I met their President/CEO, Davyeon Ross, last March at the 2009 IEG Sponsorship Conference. I had a great time chatting with him and we have stayed in touch since then. I think the AthletixNation platform is very interesting, especially as it relates to local sports websites and helping them add more content, highlights and things they may not otherwise have access to. Recently, I sent Davyeon a couple questions for an interview that  I thought would be interesting to post here on the blog.

1) What is the vision for Athletix Nation?

Our Vision is to make AthletixNation a resource for agencies, advertisers and publishers who want access to and the ability to associate with college sports content and interactive engaging applications.

2) What’s your background? Why did you decide to start the company?

I’m originally from Trinidad and Tobago and received a basketball scholarship to Benedictine College in KS (Go Ravens). At Benedictine I received degrees in Computer Science with minors in Math and Business while leading my team in scoring. After working a few years I went on to receive my MBA. I started off my career at Sprint in the Engineering group and was recruited to a start up boutique consulting firm. At eVergance I worked with numerous company’s nationally and internationally including T-Online (Germany), RIM/Blackberry (Canada), Sasktel (Canada), Business Objects (Canada), Siemens Medical Systems (Germany), Mattel (New York) and several others. I started AthletixNation because I wanted to combine my passions, sports and technology. It was also around the time eVergance was acquired and a perfect opportunity to capitalize on the things I had learned during my career.

3) What has surprised you most about the sports industry since you got started in it?

One of the most surprising things about the sports industry is how convoluted the rights structures are. As we continue to acquire more content and build relationships we continue to learn more about the rights. College by far is the most convoluted but I’m excited to be a part of the college sports experience.

4) What do you think the biggest opportunity is for publishers/companies to utilize your products?

Well many of our publishers have relationships with advertisers. I believe as they continue to leverage our products to enhance the online experience and supplement their existing content, there is an incredible opportunity to provide local advertisers with cutting edge engaging solutions outside the traditional banner advertising. Many of our publishers are local media outlets and these outlets have relationships with brands at the local level who are excited about being associated with their local teams.

5) What’s next for Athletix Nation?

This year we are hoping for a growth year. We have a great distribution network (over 400 publishers), access to great content and an exciting digital framework. We launched a couple apps on Facebook a month ago and we also have our bracket challenge app which I encourage everyone to play @ http://apps.facebook.com/axnbracketchallenge/. We are also heavily working on some mobile apps.

6) Video, fantasy games or mobile apps – which is going to be hotter or better utilized by sports properties this year?

Well, I think we are going to see a hybrid of all of these components. I hope to see video integrated into fantasy games being played not only on the web but also on mobile devices. Statistics show that video advertising and video usage is on the rise. AthletixNation hopes to see and be part of more integration of video into other mediums and applications to bring relevance and amazement to consumers. As it relates to sports teams, we should see better integration of video and games across the 4 screens (Mobile, TV, Jumbotron and PCs). Teams are doing a much better job learning about their audience and consumers which I believe will assist in marketing to these audiences.

7) If you had $1 million to spend on Athletix Nation right now, what would you use it for?

Two main things, I’d hire 3-5 sales executives and a few more engineers so that we could continue to innovate and sell our existing inventory. Oh, I’d also give myself a raise lol

How can people get in touch with you to learn more about you or your company?

I’m always accessible, you can email me at dross@athletixnation.com or send me a message on twitter @axnpres. I’m extremely responsive and open to new concepts, new relationships and new partners.

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Thanks for doing the interview, Davyeon.

I encourage any of you who may want to learn more about AthletixNation to get in touch with Davyeon and let him tell you more about what they’re doing. I’m also curious to hear what your thoughts are about his company, and I’m sure Davyeon would appreciate your thoughts and feedback, too.

Though I’ve seen a number of Tony Robbins videos online and think he’s a great guy, I was wondering the same thing before I heard him speak last Monday.

For four hours, Tony had everyone listening, engaged, and, at times, on their feet and dancing (see end of video below). I’ve never seen someone who can control a crowd as well as Tony. He had the crowd fired up and gave people some things they can apply to their own life and businesses. His main focus is getting people to understand what things drive them to do what they do, and how they can use this knowledge to focus on the things they want. I came away with some good ideas about what I should focus on, and his speech energized me for the rest of the conference.

If you really focus on whatever it is you want to accomplish and attack it with an insane amount of energy, then good things will happen. This message can apply to anyone, so even though it wasn’t directly focused on sponsorship, I thought it was a great message for people to hear, especially considering that things have been difficult for many people lately.

Here’s a short clip of Tony’s speech. At the end you can see how fired up everyone was.

Speaking of LinkedIn, there will be a meetup for members of the Sponsorship Insights LinkedIn Group on Sunday, March 8 at 6 PM at Kitty O’Sheas Pub in the basement of the Hilton Hotel in Chicago.  This will be the first official gathering for the group, which Dan Beeman has built up to about 3,000 sports marketing and sponsorship professionals. LinkedIn is a great way to network with professionals and form new relationships, so if you’re in this industry, I highly recommend joining this group. Dan also has a great blog (Sponsorship Insights) that you should check out if you’re interested in this stuff.

Dan asked me to help host this meetup, and I’m excited about discussing sports marketing and social media with anyone who is interested. Please let me know if you’ll be able to make it. If you can’t make this meeting, but will still be attending the conference, I’d still love to meet up. Drop me a line if you’re interested!