3 ways Oracle Red Bull Racing crafts the ultimate customer experience

Thanks to Oracle Advertising and Customer Experience, I recently had the opportunity of a lifetime to spectate one of the world’s most exhilarating sports, the Formula 1 United States Grand Prix (USGP) in Austin, TX. And it got me thinking about the ultimate fan experience.

What’s the ultimate customer experience for today’s sports fans? What does it take to create the perfect day-of environment, one that will keep fans coming back for more? 

We all have our stories of a bad customer experience: Wait to buy a ticket, wait in line to get in, wait again for bad seats, and wait yet again to get out and go home. But my trip to Austin couldn’t have been more different.

This event offered a unique fan experience driven by customer preference and behavior, ranging from the social media posts you’ve “liked” to the jerseys and merch bought along the way to your seats.

During the event, four-time Formula 1 World Champion Oracle Red Bull Racing offered fans exclusive behind-the-scenes access to the exciting event via The Oracle Red Bull Racing Paddock, the brand’s all-new, free loyalty program. Fans can earn points through engaging with the team and then trade them for perks like digital downloads, autographed merchandise, and even VIP experiences. It was fun to see how such personalized fan interactions contributed to the excitement around the event—even before the team ultimately took home the win.

Here are just a few of the strategies I gathered along the way for creating the ultimate customer experience:

1. Really get to know your fans to help shape your ideal customer experience.

“Who are our fans? Where are they located? How many t-shirts do they buy? How many races do they watch?”

These are just some of the questions asked by motorsport marketing teams looking to build customer loyalty within their fanbase. Today’s sports brands, like Oracle Red Bull Racing, need effective technology in-house to get to know their fans are and what they care about.

Enter The Oracle Red Bull Racing Paddock, a one-of-a-kind loyalty program within Formula 1 racing. The Paddock delivers a unique experience to each fan to bring them closer than ever to the race action and make them feel like they’re truly a member of the Oracle Red Bull Racing team.

Using Oracle CrowdTwist Loyalty and Engagement, The Paddock rewards fans for both their in-person and digital interactions with the Oracle Red Bull Racing team with perks and experiences that money simply can’t buy.

While at the USGP, I signed up for The Paddock and instantly gained access to exclusive videos and team content. It was a pleasure to see firsthand how Oracle plays a key role in helping brands create agile, interactive fan experiences.

2. Align with the best technology partners to help you meet your goals.

Finding the right technology partner is crucial in racing to the finish line of first-class fan experiences. Do you currently have the right technology partner that could help you reach what your business is trying to achieve? This was one of the key questions raised by Oracle Red Bull Racing CMO Oliver Hughes during our executive events surrounding the event.

At Oracle, we ask what you need and deliver a passionate team to help you implement the best tools to meet those needs and the needs of your customers (or fans). In addition to helping Oracle Red Bull Racing achieve ambitious marketing goals, our team also helps from a resource perspective, seconding consultants from Oracle to become extensions of the in-house team. We’re also able to share learnings and best practices from other Oracle customers like The Premiere League and the NFL.

3. Collect and use the right customer data to fuel personalized customer experiences.

Custom-designed marketing cloud technology, such as The Oracle Red Bull Racing Paddock, can help you automate marketing activities like fan engagement and content management, campaign execution, website tracking, measurement, and reporting alongside learning more about what the team’s fans love—all capabilities that play the most crucial roles in creating fan affinity with today’s sports and entertainment brands.

Going forward, I’m very much looking forward to interacting with The Paddock to see how personalization will play into future fan experiences.

What an experience!

Along with more than 440,000 other fans, I was able to truly immerse myself in a sporting event with one of the most passionate fan bases in the world.

These fans roared and cheered as the drivers laid their lives on the line for a podium win. The visceral feeling of seeing the F1 racecars zoom by fans at 190 mph is forever cemented in my memory and has opened a new world for me.

And I love that Oracle can be part of fueling the action as part of a top-notch loyalty program that creates excitement, builds deeper customer relationships, and offers engaging customer experiences for fans just like me.

Watch how Oracle Advertising and CX and Oracle Red Bull Racing team up to deliver unrivaled customer experiences and bring fans closer to the race––all through personalization and real-time engagement.