From travel creator to founder, Ellie Wookey is helping athletes turn influence into long-term business opportunities through content, strategy, and commercial partnerships.

Having launched UK-based agency Press Upload in 2024, her goal is to “build and monetize athlete brands,” she says. “That’s athletes across multiple different markets: the United States, the United Kingdom, Europe, and the Middle East, and across lots of different sports. We want to position ourselves as the go-to place for athletes globally.”

At just 25, Ellie has already built two ventures. Her first, “OneGlobe360,” grew from a travel blog into a 50,000-follower platform across YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram. “It sounds like a weird time to start a travel brand,” she laughs, “but I just wanted to get all of that creativity into something that would get me through lockdown.” 

That experience of building an audience from the ground up laid the foundation for Press Upload, which now works with more than 80 athletes and 10 brands worldwide.

Before starting Press Upload, though, Ellie noticed an imbalance between how creators and athletes approached their online presence. “Long gone are the days of the David Beckham personal branding era where he did it one sort of way,” she says. “Now an athlete of any sport or ability can build a brand.”

The turning point came when she observed a new generation of athletes using social media to tell their own stories. “You see it with Ilona Maher in women’s rugby,” she adds. “She’s built the biggest brand in rugby, and she’s now monetizing it. There’s just this gap to work with athletes in partnership to help them build their brand, post content, and monetize, whether that be through partnerships or launching businesses.”

For Ellie, the opportunity lay in a simple but overlooked insight: while creators and influencers had mastered personal storytelling, many athletes still relied on traditional management structures focused solely on sponsorships. Press Upload aims to change that by guiding athletes through the creative and commercial sides of brand building.

How Press Upload Works

Press Upload’s structure mirrors a boutique agency, but with a specialized focus on athletes. The team provides content strategy, brand partnerships, and athlete-led business ventures. Its process follows what Ellie calls the “Press Upload Playbook,” a three-step framework of positioning, presence, and partnerships.

“Without positioning, you can’t have presence,” she says. “Without positioning and presence, you can’t have partnerships. So that first step, content and brand identity, is essential.”

The agency’s work begins with a free consultation, where Ellie and her team learn about an athlete’s goals, audience, and existing platforms. “We follow a model called LAPS: leads, appointments, proposals, and sales,” she says. “The first meeting is really for the athlete to talk and share their story. Then we build a custom proposal and strategy from that.”

Once onboarded, clients gain access to tools such as personalized media kits, content ideation support, and partnership negotiation. For some, Press Upload goes even further, co-building ventures like online training programs or branded products. 

“We want multiple touchpoints with athletes,” Ellie says. “Perhaps it starts with Instagram or TikTok, then YouTube, a podcast, or a business. We want to unlock opportunities across that ecosystem.”

Athlete Storytelling

While influencer agencies often focus on lifestyle creators, Press Upload’s work emphasizes the storytelling potential within sport. 

“Athletes have unique stories; they’ve faced injuries, setbacks, and mental health challenges,” Ellie says. “We all have stories to tell, but athletes can show resilience and perseverance in ways that inspire others.”

She believes that credibility built on the field translates directly to commercial appeal off it. “They’ve already built a fan base. That loyalty and credibility carry over into content and partnerships,” she says.

A recent example involved a Mexican national basketball player whose spirituality shaped his personal brand. “His faith is really important to him,” Ellie says. “We incorporated that into his content plan, and one of his first videos with us reached 200,000 views.”

Integrating AI and Data

As the agency scales, Ellie has turned to AI to improve efficiency and generate insights. “AI is the most incredible thing that’s come in the last five to ten years,” she says. “We’d be wrong not to use it because everyone else is.”

Press Upload integrates tools such as ChatGPT, Claude, and Opus Clips to optimize workflows and generate content ideas. The agency also uses Pillar, a data platform that builds real-time media kits by aggregating athlete performance metrics across social platforms.

Ellie plans to expand this data-oriented approach. “We’re in talks about building a marketplace to connect athletes to brands through a fan engagement concept,” she says. “We want to push into data, tech, and IP, not just to make us a better business, but to give athletes better insights and opportunities.”

Challenges and Growth

For Ellie, balancing creative quality with growth remains a core challenge. “I want to scale quickly,” she admits. “For the first six months, it was all about building foundations, relationships, and case studies. The last six months have been about scaling and increasing the number of athletes, brands, and campaigns.”

That growth has tested her leadership skills. “It’s difficult sometimes to balance that desire to accelerate with maintaining high quality of service,” she says. “We’re working on good systems, processes, and workflows. That’s what allows scalability.”

Mentorship has played a role, too. “I’ve got mentors who’ve worked in the agency space for years,” she adds. “They’ve helped me figure out how to grow while keeping creative control.”

Defining Success and Brand Equity

Metrics matter, but engagement and long-term brand equity matter more, according to Ellie. “An athlete could have 100,000 followers, but if they only get 100 likes per post, that’s not great engagement,” she says. “It’s better to have 10,000 followers and a thousand likes.”

Press Upload measures success through both creative output and commercial returns, focusing on delivering return on investment (ROI) from brand partnerships. Yet, Ellie insists that true brand equity goes beyond financial metrics. 

“Brand equity is impact. It’s legacy,” she says. “That can mean opportunities, comments from fans, or inspiring someone to take up a sport. Monetization is part of it, but there’s more to it than that.”

Industry Trends and Market Fit

Ellie sees Press Upload as part of a new wave of hybrid agencies bridging creative and commercial strategy. 

“The way sport has run for quite a few years is quite traditional,” she says. “A lot of agents haven’t prioritized building the brands of their athletes. We come in at step one, helping them become good content creators, which directly translates into better partnerships.”

She also sees a larger shift coming in the creator economy itself. “With the rise of AI, we’ll always utilize it,” she says, “but I think we’ll return to human-to-human relatability. Most people, whether you’re an employee, athlete, or travel creator, will start to see themselves as creators in some way.”

Press Upload’s Future

As Press Upload enters its second year, Ellie’s priorities are clear: deepen partnerships, raise the caliber of athletes, and expand collaborations with sports clubs and federations. 

“I’d love to work with more pro and international athletes,” she says. “We’re also speaking with clubs and sporting bodies to see how athlete-generated content can benefit them.”

The company’s long-term vision includes developing intellectual property around its athlete-brand marketplace. “We’re building up our portfolio of services, data, and IP (Intellectual Property),” she says. “I’ve always got that vision of the exit, whenever that happens, but for now, it’s about impact.”

Regarding the legacy she hopes to leave, Ellie is candid. “If we’ve helped athletes realize what they can achieve off the pitch, whether that’s through brand deals, businesses, or just inspiring others, then I’ll be incredibly proud,” she says.