IMG and Marcos have outlined both long-term and short-term goals to achieve in their partnership. Long term involves setting Marcos up with endorsement deals both inside and outside the tennis industry.
“Our goal is to develop a strategy that makes him interesting enough that companies on a global basis will want to sponsor him worldwide,” explained Carlos. “So that’s our long term goal, to be able to build his image, to work with him to build his image in that way. It requires him to continue to perform well on the court, but it also requires us to work on a marketing campaign that builds his awareness up inside the tennis community and beyond.”
One of IMG’s first acts after signing Marcos was to secure his appearance in the all-star field at the Mubadala World Tennis Championship in Abu Dhabi at the start of the new season, which serves as an example of the immediate objective to continue to maximise his industry deals.
“His appearance fees, his clothing contract, to find those opportunities within the industry and establish him as one of the marquee players on the tour, a ‘must have’ among tennis sponsors and tennis event promoters,” said Carlos. “Also to find other exhibition opportunities for him to play, selective, not a lot, but get him to play some exhibitions with other top level players during times that suit his schedule.
“We thought he’d be a perfect fit for that event [in Abu Dhabi], and the promoters agreed. That’s the value of our company, in that we’re working with a lot of these promoters so they’re asking us who the hot players are that we want to have in this event and we’re able to say ‘Marcos Baghdatis right now is pushing Top 15, moving towards the Top 10, he’s had a great year, beaten Federer, Nadal, Berdych and a lot of other top players this year. This is the guy you should be looking at for the event.’ They do their research and they go ‘Wow, you’re right, he is amazing. This is one that we hadn’t really been thinking about, but he’s someone that we want to take.’ So that’s really the advantage of working with an agency like IMG.”
Carlos and IMG are working to raise Marcos’ profile internationally and one project that fans worldwide can look forward to is a documentary that Marcos will film in Cyprus with the Tennis Channel. While it will reach out to American fans when it airs on the Tennis Channel, the footage will also be available to be licensed by other international broadcasters.
“The Tennis Channel documentary is important because it gives us access to the core tennis audience in America to really help them understand who Marcos is,” explained Carlos. “Then through that deal we also have the opportunity to license footage to offer to other international broadcasters. So even though the documentary is for the Tennis Channel, we also have the opportunity to use the same show and be able to offer parts of it to other international broadcasters that are interested in learning more about it and interested in doing stories that will help viewers learn more about Marcos.”
Stay tuned to www.baghdatis.com as we bring you all the latest news on Marcos’ ventures with IMG.
