Skip to main content

10 takeaways from Global Sports Fan Summit 2015

By Anonymous


Running a startup in a nascent field, one does not come across a great a deal of direction from the outside world. There is no blue print that exists for what you are doing and everyday is an experiment which you hope will take you closer to your goal. At Fantain we find ourselves trying a hundred different things and sprinting in four different directions, presuming it is taking us to our goal.  We felt it was important to look around and learn, to benchmark with the best in the business.  This could save us time and money, and ensure that we don’t have to make all mistakes ourselves. 

With this in mind, I attended the Sports Fan Summit (http://www.sportsfansummit.com) held in Sydney, Australia in June 2015.  I am glad I did.  The Summit was a fantastic opportunity to meet some of the best minds in the world as it relates to engaging sports fans.  I got the opportunity to share ideas with people who are constantly innovating.   We were able to develop a vision for the company based on global best practices.

Here are a few takeaways for me from the summit -
1.  Almost all owners of successful sports teams are passionate sports fans themselves.  They continue to view the sport as a sport, and not as a business.  By extension, they have a long term view and are open to making long term investments in their business.
2.  It is imperative to delight fans at every turn.  It is not enough if your team is performing well.  As a team owner, you need to understand your fans’ every need and cater to them - day in and day out.  If you do not have a team dedicated to doing this, you are missing the plot.
3.  With the consumerization of technology, there is a massive opportunity for sports teams  to know your fans really well and to engage them consistently and effectively.   Technology has made it possible and cheaper than ever before to connect with your fans.
4.  There is a fair bit of confusion on whose job it is to engage fans.  I saw real life fan engagement being executed by Sports arenas, Sports leagues, Sports teams, Technology companies and other third parties. As the market matures, there will be a greater clarity on who should be doing it which will help the cause of everyone
5.  Fan Engagement has massively enhanced the scope of marketing..  The biggest problem of marketing has always been measurability and fan engagement is solving that problem right and centre.
6.  There is no shortage of sponsors interested in making sports investments.  But they are interested in investing only in teams that are reaching fans effectively.  Tracking and measurements are critical for money flow in this market. 
7.  Teams are coming off the ‘high’ associated with social media.  Everyone was chasing ‘likes’ and ‘follows’ a couple of cycles ago - but are now realizing that social influence is more important that social reach.  Just touting your likes is not enough to attract sponsor dollars any more.
8.  The best sponsorship agreements make sure that the teams and brands work in tandem to spend the activation dollars - and always focus on benefiting the fan.   Activation/promotion of brand that does not drive value to the fans is useless.
9.  There is no ‘one set formula’ for success in sports team management.  Teams that have tried various things like focusing on women, kids, minority communities, etc have all been successful.  So the emphasis needs to be about execution, execution and execution.
10.  Most successful teams look at fan communities both in aggregate and as a collection of smaller communities with specific common needs/goals.  And the job of fan management teams is to ensure that they understand each segment well and cater to them.

This was my first visit to Australia and I loved visiting this great country.  The Aussies (& Kiwis) are great conversationalists - the openness with which people shared information and best practices was delightful.  In the same spirit, I am open to sharing my two cents with anyone in this space of sports fan management.  Shout me a note to anand@fantain.com if you think I can contribute to your thought processes in any way.

I am also attaching a link to my interview in the sidelines of this event 





Anand Ramachandran
CEO, Fantain Sports





Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Chennai beats Mumbai and clinch thriller

By
It is not just about coming back. It is about the impact you make in the process. And Chennai team knows how to with a bang.  The Chennai team beat the home team by one wicket in what was an absolute sit-at-the-end-of-the-chair thriller. It was one of the best chases the tournament has seen and it most definitely won't be the last. The player who made the difference in the end - Jadhav - literally came back from the dead after retiring hurt to take his team to the finish line by hitting the ball in style with a six and a four.  Batting on one leg and playing an absolutely unbelievable shot, this player leveled the scores first with a six and finished the match with a four.  Key Points  MI has never won their opener since 2013. This was Chennai's first win against MI in an opener of this T20 League  DRS used in the league for the first time  Bravo : It was a great team effort. I want to dedicate this win to the CSK fan, they have waited long for
Post a Comment
Read more

Need for co-ed sports

By
Now, this is hardly a feminist piece. I am not here to tell you that women can do anything that men can and better too. One, you know it too. Two, this is hardly about women. I am not here to praise women and demand better rights. I am talking about the possibility that the entire field of sports can take a whole new meaning if gender is not made the criterion. So this is how the idea for the blog started. The Women’s Indian Cricket Team performed really well at the world cup this year. Mithali Raj praised her team for their hard work, persistence, and passion for the game. She also added that there should be an IPL tournament in the country for the women’s team now. Raj believes that the team’s fantastic game has increased the fan following for the women’s team as well and that they have earned their place here. While I am honestly not sure about an IPL tournament for women, it did get me thinking. Why not mixed sports? Now that girls play almost all the games that the guys do, w
3 comments
Read more

Blog Time: How I won my Fantain Fantasy Cricket

By
I played the Sri Lanka – Zimbabwe match and I won more than six times what I put in. That is a really good investment, isn’t it? I have been asked by Fantain to share what I did and how I planned my lineup. This is how. Kusal Perera  – I made him captain. I won a massive 120 points. My vice-captain was Dinesh Chandimal .  So I got 43.5. In hindsight, I could have picked Perera. He did fabulously well and earned a whopping 89 on the app. The other player in my lineup who helped me win was Sikandar Raza . He got 88.5 on the app. These four players are a must be in the next match between Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe.  Dinesh Chandimal is one good consistent player that I always have. So it’s like this. I have four categories when I play fantasy cricket. One is the must-have players who will be on my team no matter what. For this match that I played, they were Kusal Perera, Dinesh Chandimal, and Upul Tharanga. For me, old is gold. Experience speaks volumes. The second category is ba
Post a Comment
Read more