ESPN’s Savvy SVP Connects Audiences and Advertisers in a Multimedia World
By focusing on advertising effectiveness and delivering quality audience and potential customers for ESPN’s clients, Patricia Betron has reshaped the way businesses thinks about ESPN. Its fans are not just sports fans, but also consumers, and this savvy senior vice president of multimedia sales has lead efforts to understanding the often under-appreciated buying power of its traditional audience, and developing insights into a growing bicultural Hispanic audience, as well as a growing female sports fan base.
She has also pushed the company to understand media consumption behaviors in a multiscreen environment. Over the past two years, Tricia has led innovative deals that incorporate the multiscreen nature of video, developing industry-leading concepts that are not only revenue generators, but major breakthroughs in scale, scope, and concept.
Tricia has been a leader in focusing on serving both ESPN’s viewing customers and its advertising clients—engaging customers to best achieve results in marketing to them. She has blazed a trail among women in ESPN’s sales organization, runs a vast multimedia team that spans the country, and handles some of the biggest accounts with whom ESPN does business—all while raising two children.
“My first sales position was a real leap for me. I never thought of myself as a sales person,” said Tricia, “and realized I really enjoyed it. I knew this was what I wanted to do when my first client told me I helped grow his business.”
Tricia is a well-regarded member of ESPN’s executive team—respected by her peers, her superiors, and her staff. She’s an active member of the Executive Women Forum at ESPN and a mentor to many women across the company.
