It's hard to ignore the monumental season that Steph Curry and the Golden State Warriors have been having. In fact, it's been a historic season for the defending NBA World Champions and the 2014-2015 NBA Most Valuable Player.
But on the court isn't the only place Steph Curry is making big plays and finding incredible success, he is also doing so with his off-the-court ventures.
Curry has teamed up with former
I had a chance to speak with Curry, Barr and Mayden regarding the development of Slyce.
"The idea of Slyce started with my observation of Steph Curry’s journey from his rookie year to where he is today" Barr said. "Steph took a very intentional and deliberate approach to creating, building and growing his own personal brand via social media. Starting in his third year in the NBA, Steph really went above and beyond in how he engaged with fans via social media. This led to his
As he continued to progress in his NBA career, this engagement started to decrease. Why? Steph described the fan engagement experience on social media as noisy, painful and time consuming. The idea of Slyce was sparked by athletes’ desire to capture the value they get from fan engagement but feeling like there was no way do that efficiently. Slyce has now evolved into a way to allow athletes to control their social presence but also better partner with brands and leagues through content, data and analytics."
Curry has been a game changer in the NBA and is hoping to help Slyce become the next big thing in social media:
"I'm very active on social media and see the huge impact it has on engaging with fans and being able to have a voice" Curry said. "Talking with Bryant, he had answers to all the pain areas I experienced as my following increased and knew he had a great vision on how to make that experience more authentic and efficient for both me and my fans.
It's (Slyce) a one-stop shop for sharing content and getting all the information you need to know about who's following and engaging with you. There is also potential for more detailed data that can help an athlete or influencer build their brand more productively."
Curry is a firm believer that Slyce will appeal to athletes as well, furthering his confidence in it's development and eventual impact on a long-term scale:
"Well first there is a need in this space for a better influencer-to-fan experience. Secondly, I know the brains behind the process and the ground work that has been done to make this a successful venture. We have experienced minds and hands-on athletes that are working tirelessly to better the product every day.
"It's an easy to use, simple process that is similar to traditional social media platforms when it comes to sharing content and text. The seamless timeline page makes following your favorite influencers an active and engaging experience" Curry told me.
Slyce is hoping to make an impact for businesses, athletes and brands in the sports medium and Curry's partners are putting things in motion to ensure that the platform offers a uniquely different social media option than what is currently available.
"For athletes, Slyce provides a streamlined approach to managing their social media presence" Barr elaborated. "On top of that, we aim to make sense out of the incredible amount of data and analytics these athletes and brands are presented with. Our backgrounds allows us to understand the landscape and know how to turn data into actionable insights that positively impact all stages of the brand-to-athlete value chain.
Right now we are focused on the athlete experience. We are dedicated to creating the most effective, intuitive and valuable experience for athletes. That is our biggest goal right now. If we’ve created an environment where athletes are comfortable and willing to engage, then the fan experience will begin to improve. Our Q&A feature is highly engaging for both fans and athletes and we have a number of other features on our product roadmap that will provide more opportunities for athletes to seamlessly interact with fans in more of a two-way manner."
"Indeed. With our QA feature, we have created a way to connect digital engagement to physical interaction" Mayden said. "We are blurring the lines between just “listening” to conversation and actually “having” a conversation in person, with those you admire and aspire to learn from. This is just the beginning of something that we believe has a chance to disrupt the industry in a forward-leaning and authentic way.
Slyce also offers a chance for the fans to choose what questions are relevant and most valuable to the conversation. Many platforms do not allow the audience to serve as curators and/or editors of the narrative. With Slyce, the fans drive the conversation and the athletes set the topic. It’s a true, free flowing conversation where the most thoughtful, insightful and informative questions win. We are democratizing the idea of a “press conference” with the push of a button."
Naturally I wondered just how Slyce plans to be competitive in the social media landscape with the likes of powerhouses such as Twitter and Facebook, who have dominated the niche. With my personal experience running Elite Rank Media (an Internet Marketing company) and Sports Rants (a social media platform for sports talk) I know first hand the many hurdles that can stand in the way of new brands, social media platforms and outlets.
Navigating through these hurdles while, at the same time, building a dedicated fanbase to fuel your forward movement can be challenging at best, especially with the constant evolution of not only social media, but also online business and the means in which people search & find information via the internet (
So what makes Slyce stand out?
"We are a destination for athletes to manage, distribute and control their core narrative" Mayden said. "Never before, have we seen a generation of highly communicative and highly mobile public figures. Slyce aims to disrupt the modern narrative that athletes are simply the sum total of their physical prowess.
We are not a social media company. We are a mixture of athlete led, data informed creative, critical and analytical business thinkers who use social media data as a mechanism to create deeper engagement with fans while expanding the horizon of opportunities for athletes beyond their respective fields of play.
The various actors in the traditional “value chain” of brand/product creation on behalf of athletes and Influencers have been subjected to fragmented, inefficient and non-data informed communication processes and methodologies for years" Mayden continued. "As result of the multiple layers off creators, approvers and stakeholders, details often are lost or misinterpreted. This is something that I saw and had taken note of during my 13+ years at Nike/Jordan creating on behalf of some of the world’s most elite Athletes and prolific personalities.
With Slyce we aim to automate this workflow and make it simpler, while creating efficiencies for every single person in the value chain."
"Slyce is built with athletes, not for athletes. Every platform has started with the average person, but athletes are not average in the way people engage with them and the spotlight that’s always on them. They’ve always joined a platform after an audience has been created" Barr said. "With Slyce, we are creating for the athlete first. We don’t view ourselves as a social media platform, but rather a compliment to the ecosystem that allows athletes to better manage their content publishing and cut through the noise that exists when they want to interact with fans."
Slyce seems determined to stand out in a often times crowded social media audience. But their leaders such as Curry, Barr and Mayden seem confident that they can create their own unique and special niche that will live on for years to come.
Get ready for something different, Slyce is on it's way.
