How does one become head of communications of one of America's major sports leagues? Andrew Thomas talks to Dan Courtemanche, the executive vice president for communications at Major Leaue Soccer

Photographs by sassofoto.com

A football match may well be a game of two halves, but for Dan Courtemanche, his rise to executive vice president of communications at Major League Soccer (MLS), has been a steady progression up the career league. However, had he taken the route expected of him upon graduation, instead of finding himself the captain of comms for America’s professional football league, he could have been relegated to selling office supplies.

Courtemanche completed a marketing degree at the University of Georgia, and was on the cusp of signing on to a sales job with a local office supplies firm when he heard of an internship at a sports marketing firm in Atlanta. The office supplies post came with a good salary, an expense account and a company car. The internship was unpaid. Courtemanche says, “My parents thought I was crazy, but I said if I do this for a few months and it doesn’t work out I can always go back and look at that sales career.”

It was a small sports marketing firm in Atlanta with only a handful of clients, just after Courtemance started, the agency expanded. “I was there at the right place and at the right time and they hired me full time,” he says. It was a transfer he hasn’t regretted making. With a debate raging in PR and communications on the ethics of unpaid internships, it’s unsurprising that someone at Courtemanche’s level has strong views on the subject. However, considering his career start, the surprise is how vigorously opposed to the practice he is. He sees it as arcane, and has ensured that MLS doesn’t use free labour, “This was 23 years ago; a different time. At Major League Soccer interns are compensated on a wage that is appropriate to their skill set.” Despite his clear opposition to unpaid internships, Courtemanche still believes that nothing beats that first taste of experience, “It is extremely important that young people can showcase their talent and ability to a potential employer. Hopefully they’ll either secure a full time job or at least get referred to others within the sports industry. We have dozens of interns come through our company each year and the very talented ones are hired by Major League Soccer. Others are referred to our clubs, the US Soccer Federation, CONCACAF [The Confederation of North, Central American and Caribbean Association Football] or others within the soccer industry. It’s very different to when I went through the system. As it should be.”

What is also different is the number of vocational communications courses now available. When Courtemanche was at college there were only four universities offering sports marketing degrees. Now there are dozens, including his alma mater. “I didn’t take any PR or journalism classes or comms courses. I was focused on a career in business, and in a broader scope that’s what I do now. It’s still a minority who come through the university sports marketing management programmes. The vast majority still come through a straight business programme or are former journalists.”

At Strategic Group, his role was to support sponsorship campaigns for clients. He says experience at an agency is invaluable, “Anyone who wishes to get involved in the sports industry should start their career with an agency. You get exposure to all aspects of the business. I was fortunate to work on the Goodwill games, the PGA tour, major league baseball and other projects.”

Strategic Group was predominantly a sponsorship fulfilment agency, and although it had done some communications work, this had never been a major focus. Winning the Atlanta Attack account changed things, not only for the agency but for Dan Courtemanche. Atlanta Attack were the local professional indoor football team Indoor football endured a brief popularity, during which the Attack brought in Strategic Group to consult on sponsorship sales, broadcasting and communications. Courtemanche was the youngster in the office “They looked at me and said - oh you played soccer when you were growing up, you can manage their comms.”

The timing was impeccable. The Atlanta Attack client win coincided with Mastercard appointing the agency to assist during the lead up to its sponsorship of the 1994 World Cup. This allowed Courtemanche the opportunity to learn his trade on the smaller account, but also to work on communications on the big, resume- boosting brand of Mastercard. He helped develop the card company’s strategic plan for activating and maximizing its sponsorship of the United States-hosted event, which many argue was the turning point for association football in the U.S.

It was also a turning point for Courtemanche. While working on the Mastercard account, he came across the Continental Indoor Soccer League (CISL), and approached them in an attempt to align sponsorship opportunities. Although he was only three years into his career, the CISL asked him to come and manage their communications and help launch the nascent league. Admittedly it was only a small league, but the majority of the teams’ owners also ran NBA basketball or NHL hockey teams, turning to football to ensure their stadiums were occupied during the off-seasons.

“I thought if the soccer league doesn’t work out I will have made enough contacts to help with a career in one of the other sports,” Courtemanche says. The league was doing relatively well, growing from seven to 15 teams, 11 of them owned by NBA or NHL owners. It also got Courtemanche’s name more widely known across the soccer industry. In late 1995 he was approached by the president of the United States Soccer Federation, Alan Rothenberg, on behalf of Major League Soccer, who asked him to become the MLS’ first head of communications.

Football had a history of failing in the U.S. Leagues came and went – CISL closed its doors in 1997, two years after Courtemanche left. But Courtemanche notes an optimism about the MLS, “What made it feel different was the incredible success of the ’94 World Cup, which still holds the record for the highest average attendance of 64,000 fans per game. But what really made the impact was the strategic plan behind the league and, most importantly, the ownership. The cornerstone was the foundation set by Lamar Hunt, Robert Kraft and Phil Anschutz. These individuals suddenly made it look like it could be hugely successful. I felt it provided a great opportunity for an ambitious 27 year old.”

It still wasn’t easy. Although the first year’s average gate of 17,406 was ahead of the initial forecasts of 12,000, interest subsided and the league levelled off to an average of 14,000. In 1999, having lost $250 million in its first five years, MLS fired commissioner Doug Logan, replacing him with Don Garber, the senior vice president of the National Football League (NFL), America’s gridiron football association. Within two years, Garber revolutionised the MLS, taking the league down the long journey towards profitability, a destination it would finally reach in 2005.

Much of the turnaround of MLS’ fortunes would be missed by Courtemanche. The MLS offices were in downtown Manhattan and Courtemanche lived blocks away from New York’s twin towers, levelled in the tragic events of September 11. Like so many people affected by the World Trade Centre bombings, Courtemanche and his wife decided a lifestyle change was necessary. They left the nightmare of post-attack New York to return to Atlanta where Courtmanche become the head of communications at the fledgling Women’s United Soccer Association (WUSA).

Although it was his third league start-up, Courtemanche was happy in the new role. Sadly, however, the league was not to last, and after three seasons WUSA called time.

A year of consulting roles followed, including working on the Tour de Georgia, America’s premier professional cycling event. Throughout his time in Atlanta, Courtemanche stayed in touch with his old colleagues at MLS. In early 2005, Garber called. The trauma of 9/11 had subsided and Courtemanche didn’t need asking twice before returning to New York in March 2005 to take up the position of senior vice president for marketing and communication.

It was an exciting time for communication professionals. In his first stint at MLS, Courtemanche worked closely with the marketing department. “Although there was budget to spend on traditional marketing and advertising we really had to rely on earned media to break through the clutter and generate cultural relevance for the start-up league,” he says. MLS had already been ahead of the ball in Courtemanche’s first tenure when it became the first professional sports league to have a website.

In 2005, the league became profitable. Yet digital was still outsourced, remaining so until 2009. When Courtemanche originally started in 1995, communications was run by him and a part-timer. The department is now comprised of 10 people with two independent consultants and an outside agency assisting with crisis communication. Overall, MLS has grown from 30 people to 200.

Head count obviously hasn’t been the only area of change. “As a young league, there were concerns as to whether the league would survive,” Courtemanche says. “It was easier to manage the communication process. Back then the tactics were different and if something happened you could take your time, analyse it, decide how you would work with external media and messaging and interviews and then, the next day, it would be on television or in the papers. As everyone knows, you now have seconds before you have to react.”

The increased need for quick responses, together with the league’s growth and success, saw Courtemanche’s responsibilities change. In 2010, Howard Handler, a well-respected marketing executive with a history of marketing big brands such as the NFL, EMI and Virgin Mobile became chief marketing officer and Courtemanche took up his current position of executive vice president of communications.

Having worked for so many start-up leagues, and with a number of leagues relegated to fail, it is clear that Courtemanche is now relishing his time at Major League Soccer. The league has expanded to 19 clubs, and recently announced intentions to grow to 24 by 2020. Globally regarded as the seventh most successful league, MLS’ stated ambition is to be among the top leagues in the world by 2022.

The growth of the game was arguably established 1994’s World Cup, but a growing Hispanic community and a rule change allowing clubs to pay more for a limited number of, mainly overseas, players has also helped. The latter allowed internationally renowned English star David Beckham join the L.A. Galaxy in 2007. “Beckham’s signing announcement was the busiest day in my career,” Courtemanche says. “We’d obviously planned our announcement but once we’d gone live that morning I literally spent the whole day on my phone and computer. I didn’t stop for lunch or dinner but kept going until about 11:30 that night.”

Beckham was clearly a catalyst for the league’s success, one that will be hard to replace. “Fortunately here in the States and in Canada, there are many more people who grew up with the game including those in decision-making roles in the media and those charged with programming and corporate marketing. That’s very different to how it was in ’96.”

But Courtemanche isn’t playing for extra time, “We still have to creatively sell the sport to generate incremental media coverage and get that earned media. There are only a handful of soccer players who are in significant demand, which is great and we love that but we need to continue to creatively sell and position and place many of our players with media outlets. So it’s still a strategic process and it’s still selling. It takes up the vast majority of my time but it’s what I enjoy, and it’s part of my background.”

He may still see it as selling, but for Dan Courtemanche, had he decided to please his parents straight after graduation, he may well have been selling paperclips rather than coverage for the world’s most popular sport.