IndyCar® star
Danica Patrick teamed up with Go Daddy in late 2006 when
she was just getting her start in IndyCar® racing. Within four months of becoming
the first woman driver to lead an Indy 500 race, Danica signed a sponsorship deal
with Go Daddy. "Danica is edgy, innovative and fun - all qualities we identify with
at Go Daddy," Go Daddy Founder Bob Parsons said of the 24-year-old IndyCar rookie.
To unveil the car she would be driving in her first year with
Andretti Green Racing Team, Danica drove it around downtown
Chicago on a rainy day in September 2006. At the media event that followed, Danica's
name was on everyone's lips. Within months, Danica appeared in two television ads
for GoDaddy.com.
Calling the
Indy 500 the "Super Bowl of racing," Bob stepped up his
Indy involvement the following spring, signing on as a presenting sponsor of the
2007 Indy 500 broadcast. For the second year in a row, Danica finished 8th, losing
the race to teammate Dario Franchitti.
In early 2008, after weeks of negotiations with Network censors, Bob took a different
approach to Super Bowl advertising. Rather than shelf the ad censors refused to
approve, Bob created another commercial designed to drive viewers to their computers
to see the "real" commercial. This one was approved.
Danica's "Exposure" commercial broke all the records. Before
the game was over, GoDaddy.com recorded an amazing 1.5 million visits, compared
with the previous year's record of 500,000. Even days afterwards, traffic to the
site remained unusually high.
On April 20, 2008, Danica became the first woman driver to win an IndyCar race,
taking the Indy Japan 300 after the favorites were forced to stop for fuel in the
final laps. She finished 5.8594 seconds ahead of pole-sitter Helio Castroneves,
taking the lead on the 198th lap of the 200-lap race. "It's a long time coming,"
Danica said of the win.
"For us, there was never a question of IF Danica could win," Parsons said after
the victory, "we've believed in her from day one."
To prove it, Go Daddy renewed its sponsorship of IndyCar's most popular driver and
the
Andretti Green Racing Team to extend through 2009. "No other
celebrity brings it all to the table like Danica," said Parsons, announcing the
continued sponsorship. "She's fast. She's focused. She's smart. She personifies
all the things GoDaddy.com is about."