does go badly, you want me to have your back, right? So I give a lot of latitude. I just always remind them, like, don’t live on an island, right? You’re always best if you’ve got everybody’s buy-in to what you’re doing. And I think that that kind of served me well. You know, we just had a conversation yesterday about TikTok, right? Everybody loves TikTok and everybody’s trying to figure out TikTok and how it works and what we can put out there, what we can’t put out there. And there was a question about music licensing when you’re pulling a video off of TikTok and putting it onto one of the other platforms. Well, somebody was doing that on their own. They didn’t necessarily ask, say, do. And then our legal department was like, eh, no, you can’t do that. You know what I mean? So I was like, listen, if we’re going to get a big fine, you don’t want me to not know that that big fine is coming, right? So that’s kind of the approach that I think.

[20:57] Don Costante:

Yeah. What advice would you give somebody who’s just about to start their managing career? They’re young. They’ve just been given a group of people to manage. What advice would you give them?

Advice for New Managers

[21:08] Diane Ferrante:

First off, that is in any business, that is the most difficult transition to make ever. So I think that it’s crucial to get that right. And it kind of goes back to what I was saying earlier. If you’re a really good manager, you have the understanding that you work for your staff more than they work for you. And your job is to give them the tools that they need to perform the duties that they have to do. And I think that is always my best advice that I give people when they move into that. And I have had a lot of people come up under me that have made that transition. Some have made it well, some not so well. You know, some want to come in and be a dictator and be like, you will do this because I’m your supervisor because I told you to do that. And I think we all know, like, that’s not how the world works. It’s just not in any case. But the advice I always give is just understand that you work for them more than they work for you. Like, it’s your job to make sure that they’re happy, that they’re doing what they need to do.

[22:09] Don Costante:

Yeah, do you give direction?

[22:10] Diane Ferrante:

For sure. But if you’re respected and they know that you’re there for them and they know that you have their best interest in mind, then, you know, that happens naturally. So I think that’s my best advice that I give people.

[22:23] Don Costante:

Well, that’s great advice. You just gave the formula for success and managing people. Let’s shift gears to a topic that I love, team introductions. What’s your philosophy when it comes to team introductions?

Team Introduction Philosophy

[22:34] Diane Ferrante:

First off, that’s where you spend all your money. Just spend all the money. So your entire budget is just thrown at your introductions. No, team introductions are probably my favorite time of the year when we sit down and we plan it out. And I’m really proud of the introductions that we’ve done in Detroit over the years. Every year, I will tell you, I think it’s the best. Every year I come out with my staff, I’m like, this is the best one we’ve ever done. I think now team introductions have evolved. And we kind of talked about this when we moved into Little Caesars Arena. So this is going to be our fourth season coming up in Little Caesars Arena. When we made the move, we had all of these bells and whistles. And it’s really gone from a video board introduction to theater. It really is live theater, if you think about it. Especially in baseball, it’s a little bit different. But in the NBA, in hockey, in anything that has an enclosed arena, it’s really theater. It’s just happening all over the building. So for us, we took our introduction and really kind of made sure that everything was tied together. So our introductions now start with a light show that feature all of our LED lighting.

[23:43] Diane Ferrante:

And at Little Caesars, we have this amazing panel in the ceiling. And then, you know, it’s tied to the sound and it’s tied to the special effects. And then the video has almost become secondary. I don’t want to say secondary, but the video, everything else kind of is this big, gigantic buildup. And then, oh, by the way, there’s this awesome 30-second video that comes up. So it’s always been a folk part. It’s one of my favorite things to work on. It’s one of my favorite moments in the game. You know, getting fans in the seats is where we have to focus because everybody enjoys our club too much. But I love, love, love intros. And they do generally take a lot of your budget.

Planning the Introduction and Starting With the Track

[24:21] Don Costante:

When do you get together to start your planning for the team introductions and the discussions that you have about what elements you’re going to use in that process?

[24:27] Diane Ferrante:

Well, I think, you know, there’s a natural progression, right? So your branding and your marketing people kind of go first. And we are constantly, so you want to tie it in with your team messaging. I think that’s my point with that, right? So once you have kind of that advertising platform that you’re going to move into the season with, you know, you want to kind of not mirror it, but be in the same vein as that. We are constantly, we’re working on our intros year-round because you’re always looking for the next special effect. You’re always looking for a cool lighting scheme. You’re always, you know, I wanted to do drones now for four years, three years. We’ve been trying to do, you know, you’ve seen the live lighting drones, the coolest thing, but they’re difficult to get approved if you want to know the truth. There’s so many like security issues with flying a drone in a building that it’s tough to get approved. I will eventually get it approved, but I haven’t gotten it done yet. But we’re always looking for elements like that that we can introduce into our show. And once we kind of have that, then we say, okay, how can we build on this?

[25:33] Diane Ferrante:

We know we’re going to have lights. We know we’re going to have videos. We know we’re going to have dancers. We know we’re going to have dunkers. How can we like bring it all together with a new element? And so it usually starts with the track. I always say, start with the track, no matter what you’re doing, start with the track because everything goes from there. So I would say our music director, Sean Martinez, who’s our game instructor too, he’s really heavily involved in all of the music that we play. And I bet you Sean’s looking for a cut right now. You know, our season is over and I bet he’s already looking.

[26:06] Don Costante:

So when you talk about music, is there a specific genre of music that you prefer with your player introductions?

Custom Music and Licensing

[26:12] Diane Ferrante:

So we’ve switched that up a few times too. I will tell you, because of all the licensing issues out there now, we have done a custom track for probably the past five years at least, I would say. We’ve had a track built. So we’ll go out, we’ll come in and say, okay, we want it to be in this vein. So we’ll like find some music cuts that we kind of like. This year we went in with a kid rock song, and we were like, okay, we want to kind of not replicate it. You don’t want to rip it off, but that kind of tempo, that beat that we wanted like a lot of guitar. We wanted rock and roll. We wanted like that type of vibe. You know, we have a couple of years ago, we came in more of like with the big theater sound, like the big Star Wars or Top Gun or something like that. So I think we always try to change it up a little bit. We want it to, like I said, match with the branding and match with some of the other things that we’re doing as an organization. But then we kind of work with our music company, APM Music. I don’t know if you’ve worked with APM. APM’s done our track for the last, I thought, four or five years anyway. And we’ll say, this is what we’re looking for.

[27:16] Diane Ferrante:

And then we just, it’s a collaboration past that. And Sean works with their producers. And then we, you know, end up with a track. We always try to build slow, not slow, but start kind of small and then end big because you want that big moment just before you introduce the players.

[27:31] Don Costante:

So start with your track, you’re looking throughout the year for that next big theatrical element. Just so listeners and those people going through this process with your game, your season, starting with preseason in October, traditionally, when’s that first sit down meeting after you’ve received the marketing theme and you’ve got your track? When are you guys sitting down and really starting to hone in on the look and feel?

The Annual Production Timeline

[27:53] Diane Ferrante:

We spend most of August on that.

[27:55] Don Costante:

Okay.

[27:56] Diane Ferrante:

You know, I would say we start to really kind of get serious. You know, you have to be ready for media day, right? So when the players show up, that’s when you get your first ability to shoot live shots with them. And so by then, and that’s usually early September now, by then you have to know what the look and feel is going to be, know what the scheme is going to be, know what the soundtrack is going to be, because you really have to blend all of that into the video. So I would say that it happens in July, but I find that July, just the way that things fall, people tend to go on vacation a lot in July. Yeah. With the way our season falls. But when everybody comes back in August, I would say there’s a, most of August I think is dedicated to that. And our graphic, our motion graphic people, they start building probably, they start building elements, I would say, July, August too.

Using Entertainment Teams in Player Introductions

[28:47] Don Costante:

So you talked about taking a very theatrical, multidimensional approach to your player introductions versus just obviously a video board, which is outstanding. Talk a little bit about, I mean, you have a lot of entertainment resources and you talked about dancers, but do you try to incorporate all of the entertainment resources that you have? And if so, what are those resources that you’re using?

[29:09] Diane Ferrante:

That’s an interesting dynamic. We used to have, you know, every dance team that you could imagine in our ownership, they really took the kind of less is more approach to, I think we have four dance teams now, or, you know, entertainment teams. They’re not all dance teams. So we really kind of pulled that back a little bit and then focused a lot more on those four smaller properties. But, I mean, are we talking intros or throughout the game?

[29:34] Don Costante:

Yeah, no, for introductions, are you taking those four properties and making sure you’re incorporating all four of those into your introduction or just kind of just using a couple of them to add impact?

[29:43] Diane Ferrante:

I would say it’s different. It’s different throughout the year, right? I would say opening night, we focus on the dance team, the Detroit Piston dancers. We’ve taken them up into the stands a little bit more, you know, just to keep movement happening everywhere in the area. And there’s so much going on on the court with the light show that we felt like it was almost just too much, right? It was just, it was overwhelming. So we tend to use our mascot on the floor. We incorporate our dance team, but a lot of times they’re in the stands kind of encouraging fans to stand up and get into it. The drum line is another group that we don’t use every night. But if we had a big game, you know, when the Lakers come in, it’s always a big game in Detroit when we’re playing. Honestly, the Bulls is always a big game in Detroit. So whenever we have those kind of bigger games, we’ll try to bring in a different element. The drum line is one of my favorite elements to incorporate into the intros. And last year with our, when we were working with APM, that’s one of the things we said. We wanted it to have a really strong drum line so that they could kind of play with the track.

[30:47] Diane Ferrante:

So we’re still running the track, but now you’ve got live drummers that are playing on the floor as well. So I would say it’s a little bit, you know, different every night.

Alternate Jerseys and Themed Arena Looks

[30:55] Don Costante:

What about your thematic game days, Armed Forces Day or holidays? Are you changing your team introductions, your video or any aspects of your introductions so they align with those thematic nights?

[31:08] Diane Ferrante:

So we don’t really do, we haven’t really done theme nights. What we have built different intros around is, you know, now Nike has so many different jerseys out there. And what we’ve built themes around is on the nights that we wear the different jerseys. Like last year, not this past season, but the season before, we had a secondary jersey. It was black and silver, ironically, with your time in San Antonio, right? It was black and silver. And, you know, the whole premise behind it was kind of a throwback to the bad boys. And so we did a video built around kind of what the jersey meant. And on those nights, we changed the entire look of the arena. So, you know, the video board look, the LED look, the open. Then three years ago, I want to say we wore chrome jerseys. So the intros and everything in arena took on that, took on a chrome look.

[32:07] Don Costante:

How many games are you talking about with different jerseys?

[32:11] Diane Ferrante:

Usually it’s about anywhere from six to ten home games that you’ll play in a secondary jersey. So we did, two years ago, we did the black and silver and we did the chrome knights. So we had three different looks on our video board that we would go to depending on what jerseys the players were wearing. And I thought that was pretty cool just from a look and a feel. I loved how it came out.

Changing Introductions for the Playoffs

[32:35] Don Costante:

That’s pretty cool. What about if your team goes to playoffs? Are you making any adjustments to your team introduction there?

[32:40] Diane Ferrante:

Absolutely. We changed everything.

[32:41] Don Costante:

By round or is it just for the same introduction throughout playoffs?

[32:45] Diane Ferrante:

By round. I mean, unfortunately, in the last, you know, ten years or so, we’ve only been to two playoff games at home. But we changed the open for both games. During that, we changed everything because that’s really when it gets intense. And, you know, back in the days when we were, when the Pistons were really good and we were, you know, in 04, we won the championship. And then there was about ten years that we went to the Eastern Conference Finals every year. And we got really into building opens then, you know, because then you want to tie it around the story of the game. And it just has more, when you’re playing the same team four nights, seven nights in a row, there’s more to build on. There’s more story to tell there than there is for just kind of an average regular season home game. So I think that’s what you really want to do is tell that story of that, you know, matchup more so than you would in the regular season. So that’s always been my approach in the playoffs is what’s the story? What do we need our fans to really get angry about or excited about or ready to go into battle with us for? So I think that’s how I’ve always approached playoffs.

Ownership and Basketball Operations Involvement

[33:52] Don Costante:

What about basketball ops or even your ownership for that matter? How involved is basketball ops and ownership in the conception process of these team introductions, whether it’s regular season or once you get to playoffs?

[34:06] Diane Ferrante:

So our ownership is really engaged. They always ask us, what’s the narrative? What’s the story going into the season? What are we looking for? You know, I talked about the marketing and the branding and that kind of comes there. So ownership is really, really engaged there. And then the intros just kind of fall out of that. So I would say that they’re really engaged in the story that we’re telling and making sure that, you know, they’re just they’re interested in it. They love it. You know, they’re passionate about it. So I think that’s why we do share a lot with them and they have a lot of input when it comes to that. So the nuts and bolts of the team intros, maybe not so much, but certainly the messaging around everything that we’re doing, they’re heavily involved in.

[34:48] Don Costante:

So basketball ops isn’t getting so involved in the video that you’re playing in terms of the players you’re utilizing or the number of times that certain players are being seen or anything like that.

[34:59] Diane Ferrante:

They don’t need to approve it. So we do work with our PR department just to make sure that, you know, we’re equal with everybody that needs to be featured.

[35:06] Don Costante:

Right.

[35:07] Diane Ferrante:

Your franchise players are getting their love. Everybody’s getting the love that they need and that we should be pushing as a franchise. Where I think basketball operations gets involved is when they’re looking to really inspire their guys. When Kobe Bryant passed away and everybody was doing, you know, the moment of silence and tributes, our players were as involved in that as I’ve ever seen them with anything. I mean, they came to us and they were like, we want to do this. We want to do this. We want to do this. And so we just worked with them and worked all of their elements into the presentation that we did prior to the next home game for Kobe. When it came to playoffs, I wouldn’t say that they did anything that showed up in arena, but they certainly had some stuff behind the scenes that they asked us to do to enhance, like just when the guys were running out onto the floor and elements like that.

[35:51] Don Costante:

That’s great.

[35:51] Diane Ferrante:

I think that basketball operations does get involved and we’ve always been really, you know, responsive to whatever they’ve asked us to do. Like I said, in the beginning of the interview, that’s why we’re there. We’re there to play a game. So.

[36:03] Don Costante:

Yeah. I don’t know if I’ve ever told you when I was in San Antonio near the latter part of my tenure there, basketball ops got very involved and they would provide us with a list of players and the ratio at which they needed to be shown on the video. And then when we created the video, I had to take it and you know, you’re talking about a minute 30 video or whatnot. And I am very happy about what we created. We went to the office of the GM sat down and I’m thinking, okay, this is going to be an easy process. They’ll approve it. We’re out. And they turned it on and right away they put it in pause and they went one frame at a time and they’re looking to make sure. So if we had a ratio, let’s say Tim Duncan’s two to one, and we had a picture of Malik Rose doing a rebound, but in the background, you could see Tim’s arm or side profile that counted one for Tim. Yeah. It got very, very detailed, even into the movements. The specific player had to be shooting off of the right arm off the right leg. So yeah, I was just curious because it varies depending on where you are in the more latitude you get with the, with the baseball or basketball or the different ops groups, the better.

Comparing Approval Processes Across Organizations

[37:10] Don Costante:

Scott Gunningham down in Atlanta. He said he doesn’t have to go through an approval process. So yeah, it’s just interesting to hear how other organizations work.

[37:18] Diane Ferrante:

Yeah, I know. I’ve been fortunate. I’ve heard the same out of Miami.

[37:22] Don Costante:

Yeah.

[37:22] Diane Ferrante:

We’ve changed coaches a lot in our tenure. So maybe that’s some of it, but no, we get a general direction through our PR department that says, you know, Hey, the course. The core of our team. This is the core of our team. As long as you’re kind of showing that. And, but, but I found that they’ve always wanted to kind of equal across the board. You know what I mean? At least with your, at least with your top seven, you know, they are everybody to get their due.

[37:43] Don Costante:

Right.

[37:44] Diane Ferrante:

You can’t go wrong with being equal.

[37:45] Don Costante:

Yeah. So you obviously are passionate about player introductions. How do you come up with that creative though? I mean, I know you’re thinking about it all year and we have already talked about finding that track and all that, but the actual creative concept. Is there a process you go by to come up with that creative?

Developing the Creative Concept

[38:03] Diane Ferrante:

I will tell you, I trust people who have vision, right? We are very collaborative in my group. And if I’ve got a producer who comes in and they feel really passionate and really strongly about a look that they’re developing or about a song or anything, if they have the vision and they feel passionate and they can sell that vision, then I trust them. Right. So I think some of it is trust and not controlling. I don’t control that process very much. I kind of am freewheeling a little bit. No idea is bad. Everybody bring your, your best ideas. But when I find somebody who’s really, really passionate, feels really, really strongly, I find that that’s when it’s going to work out best. We’re working on a video right now within our team. And as my producer was describing it, I was like, I don’t see it. I don’t see it. And he’s like, no, no, no. It’s going to be great. We’re going to do this, this, this. And I was like, I can’t visualize it. And I finally said, Andrew, I trust you. I trust you. If you’ve got this vision, just go and I’ll let you know how it turns out. It should be done next Wednesday. But sometimes you have to like just trust that the people who are actually creating it, actually doing the editing, that they have the vision and it’s going to turn out better than you expect.

In-House Production and Future Introduction Ideas

[39:14] Don Costante:

Now, do you create all your digital elements in-house or do you outsource a portion of that?

[39:18] Diane Ferrante:

They’re all in-house.

[39:19] Don Costante:

Yeah, that’s good. Yeah. What’s one thing that you’ve always wanted to try with your introductions, but you have yet to do it and outside of drones?

[39:28] Diane Ferrante:

I was going to say drones, that would be it. This is going to sound dumb. But I’ve always wanted to do an open, a video open where the players are more lighthearted, that they’re not all mean and looking into the camera. I always wanted to do an open where it was a little more entertainment driven, like some of the stuff they’ve done in Miami. But I used to always like, and this is going to totally date me, but the Bill Cosby show, I know Bill Cosby has a bad to bring up now, but the Cosby show in its day was huge. And the open, if you remember, with him kind of dancing with each one of the members of his family. And I always thought that would kind of be a fun open or video to do with the players. If they were either with their kids dancing or with their, you know what I mean? Like just showing that light side of them, I always thought would be really fun, but I’ve never gotten approval to do it.

[40:24] Don Costante:

Well, never say never, right?

[40:25] Diane Ferrante:

Never say never, right.

Contest Development

[40:27] Don Costante:

Let’s talk about contest development. Contests are so important, obviously for entertainment, for sponsor fulfillment. Talk about your process for developing new on-court contests. Where did the creative ideas come from and who’s involved with that process?

[40:41] Diane Ferrante:

You know, it’s really funny because I will tell you when our new ownership came in, we really got away from doing on-court contests. And we went through a few seasons where we didn’t do any contests. It was either, yeah, it was either a video or somebody was performing or, you know, so we’re just now starting to get back to contests. My biggest requirement to our partnership people that I always try, I don’t always succeed, but I always say that there has to be something, the audience has to have something riding on it, right? The half-court shot, everybody gets involved in because it’s nearly an impossible shot. But if you’re going to have two people out there shooting for 24 seconds, who really cares?

Creating Audience-Wide Engagement

[41:21] Don Costante:

Do you know what I mean?

[41:22] Diane Ferrante:

Right.

[41:22] Don Costante:

I get it.

[41:23] Diane Ferrante:

Unless there’s some type of engagement for everybody in the audience, it tends to fall on deaf ears. That’s why you see pizza delivery is so popular. T-shirt tosses are so popular. The drops from the ceiling are so popular. And that’s because everybody can win something. Everybody is engaged, right? So I always say, what’s in it for me? You know, why do I care if this guy makes a basket or not? So that’s a big part of the development, I think, that goes into it is it’s got to have something else. Now, a lot of times, if there’s an interactive, like saying for Jeep, where people can shoot and they can go through a certain process to get a little bit closer and the audience can get engaged that way. You know, but I think that’s what I always look for when we first start is what’s in it for everybody.

Working With Partnerships and Sponsors

[42:05] Don Costante:

Who’s involved in that process? Is that just your staff or are you involving partnership or other groups?

[42:11] Diane Ferrante:

It’s mostly driven by partnership right now because we got away from it for so long. I will say, you know, Sean probably owns that. Sean Martinez, who is our Game Offs director, he owns that with the sponsorship team. And he’s in their meetings when they start talking about, OK, you know, Jeep would like to do they’d like to give away a car. How can we give away the car? And I think Sean drives that process with sponsorship and then kind of brings it back to our department. And we talk about it in our department meeting and kind of try to brainstorm it out.

[42:39] Don Costante:

Are the contests 100% that you do sponsored or are there some non-sponsored contests that you’re doing?

[42:46] Diane Ferrante:

I would say 95% are sponsorship driven.

[42:49] Don Costante:

How long does it take when you come up with a creative idea or sponsorship does from inception to production to implement?

Production Timelines and Rehearsals

[42:57] Diane Ferrante:

We can turn things around quick. It just kind of depends on, you know, when a lot of times sponsors want to hit a certain period of time, you know, whether it’s first quarter, second quarter, third quarter, whatever. But sometimes they sell a deal and it has to go live the next game. And, you know, I think we’ve always prided ourselves on being able to turn things as quickly as we need to. We’re kind of built for speed like that. So it can vary, but I will tell you, there are things that we get to market very, very quickly.

[43:23] Don Costante:

Do you go through a rehearsal process with everything that you’re in?

[43:26] Diane Ferrante:

Always, yeah. We rehearse everything every night and we will rehearse the same contest every single night. What happens, and it always happens a couple months into the season, right? You come in opening night, you’re going to be perfect and everybody’s engaged. And then it starts to become routine and it starts to become habit. And then that’s when you kind of get, you know, lazy. I won’t be lazy about it, but kind of, you know, oh, I got that, you know, it’s covered. And that’s when you start to forget stuff. So we rehearse every single night. It’s for nothing else to make sure that all the props work, you know. I can’t tell you how awful it feels when you send your mascot out with the gigantic ball blaster and the ball blaster doesn’t work. It’s horrible.

[44:06] Don Costante:

Now you mentioned mascot. Are you using all four of your resources, entertainment teams, or are you always using entertainment teams as part of your contests?

[44:14] Diane Ferrante:

Yeah, they’re involved in, if there’s a shooting contest, everybody that’s there is involved. That goes for everything. You know, if we’re doing a pizza delivery, if we’re doing, you know, we do, we give away lottery tickets. We use all of our performers, all game along.

Building a Contest Playbook

[44:27] Don Costante:

So you said that partnership is pretty much driving the ship on contests, but did you give them a formula for successful contests that they should kind of follow?

[44:36] Diane Ferrante:

So we have kind of a playbook on here’s the 10 contests that we’d like to do that we think would be great, right? So we give them that. And then what happens is they go out and meet with the clients and the clients have their own ideas and the clients have their own branding people and the clients have their own objectives. So they’ll come back and say, okay, this could work for them, but could we change this? Or none of these fit for the client. Here’s what they’re trying to do. Can we go from there? We kind of develop a good, valid idea. But then if we have to do something custom for the sponsor, we’ll do that. We do the same thing on the video side of things. You know, I told you we have a really robust digital platform that we roll out. We have all of these content channels. It’s really a very well thought out distribution plan. But I can’t tell you how many sponsors come in and they have their own idea and their own marketing and their own plans that they’re trying to hit. So they’ll ask us to customize something. And we’re always open to customizing, you know, without, you don’t want to lose the piston brand, but we’re always open to working with our sponsors and customizing content.

Protecting the Brand and the Sponsor

[45:33] Don Costante:

I think there lies a challenge sometimes with, you know, money’s on the table. They have an idea, partnerships bringing it to your door and it just doesn’t seem to work. Obviously, I never say, sometimes I’ll say no, but I’ll definitely say, well, here’s how we can make it work. Have you ever been pushed, though, where you had to go forward with a idea that was brought to the table by a sponsor?

[45:56] Diane Ferrante:

You knew it wasn’t going to be successful, but they weren’t willing to change because they do it in other markets and they felt like this is going to be what they want to do. Many times, many times. And, you know, and I know you’ve been in this position as well. And in our positions, a lot of times you’re the protectors of the brand, right? I always tell our partnership people, I’m always like, at some point, you also have to protect the sponsor from themselves. Like, having done this for such a long time, you know there are elements that you’re going to put out there and they’re going to flap. Either because you’ve tried it before or you’ve seen it flap or you just, your gut tells you it’s going to flap. So at some point, you have to protect everybody and say, listen, this isn’t going to work. This isn’t going to work. And I just had a situation like that last season where, I won’t name the sponsor, but the sponsor came in and they were unwilling to bend. They were just unwilling to bend and he would probably deny this, but I think it was the difference between our partnership guy hitting his number and not hitting his number. He really, really, really wanted me to do this deal.

[46:59] Diane Ferrante:

And I finally just looked at him and I said, listen, this is a bad one. You know it’s a bad one. I know it’s a bad one. If you’re asking us to take one for the team here, let’s just call it what it is.

[47:09] Don Costante:

Right.

[47:10] Diane Ferrante:

And he kind of smiled and he’s like, can you just figure out how to do it? And I was thinking, yes, we will figure out how to do it. And we did. And it was okay. Just okay. But just okay.

Prizing and Fan Participation

[47:20] Don Costante:

What, what’s your thoughts on prizing?

[47:22] Diane Ferrante:

I go back to what I said before. Like there has to be something in it for everybody. It’s really great. If a guy on the floor wins a car, I’m happy for them for about five seconds. Give me a free teacher and I will remember you forever. You know, so I think that you just have to really recognize that everybody would like, you know, I go back to when we used to do the ball racing and the, you know, the games, everybody would go crazy for a three cup of coffee, you know, and they’ll stand up and they’ll scream. And, but I think it’s so important to have everybody engaged and all of your fans to win something. I think it’s more, it’s the most important.

[47:56] Don Costante:

Well, the more you engage the fans, the likelihood of that promotion will be successful. I know in San Antonio, we didn’t have a problem. They always built into the package when we did a contest, cause we made sure that they did, you know, if it was a one person competing or whatever, there’d be a grand prize and a secondary prize. Right. And there was a difference between the two. So it wasn’t just like a grand prize was a t-shirt and a secondary was a hat. It was like, you want a car or you end up walking away with a hat as a secondary. They were definitely distinctively different, but in Kansas city, we struggle with that. They don’t build that into their packages. So we struggle with the contest that we run. It becomes our responsibility within our department to find the prizing. So very difficult, but I’m glad to hear you talk about the importance of that. And what’s the best contest that you’ve ever either implemented yourself or seen somewhere else?

The Best and Worst Contests

[48:49] Diane Ferrante:

That’s a tough one. The best contest.

[48:52] Don Costante:

Yeah. Something that really stood out to you.

[48:55] Diane Ferrante:

You know, it’s taken on so many forms, but the races, I think will always be fan favorites of mine, whether, you know, it started at ball racing and then it became, you know, activities. I love in Milwaukee, the brewers do the live race with the people in the costumes. I absolutely love that. It didn’t work in Detroit. We tried it, but it didn’t work in Detroit. So I would say, I don’t know, you know, I’m drawing a blank on so many of the kinds of contests we’ve done. Ball racing was probably up there and then it became character racing and stuff like that. That’s probably up there because it’s just so good to engage everybody in something that you’re doing. I will tell you the worst contest we ever had to do is we had the thing, it was a piece of exercise equipment called a health rider. It was like a bike, just the weirdest exercise thing. And they were trying to sell it. And you had to, it was like one of those things was like a full body thing. So your arms had to pull while your legs were pushing and we would take these out on the court and the person who was working on the health rider would have to try to make baskets. And there was one on each end.

[49:56] Diane Ferrante:

It was, it was just, it was just horrible. So I can’t remember the best, but I can remember the worst. That’s, that’s something about me.

[50:04] Don Costante:

Unfortunately, I think that’s what happens to a lot of us.

[50:07] Diane Ferrante:

Yeah.

[50:07] Don Costante:

Right. Yeah. What’s the biggest mistake you think people make when it comes to contests?

The Biggest Contest Mistake

[50:13] Diane Ferrante:

Not rehearsing it.

[50:14] Don Costante:

Yeah. Yeah.

[50:15] Diane Ferrante:

I think that’s the biggest mistake that people make. A shooting contest sounds so simple. We’re going to walk them out. They’re going to take a shot and we’re going to walk them off. Right. Or that we’re going to walk them on. They’re going to do this and then they’re going to walk them off. But I think people underthink it too many times and you realize, oh, you know, I can’t tell you, do you have the basketball with you? You know what I mean? I can’t tell you how many times our stage managers run to the back to get the basketball. Right. So I think that making sure that you think it all the way through is probably the biggest mistake that you can make. And staging and blocking and even going through it with your cameras. Like we used to be really, really bad about our camera operators who were always caught off guard because we didn’t go through the contest with them. You know, so now when we have rehearsals, it’s full rehearsal with cameras and lights and everybody. So everybody knows what’s going to happen on the floor.

[51:04] Don Costante:

I think you just hit the nail on the head. I mean, I think 99% of the activations on court fail because people don’t really see it through from they run out of time because they didn’t practice actually ingressing the time it takes to actually bring it and get it set before they actually start. And then how long it takes to come off. I mean, yeah, I think that is by far the biggest mistake out there. You are so right about that. I’ll introduce them to it. It’s crazy. Digital production. Let’s touch on that a little bit here. What’s your philosophy in regards to how digital production should be incorporated into game days?

Digital Production and Cohesive Game Presentation

[51:36] Diane Ferrante:

When you say digital production, do you mean like…

[51:38] Don Costante:

I’m talking about like the video board, the LED boards and any kind of support digital that you have, how you think it should be incorporated in.

[51:46] Diane Ferrante:

I am a firm believer that it should all be tied together all the time.

[51:50] Don Costante:

Cohesive.

[51:51] Diane Ferrante:

Yeah.

[51:51] Don Costante:

Very cohesive.

[51:52] Diane Ferrante:

Yeah. And our intros going back to that, like the main area that I think we really excel in bringing in every element that you’ve got. Even the timing and when you’re running your sponsorship, right? You know, I can’t tell you how many times we’ll have an amazing half court shot that behind it was something that was really inappropriate on an LED, right? So we’ve always, always, from the first LED boards we got, we said, okay, in-game sponsorship, you control that inventory. The second that that timeout is called, it all goes with GameOps. So that’s how we’ve always sold it. That’s how we’ve always worked it. So the second, it’s like a full takeover. So the second that the timeout is called, that turns into GameOps inventory and then it matches whatever we’re doing throughout the game.

[52:38] Don Costante:

I love that you said cohesive. Too often I see people just dysfunctional and they have a splatter of sponsors all over the place on all their digital boards while you’re doing a contest on the court. And the only thing down there is on-court signage or the video board in the middle. And it’s just so dysfunctional in my opinion. So I love that you’re cohesive minded. When we talk about the boards that you’re using, I mean, talk about what boards you have available to you.

Using Every Digital Asset in the Arena

[53:03] Diane Ferrante:

So we have two rings of LED boards that are in the arena. We also have signage above and below, kind of cut out of our video board. It’s not separate signage, but we have portions that are cut out. We have underbelly signage underneath the video board. And then I mentioned, you know, it doesn’t show advertising. It’s not really a digital board, but we have this lighting grid in the ceiling that we use a lot. We tie that a lot into our game day activities. Even for our sponsors, you know, we might, if it’s, you know, Blue Cross Blue Shield, we might turn it blue for their contest. You know, so we really try to make sure that we’re very thoughtful in everything that we pull together and utilizing all of the assets that we have available. And in little fuses, I will tell you that there are plenty. They did a really good job with adding LEDs in there.

Building Content Platforms Across Channels

[53:52] Don Costante:

Now you talked about earlier that your digital team does, they pump out a lot of content. What’s the creative process for that group?

[54:00] Diane Ferrante:

You know, I mentioned that we built out social platforms. We look for almost like its own channels. So, for example, threads is one that we do. So the thread concept is one that we talk to the players about their fashion, right? All of the players are most of them have their own fashion sense that they think is the best. So we talk about their fashion. We tie it into a video interview that we do. But then also on game night, you know, when the players are showing up for games, we’ll take their photos in their street clothes as they’re arriving. And we push out a thread-based graphic to, say, Instagram or Facebook or something like that. And then we’ll also look for maybe a clothier or somebody who can come on and sponsor that. So what we try to do is find platforms that can hit on every medium that we have and every channel that we have. Because we found that some sponsors are looking for impressions. Some sponsors are looking for marketing. Some sponsors are looking for their branding. The platforms that we’ve created really kind of hit everything out there. They’ve been really successful for us. We have a platform called Wired, and that is any and all sound.

[55:13] Diane Ferrante:

So post-game sound, pre-game sound. You know, anything that Coach does that’s kind of relevant, we can push out in three different platforms. So we either push it out as a video where we’re showing them actually say it, or we’ll take the quote of the night and we push that out graphically through Twitter or Instagram. And so we’ve just built out all of these elements that live underneath. So then the stories kind of fall in under that, right? So if it’s a press conference, we know that we’re going to distribute that under Wired. If it’s a fashion segment, you know, we know we’re going to put it out under our threads platform. So it really does a good job of setting expectations with our sponsors. And saying, listen, here’s every, if you sponsor threads, here’s everything you’re going to get. And you’re going to have a presence in Arena. You’re going to have a presence socially. You’re going to have a presence digitally. You know, you’re going to have a presence on every platform that we have. So that’s been really successful for us.

Evaluating Digital Content Platforms

[56:06] Don Costante:

Do those platforms change yearly?

[56:08] Diane Ferrante:

They do. We sit down at the end of the year and go through how they performed. And it’s based on performance, right? So if we hit the numbers that we were expecting to hit and it performed well, we’ll keep it. If we have a platform that didn’t perform so well and was kind of pulling down our overall numbers, then we might phase that out. If we had a difficult time finding stories for somebody, you know, we have had platforms where we’ve come out and said, okay, this is going to be a really great platform. And then the stories are kind of tougher to find and to tell, then we’ll change that up. So we change it up yearly.

[56:37] Don Costante:

And where do those ideas come for the new platforms that you have to create?

[56:41] Diane Ferrante:

From our producer editors.

[56:42] Don Costante:

Okay.

[56:43] Diane Ferrante:

Directly from the stories they want to tell.

Teams Diane Watches for Digital Production

[56:44] Don Costante:

Right. I want to get your opinion on who you think in any sport does a really good job with their digital production. Outside of Detroit, of course.

[56:54] Diane Ferrante:

First off, I will tell you, it changes.

[56:56] Don Costante:

It does, yeah.

[56:56] Diane Ferrante:

It changes a lot, right?

[56:58] Don Costante:

It moves the road. Well, let’s say this year or the last couple of years.

[57:02] Diane Ferrante:

Well, I’ll just say teams I always, always watch. I always watch what they’re doing in Miami. You know, they do the heat, especially. They do a really, really good job with all of their assets and all of their boards. So I always keep my eye on them. I always keep my eye on Chicago. Obviously, they do a great job there, too. And then there’s a kind of different facet of shows. You know, I think they’re doing a really, really good job with Portland. Obviously, I’m a little NBA-dated because that’s where my focus and the teams that I see the most out there. So Portland, I think I always kind of keep my eye on them. Really looking forward to going to Phoenix because I think they’re getting a new board next year. So I like to see, you know, the people who are getting the new kind of toys to play with. So I’ll probably make a trip out there. And I’ve heard that Golden State, that their digital inventory and their boards and everything are just amazing. So, you know, I think it changes a little bit. Miami and Chicago always seems to watch, for sure. NBA Vice, those would be the teams that I would watch.

[57:59] Don Costante:

I’ve been out of the NBA for a little bit, but a bunch of those teams are consistent with the teams that I certainly watched when I was with the Spurs. Of course, I still watch Ed down in Miami. Well, in San Antonio, you guys always did an unbelievable job.

[58:12] Diane Ferrante:

I haven’t done it in a really long time. But I remember coming in when we played you guys in the finals and being really, really impressed by everything you were doing down there.

[58:20] Don Costante:

The playoffs were so special. I mean, you know that. I mean, it’s just it’s a season in itself. And, you know, you’re absolutely right when you say each game tells the story for the next, you know, player introduction and just the intensity and continues as you go through playoffs. It raises a notch each time and you have to come up with new content that is geared towards that emotion. And so that was an enjoyable time. I love that for sure.

[58:46] Diane Ferrante:

I know. I miss those days, right?

[58:48] Don Costante:

Yeah. Yeah. They go by so quick. What about new technology? What new technology are you most excited about now or in the future? And again, put drones aside.

New Technology and Remote Broadcasting

[59:01] Diane Ferrante:

I’m really excited. The drones. I’m really fired up. And this is kind of away from game operations. But I told you, I have roots on the broadcasting side of our industry as well. And I’m really fired up about remote broadcast right now. I built, well, I didn’t build it, but we built a studio, a control room in our new facility. And we’re going to be using that remotely. So bringing in feeds from another building, cutting the show there, using that. I’m really excited about where the technology is going in that industry. I think it’s going to really change a lot of what we can do. So that’s really been a focus for me in the last probably month or so that I’m really kind of excited about what’s going on on that side of the fence.

[59:45] Don Costante:

That is exciting.

[59:45] Diane Ferrante:

Yeah. Yeah.

Final Thoughts From Diane Ferrante

[59:47] Don Costante:

So final thoughts for those listening today to our discussion. What are your final thoughts?

[59:52] Diane Ferrante:

I mean, so many. There’s so many things we’ve talked about, which has been fantastic. I have enjoyed our time. I mean, I just, you know, I feel like I’m so proud of the industry and where it started and where it is right now. And you were a big part of that. I think, you know, we all kind of, I always say we all kind of grew up together in this industry. But now when we were all first starting, there weren’t force management degrees available. They didn’t teach game operations in college. You know, we had to kind of all figure it out for ourselves. So I think, you know, just sharing this time with you and going through every aspect of what goes into a game. I’m just so proud of where the industry has come, you know, who would have thought back when we just, when baseball was putting up scoreboards, right. And be able to digitally change the number of strikes and fouls. Who would have thought it would have turned into this? So I think I’m just really, really proud of this industry and proud to be a part of it.

[1:00:48] Don Costante:

Well, I can’t tell you how much I’ve enjoyed catching up with you and having you share your knowledge and experience with everybody who’s listening. You’re really a rock star in this industry. And it’s been a while since we’ve chatted and I’ve enjoyed it.

[1:01:01] Diane Ferrante:

Thank you. You are too kind. And it was my pleasure.

Don Costante’s Key Takeaways

[1:01:05] Don Costante:

Wow. What a great conversation with Diane. Today, she gave us an inside look into some of the best practices that she’s implemented into the Detroit Pistons event presentation. From her philosophy to her management style, to her thoughts on team introductions, her ingredients for successful contests to digital production. Diane shared a lot of great information that shows just why she is so successful and has achieved longevity in the sports industry. With so much information covered, here’s what stood out to me during today’s conversation. When I talked to her about her philosophy, I loved when she said, never be a distraction to the game. Educate, inform, or entertain. If you’re not doing one of these three things, then it shouldn’t be in your presentation. The best managers recognize that the staff doesn’t work for them. They work for the staff. Make sure the staff has every tool they need to do the job and that you’ve created a great work environment and given them the freedom to be creative. When hiring ideal candidates outside of experience must have the right disposition. They must love what they do. Working in sports is a lifestyle.

[1:02:17] Don Costante:

It’s anything but nine to five. Team introductions have evolved from video board intros to theater. It really is live theater. It’s so important to maximize all of your available resources to create a multi-dimensional entertainment approach to play our introductions. When it comes to developing successful contests, what’s in it for everybody? The audience needs to be engaged. The more you engage the audience, the likelihood that contest will be well-received increases. And finally, utilize digital boards to create a cohesive presentation. Tying your boards together eliminates distraction and brings impact to your event presentation that ultimately adds value to all stakeholders. Those were just a few things that I highlighted during my conversation today. I certainly hope that you were able to pull out a few ideas that will benefit you as well. I want to thank Diane for being on the podcast and for sharing her best practices with all of us. Well, that wraps up this episode of The Rundown. As always, I want to encourage you to reach out to me. Share your thoughts and questions or opinions. I would love to hear from you. Send them all to [email protected]Email The Rundown.

[1:03:33] Don Costante:

That’s [email protected]Email The Rundown. Also, I would really appreciate it if you would subscribe and share this podcast and follow us on LinkedIn and Instagram. And until the next time, I’m Don Costante. – Right.