Johnson's Journal - Heck Drawn to Troy by People, Purpose and Possibility

What attracted Dan Heck to Troy University as the new Deputy Athletics Director for External Relations/Revenue Generation was more about community than anything else.

"I saw this from afar, but what really solidified it through the process was just the people," Heck said. "I know it's cliché to say that, but there's a human side of things where it's not all transactional. It's not all about the almighty dollar."

A native of Big Rapids, Mich., whose past marketing jobs in athletics included his alma mater of Central Michigan, followed by stops at the University of Arizona, Auburn University and the University of Alabama, Heck said he was "blown away" by what he saw in Troy during the interview process.

"Across the board facilities-wise, you could put this right up there with the SEC in terms of the attention to detail of how they're laid out," Heck said.

"Man, it's a place where you can win championships - it's competitive as all get-out - so there's a pathway to national championships and Sun Belt championships."

Which is why Heck believes Troy is the perfect spot to work his craft of promoting the athletics programs in a variety of ways, yet also a place his family can become entrenched in what he views as a close-knit community.

"College athletics isn't like a 9-to-5 banker's job," Heck said. "It's a lot of nights and weekends. We truly feel like it's a calling - almost like a ministry - where we're here for our coaches and our athletes, but also the staff here.

"We want to be building relationships and meeting as many great people as possible. The fact that we can build those relationships, make it about the people, and still have a competitive program that wins championships and grows the brand, all in one place. It's almost too good to be true that it's all under one umbrella here."

The tasks ahead
While the duties tied to Heck's job are many - from promotions to attract and engage with fans to raising revenue through donors and advertisers - he breaks it down rather simply.

"I really feel like part of the vision would be to tell the story of Troy athletics," Heck said. "From a branding standpoint, not being shy about Troy being a place where you can still come and be a person that wants to pursue your athletic endeavors, but also a place where you can win championships at the same time and that people matter.

"From a marketing and branding standpoint, one of the things we always talk about is our coaches and players win the games, and from an external marketing standpoint, it's up to us to win the crowds. We want to create the best home field, the best home court advantage in the country.

"That's not saying it's the largest and the loudest. We know we're not going to have 100,000 people (at a football game) because the capacity is not that high. But we want to have the toughest home field and home court advantage in the country. Those kinds of things take time, but diving into everything from music to the video board to a certain hype video that's dropped in at a certain time … those little details matter and can create an energy that's obviously a great place for our athletes to compete."

Heck believes Troy's athletic facilities can be utilized in more ways than just hosting games.
"From an overall standpoint, college sports bring people together like no other," Heck said. "These are beautiful facilities that have been built over time, whether it's The Vet (football stadium), Pace-Riddle Field (baseball) or Trojan Arena (basketball). So, how are we using these facilities to bring people together outside of just game days alone?

"Again, as Troy being the town that it is and Troy University being the center of that, how can Troy University continue to be a place where people gather throughout the year outside of game days alone.

"We feel like if you can bring someone to campus for a special event, maybe, or a fanfest type of event, or some other creative event that's not a Troy athletic event, that might be somebody's first experience coming to campus that hooks them on being a future Troy student, a future Troy donor or a Troy fan."

Lifelong love of sports
Heck first developed a love for sports from being around his hometown's Ferris State University, which has a powerhouse football program on the Division II level.

"My childhood was growing up and running around the sidelines at Top Taggart Field," Heck said of the football stadium. "My grandpa ran the Gridiron Club and my uncle was on the chain gang (for football games).

"I loved sports and played sports growing up, but I would say what always intrigued me was being with my grandpa and my family attending sports events. Ferris State is also a Division I hockey program. So, seeing a D-II school playing D-I hockey and you'd have the Power 5 schools Michigan and Michigan State come into a little 1,000-seat ice arena and Ferris would beat them. That would be such a fun upset to be part of.

"I didn't know it at the time, of course, but that really shaped what I'm doing now and kind of started planting the seeds. I feel really strongly about the fact that there are few things left in our society that bring people together like college sports."

While attending Central Michigan University (CMU) and majoring in sports management, Heck became interested in the promotional side of sports.

"As a sophomore undergrad, I applied to probably 20 different internships from Minor League Baseball to Major League Baseball to Minor League Hockey," Heck said. "Who knows if the Minor League Baseball team would have hired me as a groundskeeper, maybe I would be doing field maintenance or doing operations or facilities … something like that.

"Mike Dabbs was the director of marketing at CMU at the time, and he took a chance on a young whippersnapper like me, and he gave me the opportunity (as an intern in sports marketing)."

During the internship, Heck worked with a group promoting sporting events to get fans in the stands.

"At the time, it wasn't so much social media, it might have been traditional media like print advertising and radio," Heck said. "Getting out in the streets and handing out flyers to people. At the time, more grassroots marketing, and still some of that, I think, is very valuable. You can't lose that completely."

What really hooked Heck on what would become his profession was the gameday environment at the stadium on the CMU campus.

"Kelly/Shorts Stadium is similar to The Vet," Heck said in comparing it to Troy's football venue. "It seats about 28,000 people. I think my first game as an intern, I was running the T-shirt cannon and running the smoke machine when the team ran out of the tunnel. That first gameday feeling was just the goosebumps. Even to this day, I still get that feeling."

Moving on
Heck earned his bachelor's degree in sports administration at CMU in 2009 and his master's degree in sports administration at the university in 2011. He worked there full time as Coordinator of Marketing and Community Relations (2008-2012).

"I kind of realized at the point when I was 24 years old that all my buddies had moved on to get other jobs and that I probably wasn't going to be able to live in the college town that I went to school for my entire career," Heck said.

"I wanted to kind of see if my skills I learned at the mid-major level could be tested, maybe at a larger level. So, I just applied out of nowhere (to the University of Arizona) … I didn't really have a connection out there … but then got flagged for a phone interview and then flew out there."

Heck was hired as Associate Director of Marketing for the University of Arizona and would spend the next four years there.

"I didn't know anybody," Heck said of first taking the job. "I had a mattress in my apartment and had a few bags … I think I shipped my car out and had a small moving truck.
"That was June of 2012. If you look at the history books of college sports, that was actually the Arizona baseball national championship year. I get into town and it's the last weekend of conference play.

"That team went on a run. They won the Pac 12 regular season, hosted a regional, hosted a Super Regional, went to Omaha (World Series) - never even trailed in a game in Omaha and won the national championship in my first month out at Arizona.

"That was instrumental in my career, seeing how to capitalize off the momentum of a team like that and how that can galvanize a campus and a community and excite people."
Greg Byrne, the current athletics director at the University of Alabama, held that role at Arizona when Heck was hired there.

"He really provided a lot of opportunities and kind of took me under his wing during that time," Heck said of Byrne. "Whether it was a coaching search, or whether it was including me on ideas or marketing things, he was a really progressive AD.

"I think at the time, he was one of the only ADs with a Twitter account. That was fun when we were just starting to learn what social media strategy was as an industry. Then, trying to be on the forefront of some of the digital marketing technology and some of the newer trends at the time of sports marketing."

Working at Auburn and Alabama
After four years at Arizona, Heck was hired as the Assistant Athletics Director of Marketing and Fan Engagement at Auburn University. At the time, Jay Jacobs was the AD for Auburn.

"He's another mentor who took me under his wing right away," Heck said. "At the time, Auburn basketball was not the Auburn basketball that they've been since then, so we were trying to build Auburn basketball. Obviously, Auburn football at that point was kind of the blueblood of the program."

Heck worked at Auburn from 2016 through the fall of 2022 before reuniting with Byrne at Alabama as the Associate Athletics Director of Strategic Marketing.

It gave him the rare opportunity to work at both Auburn and Alabama.

"I remember watching a documentary about the Iron Bowl - the 30 for 30 documentary Roll Tide/War Eagle - and you watched the Kick Six (Auburn football win over Alabama in 2013) on TV and all the stuff … and it doesn't really do it justice until you're in the middle of it," Heck said of the rivalry.

"People talk all of the time about the rivalry and all the stuff, but really seeing it up close and personal and being in the middle of it on both sides, which not many people have been fortunate enough to see, it really is different."

Heck said there wasn't that much of a difference throughout the inner workings of the two athletics departments.

"I will say the biggest difference will probably be the amount of eyeballs at Alabama as just more of a national brand and more of an international brand in some ways," Heck said. "Not that there's not a lot of eyeballs on what you're doing at Auburn, but Auburn being more of a regional brand."

A new home in Troy
Heck and current Troy athletics director Kyle George became friends over the years while attending national marketing meetings and trading ideas as both worked in Alabama.

"He's always somebody I've respected," Heck said. "Of course, being in-state, all of us kind of stay in touch with each other. Especially during the COVID year when there were some state things happening with attendance policies, we were always kind of benchmarking to make sure we were all doing the same thing or saying the same things to our fan base to have some alignment."

George served as Deputy Director of Athletics for External Operations at Troy for eight-plus years before being named Director of Athletics this past November after a three-month tenure as Interim Director of Athletics following the departure of Brent Jones to Georgia Tech.

"When he got promoted to the full-time AD job, it wasn't too long after that when I was just kind of minding my own business and putting my head down and going to work like I always did at Alabama, and I got a phone call out of nowhere," Heck said of hearing from George.

"He kind of talked to me about that now he's the AD, and he can't do two jobs at once and said, 'In order for us to get to where we want to be, we need somebody to come in and take on my old position,'" Heck said. "Of course, I was obviously honored just to have the phone call and be considered."

Heck was hired at Troy in mid-December and began his current role in January.

"You never want to go into a place to change things just to change things, so we're kind of taking things along the lines of what's working … what do Troy people enjoy that we want to continue doing or maybe do more of," Heck said of his vision moving ahead.

"What are some things that we tried that we need to stop doing, and what are things we're not doing that we need to start doing. We're really doing a deep dive into all things football … branding, fan experience, marketing, ticketing, licensing … to make sure we're set up for success."

Having a strong social media presence has become a huge marketing tool for college athletics.

"Think about the invention of the smartphone over the last 10 or 15 years," Heck began. "You really have a gateway to campus in the palm of your hand. You can live anywhere in the world, you can live anywhere in the country, and you can understand what Troy is all about in the palm of your hand.

"You can't really describe it (Troy) until you step on campus, but it really is kind of a hidden gem here that not a lot of people know about. We don't want to be shy about that. We want to tell that story, whether through creative video, whether it's through our graphics team, social media … whether it's from the main athletics accounts, or through the sports accounts.

"In the marketing world and branding and storytelling, it isn't any one thing. There is a lot of data that will show multiple touchpoints that lead to a decision to come to campus or sign on the dotted line to come here."

Heck said his family - wife Courtney and son Webb - are excited about their future in Troy.

"We call ourselves Team Heck, so we do things as a group," Heck said. "We're all-in on this place and want to be entrenched in the community."

Troy University Athletics

Johnson's Journal - Heck Drawn to Troy by People, Purpose and Possibility

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