Shawn Spieth dearly wanted to be in Scotland, watching his son Jordan try to win a second consecutive British Open. He stayed at home in Dallas, though, because he and a partner are launching a business that ranks pro athletes not by how much they have won but by how popular and marketable social media makes them.
"Our objective is to be the currency of social media in sports and entertainment. That essentially means we become the social version of Nielsen," he said, referring to the company famous for measuring television ratings. His new firm, MVPIndex, monitors how athletes are doing on Instagram, Twitter and other platforms and translates that data into rankings on the person's up-to-the-minute value to sponsors and agencies.
The findings are designed to be interesting also for fans: Who is No. 1 in golf? Heading into this week, MVPIndex ranked Rory McIlroy first, followed by Tiger Woods, then the younger Spieth. Who knows how that might change after the Claret Jug is awarded Sunday afternoon? Spieth entered the final round tied for the lead.
His father said the ratings are extremely fluid, which is why he thinks they will be helpful. For instance, Rickie Fowler recently dropped out of the top 10, probably because he has been so busy preparing for the U.S. and British Opens he has not been as active as usual on Instagram. "We rank and score and index every conversation that we track daily, sometimes multiple times a day," Shawn said, adding that he and partner Kyle Nelson had been in the mobile video business before they decided to get into the sports/social media realm.
"With sports being very traditional, we knew it would take a while. Paradigm shift is never easy, but that's OK," he said on the phone. "We know there are challenges, which is why I'm here and not in Carnoustie."
