I’m always fascinated by origin stories – how something was invented or made, where my long-lost relatives are from, or how and why companies were founded. While we were designing the 2021 One Lap of America Yearbook, I was curious… how did we get here? So I sat down with Stephen Burke, the Founder and President of Driftpoint Media, and asked him where it all began:

From the lens of our founder

In 2009, I went on my first One Lap of America road trip around the country with my good friend Tim Harper. At the time, there was a bulletin board on the One Lap of America website, and I remember the reaction we had when we asked for advice on a marketing kit to obtain team sponsorship. It was more of a “good luck” response since it wasn’t easy for an audience to follow the event.  

That year, we put together a marketing strategy. We created a sponsorship brochure for our team and we did a media outreach for sponsors in order to get some financial help. We were taking a Galant VR-4 and a forum of Galant enthusiasts got behind us. We were off and running. 

Moving traffic

It was an amazing first year and we drew a lot of attention online. Thanks to the release of this new thing called an iPhone, we had the ability to update people while we were in route, share a glimpse of what we were doing, and post updates along the way. People from the forums were showing up at the tracks along the way to support us and we even had roadside help sourcing parts when things broke. 

We made it to the end, definitely not in first place, but knew we had laid it all out there for everybody who came along for the ride. It was the year that MotorTrend was covering the event and I remember them coming over to us at the end and saying “you guys moved a huge amount of traffic online,” and I replied, “I know,” as I swiveled my screen to show him our event website’s Google Analytics results from the digital marketing campaign. That is when I knew we were ahead of the marketing curve and started getting serious about organizing how traffic moved online. 

We went on the event four more times. We had sponsors for tires, engines, turbos and enough money to cover costs that we were able contribute to a charity. In 2011, I developed a website that combined all One Lapper social media accounts into one feed, so you could follow the live event. We stole all of the traffic that year and I loved it.

From races to recipes

In 2012, after our One Lap race, I formed Driftpoint Media. Marketing agencies had no idea what ‘digital marketing’ was yet, so I started building the recipes for everyone else.

Since then, Driftpoint Media has grown from its focus on PR, SEO and photography to a creative agency that handles everything from branding and content creation to digital advertising and web development…and almost everything in between. We’re still a growing company, but our roots and experience in marketing and creative show our dedication to building relationships between businesses and their clients/customers. We’re a small team, but we’re passionate about and invested in every project we touch.

So if you’re ready to work with a team that’s completely transparent and adaptable and offers big agency talent without big agency obstacles, reach out. Our goal is to help you cross your finish line and then prepare you for your next race.