Executive Director of Kayo Sports, Cate Hefele, has always loved the storytelling aspect of sport. The passion of fans, the triumphs and the heartbreak on the field, and the way sport can bring a community together has always really drawn her in.
It was this passion for the stories in sport that led her from a degree in marketing and journalism to an early career working with the National Football League (NFL) in the United States, in its marketing, business and PR departments.
“I spent about seven years all up there at the NFL,” Hefele told Women’s Agenda recently.
“I feel like I really grew up there in a sport that is so massive and really has this global impact. I’ve been able to take a lot of the components of what I learnt there through the rest of my career.”
Hefele speaks fondly about her time at the NFL, where she says she honed her ability to excel in the often-male dominated world of the commercial side of sport.
“When you walk into the room, you’re often already at a disadvantage because they don’t see you as someone that played – and therefore understands – the game,” Hefele said.
“But I was able to understand the mechanics of why something could be a strong commercial deal or why it could be a good thing to market to our fans, without having stepped foot on the field.”
Throughout her career, Hefele has also spent time McKinsey & Co, where she developed a broader business acumen, before moving to Australia, where she eventually took on the role of Chief of Staff to the CEO at Foxtel, working on its streaming growth strategy.
“While I didn’t go to business school, I was able to get an education on the ground at McKinsey, where you learn so much of the rigor around strategy, around structuring, and how to think more of business outside of sport,” she said.
In February this year, she became Executive Director at Kayo Sports, heading up the largest sports streaming service in Australia. Hefele said she was drawn to the fast pace of the work being done at Kayo, and its innovative, start-up culture.
“It is this unique property where we’ve got this incredible subscription growth, but also this incredible viewership and engagement,” Hefele says. “We run on a daily basis, not a monthly or quarterly basis. And we are constantly looking at the numbers. We constantly have the platform on in the background.”
“Being the executive director, I get to make decisions every day in the business and can really see the impact of those decisions.”
At Kayo, Hefele leads the long term growth strategy, brand and go to market activity, content and programming. One of the projects Hefele has been proud to work on since coming on board at Kayo has been the Super Netball, where she thinks Kayo has played an integral role in bringing the sport to the masses.
“We’ve got the [Kayo] Freebies element, which I think has been great for access, and has also been really good for grassroots exposure of the game,” she explains.
“With Kayo, it’s the fact that it is internet delivered and you can watch it on TV, on your computer or on your mobile. It’s high-quality production at $25 a month, and it has actually broadened that base and access.”
The other aspect, Hefele explains, is that Kayo is able to play a pivotal role growing the audience of women’s sports, like netball and AFLW, by putting it in front of people who may have not been inclined to watch it before.
“About 70 per cent of Australians have increased their consumption of women’s sport recently. And it’s continued to be on the rise,” Hefele says.
“Kayo still has a male dominated audience and subscriber base, but because the platform is so flexible, we can move the tile for netball right next to say either NRL, or the AFL or AFLW, or next to the women’s Cricket World Cup final.
“And we can merchandise it in such a way that it’s giving exposure to fans who are new to netball, as well as being that access for already existing netball fans.”
As Hefele looks to spearhead Kayo’s continuing growth, she says she likes to remind herself and her team not to forget the passion of the work they do.
“In media and in sport, it’s so easy to get spun out. There are so many exciting things happening, but I think it’s important not to lose sight of the industry that we work in, and that we are luck to be able to put amazing games on the air,” she said.
“How fun is our job, to be able to go out and get more people engaged in a product and allow more fans to watch the sports they love?”