Smartsheet ignites new Formula 1 sponsorship strategy to aid STEM diversity effort

Marketing workflow management software company Smartsheet launched a new Formula 1 sponsorship strategy, Sponsor X, which forgoes its place on the McLaren team car at the Melbourne Grand Prix. Instead, Smartsheet invited local Aussie non-profit DeadlyScience to take its place on the car.

DeadlyScience promotes STEM learning (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children. This will be the first time an indigenous organization has been featured on a Formula 1 car.

In addition to sharing its ad space in the race, Smartsheet is also lending the nonprofit organization its software and consulting services to raise awareness. DeadlyScience has shipped over 20,000 books and science resources to remote schools in over 100 communities across Australia.

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Why we care. We saw a lot of out-of-the-box strategies during the Super Bowl. Brands supported marquee sponsorships with digital messaging, or skipped the Big Game altogether and took to social media. Smartsheet is supporting this strategy with digital assets that explain DeadlyScience’s community efforts. They are also providing the blueprint for how other companies can use their sports sponsorships to give more visibility to nonprofits. And they’re using a hashtag–#SponsorX.

About The Author

Chris Wood draws on over 15 years of reporting experience as a B2B editor and journalist. At DMN, he served as associate editor, offering original analysis on the evolving marketing tech landscape. He has interviewed leaders in tech and policy, from Canva CEO Melanie Perkins, to former Cisco CEO John Chambers, and Vivek Kundra, appointed by Barack Obama as the country’s first federal CIO. He is especially interested in how new technologies, including voice and blockchain, are disrupting the marketing world as we know it. In 2019, he moderated a panel on “innovation theater” at Fintech Inn, in Vilnius. In addition to his marketing-focused reporting in industry trades like Robotics Trends, Modern Brewery Age and AdNation News, Wood has also written for KIRKUS, and contributes fiction, criticism and poetry to several leading book blogs. He studied English at Fairfield University, and was born in Springfield, Massachusetts. He lives in New York.