During NYC Advertising Week, WWE Superstar Becky Lynch joined WWE Digital Vice President, Steve Braband on a panel to discuss how WWE Superstars create and build their personal brands.
When asked how much she pays attention to how fans are engaging, Lynch replied, “I think there’s two different–in a way, there’s two different audiences– the online audience isn’t necessarily the audience that’s coming to the shows with their family. So, the things that those two audiences are into are very different. And I think you have to be in tune with both and you have to keep your ears open, your eyes open to what’s working and what isn’t.”
“But at the same time, I think of this as art. I think of this as my art, my craft that I put my heart and soul into. I think you have to be aware and very diligent about not consuming too many opinions because once you’re listening to everybody, you’re not listening to yourself. It’s hard to forget what you’ve seen and what you’ve heard, especially if it’s negative. So I think you have to be very mindful of the feedback you’re getting.”
Balancing the character and real life on social media
“Big Time Becks” posts a lot about both her professional and personal life on social media. She answered how she keeps a balance with, “I don’t know. I don’t know.” (laughing) “I think it’s constantly a work in progress. I try to keep my social media platforms very much in line with what I’m doing on TV. So that everything feels like it’s one story being told. The same character that you see on TV is the same character that you see tweeting, the same character that’s posting on social media. Sometimes, we bring in a little bit of reality, just like we do in WWE.”
“But for me, I think it’s important that I keep a little bit of me for myself and my family. I don’t like posting pictures of my baby girl too much because I take her everywhere and I want her to be free of any of that kind of stuff.”
10-year-old Becky Lynch helps her branding choices
Lynch had a simple response on deciding what products to brand: “would ten-year-old me think its cool? Not always, but when you’re on the cover of a cereal box. It’s pretty frickin’ cool. I think in the beginning of my career, any opportunity that came my way was ‘yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.’ (pointing) Then as you grow and you can get a little bit pickier, you think ‘how do I want my brand to appear? How do I want this to effect the business in general? Or how will this progress the business? How does this progress me, my family, is it good for everyone involved?’ That’s how I look at things or how will ten-year-old me feel about it?”
Being on Billions since she was a fan of the show was a highlight for Lynch. The SportsCenter commercial is another favorite branding opportunity.
When Lynch wasn’t getting much TV time, social media was a “live mic in my hand 24/7 so that I could tell my story, so that I could get my message across. The currency of Twitter is the zinger; how do you zing people? And people get interested in that and they get engaged in that. And we’re in the conflict business–sure pre-determined conflict business, but it’s a conflict business– so when people see that on Twitter, they’re like, ‘oh, that’s real. That’s the real thing there.’ So, it’s always helped to drive a story.”
She also says that people get upset about the conflicts on Twitter, but that helps drive the story.
