How to Connect with Modern Fans – Zach Galia, Pittsburgh Pirates

This transcript has been transcribed by Riverside.fm, no edits (please excuse any errors)

Sean Callanan (00:01.092) Very happy to welcome Zach Galia. He's the Director of Social Media and Content Strategy at the Pittsburgh Pirates in the Major League Baseball League, MLB I should say. Zach, welcome to the podcast.

Zach Galia (00:13.39) Thank you very much for having me. Really excited.

Sean Callanan (00:16.216) I'm really able to appreciate you taking the time. I always get started by asking people how they got their start in the world of sports. What about yourself? What was your first job or role in the world of sports?

Zach Galia (00:28.206) Yeah, I mean, I'll try and give the abridged version, but, yeah, I mean, so I

Sean Callanan (00:32.369) I like the journey. So no need to abridge because I like the twists and turns and it is very simple. A lot of people go different ways. So I always find some usefulness in the journey.

Zach Galia (00:42.798) Sounds good. All right, well, I mean, so going to college, like I played hockey all growing up, I played baseball growing up, but still loved kind of like the creative side of things and writing, painting, all that kind of stuff. But I never really understood how I was gonna merge those two worlds together. So knew I wasn't going to the MLB or NHL. And so once college was over, I needed to figure out what life was gonna be. So in college, tried a few different things.

was an architect for I think six days until I realized how much books and supplies cost and then dropped out of that. And then just trying to, know, took a bunch of different random classes to figure things out and found kind of my niche in like mass media and communications and media arts and love just kind of you know, the film side and, you know, television, radio, you know, whatever it is, it was just, it was cool to be.

part of and learn about kind of the entertainment side of things. So I thought was going to end up in film school after college, got accepted to film school, then realized how much it would cost and decided to get to film school. And then ended up with a couple odd jobs here and there. I did a couple sales jobs that were not for me. I was an admissions counselor at the college I went to, was a hockey coach at the college I went to. And then luckily enough, I had a friend from college, had a job with the local NASCAR Track in Michigan.

And they were looking for someone to do some like video work and revamp their YouTube and and and so Wasn't a nascar fan didn't know anything about the sport But jumped at the opportunity. And so once I got into that role Probably within a month my boss kind of came to me was like, you know I I hope and and thought that maybe you would take over all of the social media accounts by now In this role and I had no idea that that was part of the role. So I was I

dove head first in and started learning and reaching out to anyone who would talk to me. you know, had a lot of great people respond to my messages and jump on phone calls like this, just to learn, you know, what it takes to do, you know, social and this stuff for an organization, for a brand. so from that point on, it's been, you know, it's been 12 years now, which is crazy to say. And it's been, you know, still the same mindset, you know, always reaching out to people, always trying to learn and grow and, you know, spent two years there learning everything I could.

Zach Galia (03:03.726) doing a little bit of everything with graphic design and video work and photography and strategy and analytics and everything in between. And then parlayed that into the first ever social media role that the Steelers ever had in Pittsburgh. So they had a bunch of people who'd kind of chipped in from time to time, but never someone full time kind of fully focused on this thing. So again, Dove had first in four years there, learned a ton.

I can't explain how many great people I learned from and met and helped me grow over the years, but was able to kind of build and find my footing and find my voice and kind of figure out how to do this on a large scale. And then was able to take a leadership role at the Arizona Cardinals out in Phoenix.

Sean Callanan (03:51.728) I want to stop you there because I think the the important point of that role at the Steelers was that dedicated role. even like, you we are talking that's, 10 years ago, but there's still teams having that, I guess, shared approach or managed by the comms team or, you know, multiple people sort of chipping in, which does make it really hard to sort of get some to be clear across all the the channels. How important was that to sort of

I mean, was, you you become the throughput and everything comes through and becomes a high demand role. But how important was it to sort of, I guess, get things aligned and sort of have some consistency across platforms and across tone and those kinds of things to sort of have that, you know, the one person that, you know, that original role, which was that social media coordinator, that person was sort of the key thumbs, if you will.

Zach Galia (04:42.83) Yeah, I mean, I think it's, like you said, it's consistency. It's, you know, it's a lot of that stuff, but it's also just having someone dedicated to doing it too, where like social media, like if I have, you know, three people on my staff or I have 20, you're never gonna have enough to do everything that you need to do. So, but having someone that's dedicated full time to do this and, you know, just think about it and develop strategies and,

look at how things were done in the past and how you cover games is as simple as that sounds, is a big part of everything we do in sports. just having someone who was just looking at everything that the organization was doing through the lens of social media was key because there's so many, like you said, there's so many touch points, not only with fans and what you're pushing out from content, but from…

all of the people within the organization of like, you know, goals and marketing goals and ticket sales goals and the community goals with partners like there's so many different touch points that social media then contributes to that if you don't have someone kind of like you said, like as that one person or that group of people who are like, these are the people we need to go to to discuss it with. It's just, it's hard. Like there's, you know, there's not really a good way to do, you know,

this job part time. You kind of have to have someone who's fully focused on this stuff and you're always going to have more work than you have people for sure.

Sean Callanan (06:10.618) So you went from the Steelers to the Cardinals, also in the NFL, and started sort of moving into those director of social and director of digital content roles. How did that shift from being, I guess, the person always on the tools and always posting to being trying to step back a bit from that and maybe even managing or working with people that are working on particular platforms?

Zach Galia (06:34.03) That's honestly that's what I say to everyone is that was the hardest transition possible and like the hardest job you'll ever have is a leadership role because you go just like you said like I went from the doer and Covering every game and traveling with the team and doing all of this stuff to then being you know the person who steers the ship and guides the people who are doing this stuff so it was a it was a hard transition of you know, this is the stuff I'm really good at and this is the reason why I've gotten to this point and now I have to learn a whole new job of

you know, how do I make sure that my team is set up for success and how do I make sure that I'm keeping them in mind of, you know, growth opportunities and making sure that their experience is, you know, all that they're hoping. So it was, it was definitely a drastic change. I don't know that I was the best leader or boss when I first kind of made the transition. So it was, it was really hard, but I think as I've grown and I've seen kind of the mistakes and the shortcomings I've had when I was in this early on, it's, you know,

I think I'm getting my feet under me as a leader and granted I'm in kind of my what sixth year I think in a leadership role and it's still kind of, you you're developing your style, you're developing, you know, why you wanna be a leader and understanding, you know, what's important to you and then figuring out, you know, how, like I said, how do you empower your team? How do you make sure that their journey is better than the journey you went through? And, you know, me being someone who is kind of in social and sports from the very beginning, I can already help.

you know, my team with things that I've, you know, I'm probably still struggling with to this day to help them get ahead of it and give them experience in things that I wish I had experienced it. So that was by far the hardest transition was going from kind of the doer to the leader in that change.

Sean Callanan (08:19.248) Definitely, but I'd also, you know, I have spoken to lot of people who have been, you know, been in the role and then moved into that leadership role and, you know, understood the frustrations, understood the times when they weren't heard, understand the expertise that you have there that, you know, once you start stepping away from the tools you don't have, was that something that, you know, having that empathy and understanding, you know, what you was sort of desiring to offer when you were in that role and sort of making sure you can sort of offer that to your staff that are in those roles now.

Zach Galia (08:46.062) Yeah, I I think, you know, any, any person I'm sure in any department, but like having a seat at the table is everything, right? Like everything you're trying to do, especially in social, especially in content, like you need buy-in, you need kind of the thumbs up from the people who are above you making the decisions to be like, we, you know, we value what you're doing. We agree with what you're doing. You know, your direction aligns with what our goals are. Go and do it. And if you need anything, we're here. So it's, it's always good to, um, and,

utterly necessary to have that buy-in and have that seat at the table. And so that was something that was, that comes with those leadership positions and then being able to, like I said, empower your team and expose them to those opportunities to, you know, be a part of that table and understand what's being talked about at that table and really, you know, working through those issues together rather than kind of shouldering everything on your own is hugely beneficial.

Sean Callanan (09:40.144) And so now you're a director of social media and content strategy. You know, my time doing podcasting, I've seen a lot of different titles. So I always ask people what the title means, you know, in actuality and what you're doing. What does your role mean? And describe your role at the Pirates.

Zach Galia (09:58.048) I mean, I think it's very similar to what I was doing with the Cardinals. In my three different roles I had with the Cardinals, it's kind of all of those mixed together into one title. But basically, everything that goes out on social is coming through me and my team. And we're working through how we do X, Y, and Z and how we're, like I said earlier, preparing for the season. And how did we do last year? And what's the plan moving forward? How do we get better?

You know constantly looking at kind of the numbers behind everything we're posting and and how do we improve what's working? What's not and then on the content side working with you know, our content team and my counterpart our director of content and you know putting together a plan of how do we how do we make these ideas come to life and you know working together with his team and mine and you know and working on you know, the nuts and bolts of you know, you have this grand idea, but

How does it come together? How do you put it together? When do you have time when there's 162 games and how do we make that work? basically that's my job in a nutshell is just, my team strategizes and posts it and his team makes it and creates it. So it's a good counterbalance of the two of us and working together on all this stuff and shout out to Sterling on that.

Sean Callanan (11:21.368) Yes, definitely. I we use digital dollars and content is a pillar and distribution is a pillar and effectively social is, is, you know, a big key chunk of that distribution pay, especially, especially in the ML, in the MLB, which is, know, some of the channels that you have a bit more room to play as far as what you want to do. And then from your team point of view, do you have a team of people that are dedicated particular channels? Do you have a bit of job sharing or is it a bit of a mix?

Zach Galia (11:50.69) Yeah, I I think in a perfect world, you have one person per platform that has their sole focus is making sure that that platform is working at full optimization. But we just, I don't know that I've ever been on a team that's fully staffed to be able to do something like that. So there's three of us on our team, myself, our manager, Jules, and our coordinator, Grace. And basically we are in charge of pushing that messaging out across all of our channels. So.

We split up game coverage and event coverage and posting on different platforms depending on what the day is and what's happening. it's the draft or the All-Star game or whatever it might be, kind of dividing and conquering on everything so that everyone kind of gets the experience to have a little bit of everything instead of being stuck in kind of one lane. But that's it. mean, it's three of us that are sitting down, like I said, all off season and saying, what do we do well?

Where can we improve and now how do we do that and kind of putting a plan together for this season.

Sean Callanan (12:52.304) Yeah, I think it is a balance of sort of having an owner of a platform that is sort of your lead, but also you still want to be part of a team. You still want to collaborate. And, know, when you still got a small team, you still want to be able to bounce an idea, whether it's a, you know, an idea for a reel or, or something that's getting done on X or, you know, or, or TikTok and how it could be transformed for the different platforms. You know, if you don't have that ideation process, you can get a pretty isolating world if you're just the only person on it.

Zach Galia (13:17.858) Yeah, for sure. Yeah, it's tough too. mean, like, there's so many platforms now. So it's like, every time a platform gets, you know, brought up and people start using it, it's like, we'd have to hire somebody else to do that. So it's, there's, like I said, there's a lot that falls on, you know, on our shoulders, but I think, you know, we've got a great team that handles it and strive.

Sean Callanan (13:39.28) So you mentioned your first job was in motor racing and then you've been in NFL and now Major League Baseball, vastly different sports, vastly different cadence of schedules and those kinds of things. How has it been transitioning between different leagues and sort of learning that cadence and some of the differences, even in the storytelling that's required for the different leagues?

Zach Galia (14:04.802) Yeah, I I think, you know, NASCAR, I didn't know any better at that point. So it was, it was all I knew. there really wasn't, I mean, aside from learning what I was supposed to do, there really wasn't a shift by any means. So, I mean, we had two races a year and we had two other big like kind of events and then, you know, little things happen here and there. But, I always say like, I, I owe that role everything when it has to do with me thinking of ideas and making something out of nothing, because there was just.

a lot of nothing that happened because we were, you know, I was tweeting for a race car track, just a piece of asphalt in Michigan with nothing happening for eight months of the year. I mean, but going from there to football, a little bit more drastic just because it was four events to 16 events and plus a draft and plus everything else that football has. But with football, was like you had kind of, you had a week to tell every story. You had a week to either celebrate or forget.

what just happened on Sunday, Monday, Thursday, they play on Saturdays now, but like, basically you had a week for good or for bad to tell that story. And so you could really develop your content plan of what days things go. And it was very consistent in that regard. But sometimes, mean, like if you start the season 0 and 3, nobody really wants to hear from you and all the work you did in the off season is kind of on hold until good things happen.

which made it very tough and and you know conversely in baseball, know, we have 162 games plus spring training plus Stockholm would playoff baseball at some point but like It's it's a blessed like the good for the better worse. Like you get to turn the page more quickly You know you lose by 20 runs, you know Wednesday night Thursday at 3 p.m. You may have another game and it's time to go but so it's easier to turn that page It's easier to forget but it's also that

Sean Callanan (15:49.135) Yeah.

Zach Galia (16:01.056) in itself lies the challenges when you only have say 12 hours to say something amazing happens and you want to celebrate it. You only have 12 hours instead of six days to truly celebrate what it is. And you know, if that involves sitting players down or editing some piece, you know, some brilliant piece that's 12 minutes, like there's only so many hours in a day before the next lineup comes up and everyone forgot about the game before. So it's been, it's been interesting and there's been different challenges each step along the way, but

But it's all, mean, every challenge is an opportunity to be creative. So we just try and figure out the best way we can.

Sean Callanan (16:37.672) You have really gone from one extreme to the other. mean, I mean, and you've got the NFL in the middle, which is like every game is a is a major event, because you only have 16 or 18 of them, you know, plus playoffs, whereas the cadence and the grind of MLB some, know, is there like that is the challenge, then how do you do that longer form, longer arc piece? And is that where you're you are looking for a trend, whether it's a player on a hit streak or something that's happening that

because those sort of things sort of really pop off on baseball when they do catch on.

Zach Galia (17:11.914) Yeah, mean, it's just identifying and trying to figure out what moments could be coming. And granted, like you said, a history, you you never know what's going to happen, but trying to identify those kind of storytelling moments before the season even starts and try and plan for them as best you can. mean, it's, you know, it's kind of a fool's errand to plan for the future when you can't see what's going to happen. But I think it gives me a little bit of peace to know we at least have an idea of what might be coming. But but yeah, I mean, that's the challenge. No matter, you know.

Sean Callanan (17:31.024) Yeah.

Zach Galia (17:40.652) what sport or what brand you work for. Like you want to showcase and celebrate the moments that happen. And whether it's something like a major league debut or it's like you said, a hit streak or it's some milestone that's coming up, trying to plan as best you can, but also being flexible enough to know like things are going to happen that you're not going to be prepared for. How do you react and how do you kind of equip yourself for those, for the unplanned? And I think that's kind of the…

the exciting slash frustrating part of what we do is just you can plan all day every day. Like I said, I've been planning for four months for our season and guaranteed on day number three, something that we didn't plan for is going to happen and we're going to have to figure it out.

Sean Callanan (18:24.784) Most definitely. mean, that is sports, sports social. I mean, as much as the fans will talk about that there's a script, you know, there is no script. But there are a whole bunch of people behind the scenes writing many scripts that are hopeful that might happen and many creatives that are the thing. So how do you get your team to be ready for those events? Like, you know, you want to be ready for those events to be able to turn them around in a quick manner to help your, you know, we talk about digital face paint to get that.

that digital content out, so your fans can celebrate that moment. How do you get that mentality and that I get that ethos into your team?

Zach Galia (18:59.288) Yeah, I I think it's just kind of, you we always call it organized chaos. It's like we plan for everything that we can plan for so that when those things happen that we can't plan for happen, we can kind of adjust and be flexible and really kind of let's discuss, let's figure it out and let's move forward. So, you know, trying to get those processes in place of when something happens, what do we do? And knowing, you know, like if we have, you know,

of a chain of command or an email chain or whether it's Slack or whatever it is. Knowing how we react to something, we may not know what the finished product is or what kind of the package it's going to be at the end, but at least we know, okay, if something happens, here's how we go about figuring it out. And I think that's kind of as much planning as you can do for that unknown stuff is just have a system in place that even if it doesn't work in that exact moment, at least some stage of that system.

might get you closer to pushing something out that you're proud of. But yeah, it's all like, it's so crazy. And not only in sports, it's like the unexpected happen. inherently in social media, things happen and platforms get shut down or a platform changes everything that it wants to do and changes its focus. And so it's like, you not only have to be flexible to kind of…

figure out what to do when things happen on the field. But it's also, you know, just in the platform you're posting, like something could change tomorrow that you have to figure out.

Sean Callanan (20:29.922) And you as a leader, like there are some, some social teams, some brands that really push the boundary or at least plan things is your part of your role also making sure that higher ups have an idea of, know, your, your sense testing these ideas that you might be doing or saying, Hey, this, this, and this, and this, and this happens, then we're going to try this type of thing. Is that something that you're trying to make sure that no one's getting caught by surprise, but you're also getting that permission to, to be creative.

Zach Galia (20:59.296) Yeah, I mean, it goes back to like we were talking about too, is just having a seat at the table and having that buy-in is like, that's what we use the off season for is kind of presenting, here's what we found from last year that we did well, that we did poorly, here's how we want to improve, and this is the plan for this coming season. And granted, it's a big kind of blanket strategy of like, this is our viewpoint, this is what we want to accomplish. So that then as long as like, no matter how simple or complex the idea is, as long as it falls under that kind of umbrella.

the approval process or running it up the chain, it limits how much and how long it takes to do something like that. So you're talking about your viewpoint and what you want to accomplish. And then all of those moments, all of those business will just fall into place under that.

Sean Callanan (21:49.388) A big part of any strategy, content, digital, social is the location. Now, this is your second stint in Pittsburgh, being at the Steelers now at the Pirates. Tell us a little bit about Pittsburgh as a sports town and a fandom. How much is that, obviously shaping what you do in the role now with the Pirates?

Zach Galia (22:11.33) Yeah, I and I grew up in Pittsburgh, so I've been, you know, I've been black and gold from the day I was born. it's, Pittsburgh is a town that cares passionately about their sports team. And on the social side, for better or worse, you know, it's when you're not winning or you're not winning by enough, the fans will let you know and the fans will voice their displeasure quite frequently. And when things are good, things are amazing. So,

you know, it was, I think that was the biggest change going from Pittsburgh to Arizona too, was, you know, you're going from one NFL, one NFL team to another thinking like, well one football team's content, like we'll just move it over to, you know, the desert and we'll be fine. And it didn't work. Like it's, you know, the fan bases could not be more different. And, you know, the, the Cardinals were kind of an expat, not expansion team, but a relocated team to, to the Valley. So a lot of people who

lived there and were born there already had teams outside of the Cardinals. So it was like, it was very much the anger and distaste was more passive of like, if you're not playing well, if you're not doing well, like, we're just going to tune you out and we'll come back whenever things are going well. Or in Pittsburgh, that's not the case. That's if you're doing good, bad or indifferent, you're going to know exactly how the fan base feels every step of the way. And I would, I would always prefer that.

to kind of indifference.

Sean Callanan (23:41.004) absolutely. And that passion, can't, you know, that's sort of what separates sports and sports marketing and sports fandom to, you know, hey, go run social for a bank, you know, yes, you'll get the same anger sometime, but you won't get that. You won't get that that passion. One of the things that is is tough when you're in that role, especially, you know, the doers, the people on the accounts, they read all they can, they read, they're the front line. How do you and then you know, and sometimes that can weigh on them. And, you know, how do you help your staff to realize

Zach Galia (23:51.16) Yeah.

Sean Callanan (24:10.768) one, it's engagement, it's passion. Don't take it personally. Learn to step away because you have to put up the final score because that's what it is and there's a bunch of obligations. yeah, the feedback in poor times, after a bad loss can be pretty brutal. How do you help your staff sort of manage that?

Zach Galia (24:34.304) I mean, it takes a lot of practice to not take this stuff personally. And I think I'm finally, I mean, for the most part, I I'm in a good place. I don't know if I'll ever be fully immune to everything, no, mean, it's just, it's understanding that it's an outlet, right? Like, you post the final score even when you lose because you owe it to your fans who have stuck through that game for better or worse.

and give them kind of that outlet and that, you know, here's one post, granted, I'm sure they'll find other posts to tell their other opinions, but like, here's a post that you tell us how you feel, we get it, we understand, like, we're not happy we lost, like, you know, we, we, we feel the same thing that you're feeling. And we're kind of going through this together. So I mean, like, for my team, I always tell them, like, if we post something, and you see that as exponentially more replies than it does, you know, retweets or reshares it like,

Maybe don't read those comments for the day. And once you're in a good place, mentally maybe kind of go back and go through, but it's so hard because you need to know what your fans are talking about. You need to know how they feel and what they're thinking because we are, social media is kind of the most direct touch point with your fan base. So like, if you're out of touch and you're tone deaf and you don't understand how your fans feel, you're not gonna be able to do what we do successfully. So it's like,

It's that balance. I I did not do a good job of not taking it personally early on. And I think, you know, I got kids at home. I have other things that, you know, I'm not digging through every mean comment that gets sent our way, it's hard. It takes a lot of practice. It takes some mental fortitude to get through it sometimes, there's, mean, you need those comments. You need that passion.

Sean Callanan (26:25.136) One of the things I always do with sports gear clients, I offer a free service where they can text me whatever swear words they like at any moment of the day when they're getting attacked by fans. So occasionally, my I'll just get a text at weird times, just it'll just be the most filthiest stuff you've ever seen. But it helps them get that out of their system. And so like, it's much better going inventing to me than occasionally thinking I'm going to reply. So that's always a that's always a good hack. Just get it out of your system, have a walk and then it's like you feel better. But then the other thing is

You've also got to, I guess, be mindful of you when you have those highs, like you need to say, Hey, like that. It's also tough. Like you sort of said with the schedule, you know, the next day comes along. You also need to remind your team whether they're having a big win. It's amazing or a big moment. And you go, Hey, do realize what we're doing? We're on the field. We've just had an amazing, you we're in the locker room. Like the reason we're in sports to sort of remind them to go, just remember this. So we'll take a mental snapshot of this moment.

because there will be other moments, but this is why we're here.

Zach Galia (27:24.396) Yeah, it's you get your head down and so into the weeds and because there's just so much going on, but it's like, mean, like I can look out my window and see inside PNC Park and like, granted, I'm very biased, but like the most beautiful ballpark in all of the states and like, if my head is buried in my laptop and, you know, documents and it's like, you just need to, you know, you need to enjoy what you're doing. And yes, I mean, every, any job you have like,

across the entire world is difficult, but there's positives to it or you probably wouldn't be doing it. So it's like, just like you said, I mean, like you're going through the negatives, but make sure to not forget about, you know, the good things that come from it.

Sean Callanan (28:04.938) One of the things I wanted to ask you, you started on the job, like I said, on the thumbs and everyone's always looking at what's trending as far as what the platforms are doing. We've gone through the horizontal video to vertical video phase and all those kinds of things. But one constant is copy. Your content team will produce something, but then between your content team and your social team, you've got to come up with copy. What's your take on, I guess, writing copy and the importance of it?

Zach Galia (28:35.072) I mean, it's crazy. Like, no matter how good the piece of content, you could make or break that piece of content if you don't have the right copy. And like, I think that gets overlooked immensely in a lot of areas. But it's incredibly important. We work really hard on preparing copy and like even, know, brainstorming of like, player X is going to hit home run this year. Let's write a bunch of copy as we think of it and as we get inspiration, as we have time and like as we think of witty and good things like

write it down so we have it when things get crazy. But yeah, mean, it's the worst thing in the world. And I told our director of content this off season, he made this incredible piece on Paul Skenes and his debut and spent so much time on it. And I was like, man, I've never been so stressed to develop copy for this thing because I didn't wanna do it a disservice. that's how serious we take it, right? If you are not…

writing the correct copy to capture someone's attention to then watch or consume the piece of content, you're not helping yourself out. So it's a big part of what we do. for me, the more evergreen the copy can be, the better. Because if you say, Neil Cruz is good at baseball, compared to, Neil Cruz hits a two-run homer to tie the game, there's a time limit on the second one. There's no time limit on

first one, matter what the content is below it, it could be a photo, could be a highlight from a game, it could be whatever, but that gets shared exponentially more than this thing happened at this specific time. Whenever the next thing happens, you'll forget about that thing. So that's one thing I always preach to my team is like, let's try and think of things that can live a little bit longer than the moment that we're sharing. But again, like just even thinking and talking and bring some ring about just copy for tweets or Instagram, but like,

It's crazy to say, but that's a big part of what we're doing.

Sean Callanan (30:35.416) And again, it's that team that team effort of like, I use the improv phrase of yes, and like, let someone do it. And then they can either add to it or give their taken and sort of eventually you end up with something that it does hit the mark. And it also goes back to, like you said, you know, talking to, you know, Pittsburgh fans in Pittsburgh and how they want it and you know, how down to earth and how rusted on they are like that evergreen.

you know, copy as a strategy is something that, you know, whenever they see it, and then, you know, the algo might pick it up, you know, three days after. And so you want that to be to be to be useful. So yeah, I'm a yeah, I'm a sweat the copy kind of guy as well. And yeah, you're like, at some point, you go, I think, yeah, we've got four versions that we've got, we've got to go with one, we've really got to move on. Like we talked about being under resourced, but we've, we've spent 20 minutes talking about six words, and how they're arranged. But I

Yeah, I think it does matter. And I think the good people in social that do do a killer job are the ones that sweat that stuff.

Zach Galia (31:39.16) Well, and it's funny, like normally, like a highlight, something happens at the ballpark. You either, in my experience, it's like, I either have the perfect copy, exactly what I want to say within like 10 seconds, or I'm going to be sitting there for 10 minutes trying to think of something. And so like, that's why we put together, we call it our like SOS document, but it's like, let's think of all that stuff when we have time. So it's like, if something amazing happens on the field, I don't have the perfect words to, you know, capture that in that moment.

Sean Callanan (31:57.818) Mm-hmm.

Zach Galia (32:06.518) We've got 35 options from this offseason. One of them will be better than what I was going to think of and we move forward.

Sean Callanan (32:14.032) That's a really good, a really good tactic that effectively role playing in the off season of, you know, he, you know, this grand slam is going to happen. What are we writing and sort of trying to put people into getting into those reps that you're going to have in the season as an, as an off season thing. I mean, look, that, that is part of learning and growing. What are some of the things that you do to, to stay on top of things and continually be, learning.

Zach Galia (32:38.048) I mean, think like one website I'd love is it's called social media today.com and I'm on it probably way more than I should be. they do a great job of kind of whatever might be happening in social or even adjacent to social. There's you know, it's like ESPN.com like there's articles about it that you can read and research and understand and you know, LinkedIn is another great place where there's a lot of a lot of really good people that I follow that kind of keep you updated on things or

bring new ideas to the table or, you just viewpoints that maybe you're not thinking of that are helpful. And then, know, tech crunch is another one that's, you know, it's a little bit more on the techie side, but then there's kind of the social stuff that that helps as well. But it's like, there's no, there's no wrong answer, right? Like you, you want to know, I want to know everything that's going on in social. And I want to know everything that's going on at baseball. then, you know, additive to that, like everything that's going on in pro sports and how it kind of all intertwines. And so it's just,

That's always the stress and like the hard part about this job is like you're always worried about missing something and you're always going to miss something. So it's like, it's kind of making sure that it's not gonna make or break you in any sort of way. that's it. mean, like the moment you think you know everything in this industry, you're falling behind because something new is gonna happen, something's gonna change and you need to be as far ahead of it as you can. it's just.

Sean Callanan (33:45.359) Yeah.

Zach Galia (34:04.098) doing your best to consume as much as you can and put it in a good place. And then, you know, even on the other side of just like, you know, you're reading leadership books, there's podcasts that have to do with content and, you know, and leadership and different things like that. So like really focusing on not only just the social side, but also the other things that, you know, hopefully knock on what will make me successful in this role.

Sean Callanan (34:25.904) Absolutely. I want to touch on one thing there. Like you can get caught up sometimes in looking at what a lot of other, whether it be teams, leagues, brands are doing. And sometimes that can make you take the eyes off the ball. Whereas if you sort of come back and go, you know, what do my fans want? They're not sitting there looking at other teams in other leagues, in other parts of the world and realizing they're missing out. Like you've got, as long as you have your fans at the center, you can always be, you know, I like the phrase steal with pride. You can always go, Ooh,

Manchester United did that, that looks good. How do we do a Pirates version of that? And then when you do it, the Pirates fans go, I've never seen this before in my life. It's amazing. like, I think we all grade ourselves quite harshly in looking at, you know, all the opportunities and all the things you can do. But as long as your fans, you know, touch wood, stay relatively happy with what you're producing, that's the key thing.

Zach Galia (35:14.316) Yeah, and mean, like, inspiration comes from everywhere, you know, like when you're, whether you're writing a script for a movie or, you know, you're setting up for a photo shoot, like your inspiration is going to come from somewhere and no two people are alike and exactly where that comes from. And like, that's what I always preach to my team is just, you know, definitely look at what other teams are doing and, and see what is working and what kind of the industry is doing. like, just like you said, at the end of the day, this is for our fan base, not

Chargers fans or Steelers fans, there's always going to be a little bit of overlap, but you have to do right by your fan base. so, if someone has a really good idea, let's use that as inspiration of something that might work for us, not necessarily like, this trend is happening, let's do exactly that just with our players. try and do things a little bit differently. And even looking outside of sports, that was something I tried to do this off season was reach out to people who run brand accounts outside of sports and just…

pick their brain of how they do what they do and what they're looking for and how they go about laying out a content calendar when there aren't games kind of dictating what it is. it's just like everyone learns in different ways. Everyone's kind of inspired in different ways. So it's just like you were saying, imitation is the highest form of flattery. And if you see something good and someone else steals it or you do something great and someone else steals the idea, it just means that it was successful.

Sean Callanan (36:42.096) Absolutely. One of the things that digital and social departments do internally is serve many, serve many masters, you know, internally, whether it be sponsorship and commercial ticketing, you know, operations, but then also the fans. How do you help your team? How do you want gatekeep? But also how do you help your team get that balance right?

Zach Galia (37:04.194) Yeah, I it's, you know, I always say like social is kind of in the middle of that spider web of everything. And it's, you know, every different department has a different goal and something that can be shared or amplified or benefited from social. it's, you know, again, going back to like processes and setting up, you know, communication lanes that make it easier for everyone to kind of be informed, everyone to give their opinion, everyone to talk through these different things and kind of move forward. So

I think the biggest thing to always remember is like, we may be kind of the quote unquote experts in our field, but all of these people from different departments that are coming to us are the experts in theirs. So they may not think the same way we do, but that doesn't mean that they're wrong or it's not an idea we should kind of go after and see what's possible. So it's just, it's, know, a good Ted Lasso quote is be curious, not judgmental. And that's like,

That's something that we try and do every day is like, no matter who's coming to us with an idea, like that doesn't mean it's bad, wrong, good, indifferent. Like it's worth discussing. It's worth seeing what might be possible and kind of going from there. But it's just, like I said, it's setting up kind of those communication lanes and processes to make sure that, you you know what to do when these things come up and try and inform as many people as possible.

Sean Callanan (38:25.872) The other part of balance working sports is trying to have a balance in lot work and life with the constant demands of social that it's 24 seven and all channels are all active all of the time. What do you do to try to step away and try to have a bit of that balance and keep yourself on an even keel and potentially give the same advice to your staff.

Zach Galia (38:49.644) I mean, like what I always tell my staff, like I put your list of priorities together and like whatever that is in your life, I was like, you don't need to share with me by any means, but like know where you stand because that will go a long way in kind of setting those guardrails, setting those boundaries to make sure that you're not burnt out by the time we get to October. so again, breaching from a place where I was burnt out for nine years before I got here. And it's just,

One thing my dad always taught me is like, there's only one person who can look out for you 100 % of the time and that's you. So you need to be the one that figures out how you can best function and how you need to set boundaries and how you need to kind of live in this role to make sure that it's not everything. Like this is not your whole life, right? Like I am not Zach the social media guy. There's so much more to just me that.

you need to make sure that kind of all the pieces are in the right place to make sure that you can kind of make those decisions easy. And so, you know, we work in a great company with a lot of great leaders that empower you to kind of do what needs to be done to get the job done. you know, they understand that social is not a nine to five job and we have so many things to do and so many games and events to cover that like we have the freedom to kind of step back when we need to step back and then dive head first when we need to dive in. So, but again, like that, that's the biggest thing for me is just, you know,

you have to set your own boundaries to make sure that you're not getting burnt out by the time we get to the end of this.

Sean Callanan (40:24.163) Absolutely, and you as an org or you as a manager need to say, know, because you can train your fans to say, hey, we won't be replying to tweets at 11 o'clock on a Saturday. We won't, you know, and say because, you know, they can't comment on a post that doesn't get posted. So there's no pressure. But it's sometimes it takes a while, especially when you're new in the role to go, I've got to respond to this. And then it's like, well, if you do that, you'll be you'll be replying to fans at three in the morning. And, you know, you'll be in a, you know, a fetal position on the floor in no time at all. So

Zach Galia (40:48.568) Yep.

Sean Callanan (40:50.192) It is a matter of sort of setting those boundaries to sort of say, as a team, this is what we do. But we also need you to say, hey, this is tough. need to step away to be able to keep them as, you because you need to be able to feed that creative mind. It's really hard to do when you are burnt out.

Zach Galia (41:08.75) Yeah, exactly. like, the biggest thing is like, I want I always want to create kind of an environment of just open communication, honesty, like, I can't read your mind if you're if you're not feeling great, or you need a break, or you like you have to be okay coming to me and voicing that opinion and us talking through it because like, no one's a mind reader in any job. So it's it's just making sure again, setting up those communication lanes to be like,

If you need something, we can have this conversation. Don't ever feel afraid or deterred that, you know, it's not going to go your way. Like, let's talk about it. Let's make sure we're all in this together.

Sean Callanan (41:47.696) One of the things I've been asking recently on the podcast is what's in your toolbox? What are some of the key tools that you're using in your team and maybe your staff are using that help you keep everything ticking over? And it could be, know, execution pieces, it could be reporting, but what are some of the things that you find pretty valuable?

Zach Galia (42:06.606) My favorite, I guess, program is what we would call it or app. But I wish I would have invested in this company at some point because I talk about it all the time. But it's called Team Up. And it's a calendar program that has been the easiest and best way to handle the madness that is everything going on in our world. So coordinator, grace and manager Jules, they they're the ones that kind of used it at their

previous teams and brought it to my attention. And it's something like, I don't know if I will ever not use Team Up for anything and everything. But if you're looking to kind of create a calendar, whether it's just something very simple or it's something really complex where you have a ton of different categories and things need to go where, it's been a lifesaver for everything that we're trying to do.

Sean Callanan (42:59.44) Cool, very cool. And lastly, I wanna talk to you a little bit about your journey as a podcast host with the very good social media podcasts. Tell us about that as a project and sort of why you tackled it and what you learned from it.

Zach Galia (43:13.006) I mean, so it's something I'd wanted to do for a long time and just never had enough time to be able to dedicate to it. But it was something that I learned from so many amazing people and have made so many connections. like I said, like when I was trying to figure things out and find my way, there were so many people who are willing to talk and chat and share their wisdom. so I was trying to figure out a way to do.

that on a larger scale where it's not just me learning from these amazing people, it's anyone who wants to listen. So I was able to reach out to a lot of friends that I had in the industry who were interested in, and then even some people who I had just been fans of on LinkedIn and who were gracious enough to be a part of it. it was a lot of fun. We're kind of in a hiatus holding period at the moment. My wife and I just had our second child a few months ago, so still living in that world of

being up all hours of the night. But it was just something where it's like that's, when I was talking about becoming a leader and figuring out why you want to be a leader. for me, it's all about helping people and helping the next generation get to where they want to go. And whatever knowledge or experience or shortcomings that I've had in my journey, how do I share it so that it's some sort of value to somebody else in there? that was kind of the main goal behind it was just

I want to bring as many intelligent, amazing people that I've gotten to learn from over the years to a platform where anyone can listen to them because without them, I wouldn't be where I am today. that was kind of the idea behind it.

Sean Callanan (44:48.832) Well, true. I look forward to season two when it drops. Let us know I know we've had a I think Your first guess is also but Andy Perelman's been on the on the podcast. There's always good crossover and yeah It's pretty much similar reason why I started on the podcast try to learn from different people and sort of how much there is commonality in in roles in in different in different leagues and well sort of solving the same same problem, but

You can always learn from, you know, one little tweak, whether it's a tool or, or a management skill or, or, or trending and that kind of stuff. Lastly, before we wrap up, I really appreciate the time, but what, what excites you about pirates social and what you're planning on in the 2025.

Zach Galia (45:34.498) Well, I mean, I think like over the last like few years, we've of been just we've been building kind of this foundation of not only on the field, but you know, in our content, in our social and kind of everything we're doing, just building what it could be and building this foundation. And I think we're finally to a point where it's like, it's it's time to turn the corner and really see the fruits of our labor kind of blossom and really dig into all of the amazing things that we've been trying to do for for a couple of years and a few years like

to see them come to light. it's just, you know, hoping for, you know, very good things on the field, but also just from our content perspective, I don't think we've been in a better position to accomplish our goals and do what we want to do and really take the fans on this ride with us. you know, like I said, for better or worse, like, you know, the Pirates fans will be there on this journey. And so hopefully there's a lot more good than bad, but.

We're hoping to do a lot of really fun things and take our fans to places where maybe they haven't been before. So it's an exciting, exciting time here in Pittsburgh.

Sean Callanan (46:40.848) Absolutely. Well, thank you very much for coming on the podcast. I want to get to the sports gate closing five. Do you remember the first sports event you ever attended?

Zach Galia (46:49.874) man, I don't know if I remember the very first one, but it would have been either a Pirates game at Three River Stadium or a Penguins game at the Civic Arena when I was young. it had to have been a Penguins game, I'm guessing, but it was probably one of the two. I have so many memories of being there and trying to get autographs and coming to Three River Stadium for batting practice. I remember being at the

All-star game in like I think it was in the 90s I'm having on my pen it's somewhere like 94 all-star game at three over stadium and like you know sitting in the upper deck and trying to catch home run balls and stuff like that, but But yeah, I mean tons of great memories and I mean oddly enough like most of them have to do with you know Pirates penguins are Steelers

Sean Callanan (47:37.84) Terrific. What's your, you would have been to a lot of sports events in that time. Do you have a favourite food memory or a go-to food at a sports event?

Zach Galia (47:46.574) Ooh, go-to food. If I'm at a hockey game, I really want a coffee that I end up just drinking the whole game because it's molten lava when you get it. But that's kind of my go-to at hockey games. But hockey, baseball, football, anything, like give me the big plate of nachos with salsa on one side, cheese on the other, decked out in jalapenos, and call it a day. But that's kind of my go-to.

Sean Callanan (48:13.136) What's the first app you open in the morning?

Zach Galia (48:17.804) Ooh, first app. It's probably my calendar, just to see exactly what the day is gonna look like. And then it's probably something like, I mean, it's probably my email or it's probably my text, but I would say like, it's probably ESPN is probably the first app that's not like, let me learn how to function today. It's just been like ESPN.com, like the app, I've been, I watched SportsCenter from,

as long as I can remember, it's like it's literally on my TV all day too. So it's probably, it's probably ESPN.

Sean Callanan (48:54.768) And is there someone that you follow? might be someone on social or it might be an author that the listeners should give a follow on why.

Zach Galia (49:02.818) Ooh, I would say a good friend of mine, Amy Keene, she is someone who, she was on my podcast as well, but someone I've known for a very long time, but someone who just always wants to help. And she's always sharing job opportunities. And when, you know, her and her agency are kind of involved in different things, reaching out for different creators, different photographers, different whoever it is, like,

really trying to provide as many opportunities she can for the next generation. And she's always been someone that no matter where I'm at or what I'm doing, and if I need kind of a chat of like, bring me back down to earth on what I'm thinking about this, like her and I can kind of go into it and talk through it. And she's been amazing. And the other one I would have to bring up, gonna bring up LinkedIn really fast. This new podcast I'm listening to,

Um that I posted about today. It's called the happiness lab with dr lori santos um, and it's very much uh, very much about like A lot of things that a lot of people deal with and like the the episode I listened to today was about um Perfectionism and how it can kind of be a bad thing at times And so like you never think of something being perfect as being bad. So, um, it's been

Sean Callanan (50:21.946) Yep.

Zach Galia (50:27.83) It's been a really cool podcast to listen to. I found it through a couple other podcasts I listened to, but that's been kind of a favorite of mine. so, you know, anyone who's kind of going through some stuff and needs to figure out like you're talking about work life balance and, you know, frustrations and things like that. Like it's, it's been a great, a great lesson.

Sean Callanan (50:39.322) Yeah.

Sean Callanan (50:48.58) We just had a five minute conversation on 140 character copy. So like I think it's potentially relevant to us on that perfectionism piece, but I completely understand. Last question, and I'll ask this both from a personal point of view and a pirate's point of view. And you know, what social media platform is your MVP?

Zach Galia (51:09.17) Ooh, I mean, personally, I like YouTube, just because I going there and with the intention of like, I'm probably going to be there for an hour, consuming whatever I want to consume. It's less of kind of the doom scrolling and, you know, and I love to talk to, but it's like, it's basically YouTube on a smaller scale for my attention where I'm just kind of ripping through things. I would say like professionally, I think Instagram has been

kind of the MVP where it's, it kind of does a little bit of everything. And now with like, you know, broadcast channels and, know, there's just so much power within that one, you know, one click of your thumb that, you know, you kind of, you kind of overlook it at times where it's just kind of one of many apps that you have to kind of manage, but it's, it's one that has so much kind of one staying power because it's kind of changed its focus so many different times, but

but that's kind of the one that I kind of gravitate towards most when it comes to kind of professionally. And then, I mean, guess LinkedIn would be another one personally that I enjoy.

Sean Callanan (52:15.816) Yep. Yeah, Insta is sort of becoming a bit Swiss army knife of platforms and the fact that it does so many different things, it's sort of it is keeping itself in the, you know, relevancy realm for for for sports because of that. So yeah, and it is a common answer for a lot. You know, just to timestamp this, we're recording this not knowing what the fate of TikTok will be in your part of the world. So that's, that's mindful. But that's one we will watch. Zach, thank you very much for coming to coming on the podcast. We're

Can people connect with you and reach out and say thank you for this podcast or maybe check your podcast out. Where can they do that?

Zach Galia (52:52.916) LinkedIn is probably the best place. That's where I'm most active and try and share as much as I can and help as much as I can. you know, if want to find me on there, I'm happy to connect and answer any questions that you might have.

Sean Callanan (53:06.094) Well, thanks very much, mate, and all the best for the season ahead.

Zach Galia (53:10.126) Thank you so much for having me. It was awesome.