The following is a student survey being performed by Rob Sibbitts, a student in the Ohio University Sports Administration Program. The survey aims to find out how to enhance the game day experience, whether that be through technology or other methods.
There is a great rush in sports to have the best stadium, install wireless in stadiums, and combat the at-home experience. Yet, are teams misusing their dollars when it comes to upgrading the in-game experience?
At the National Sports Forum in Dallas this past year, I had the privilege to listen to Chad Estis, a fellow Bobcat, at the closing Super Panel. One of his main focuses for the future of sports was the convenience of watching a sporting event in a “man cave” versus attending a sporting event. He went on to say the best way to combat the “man cave” was to enhance the driveway to driveway experience for all of your fans.
When it comes to finding out how to enhance that experience, there are plenty of costly decisions being based off assumptions. I believe there are two types of intense sports fans: the one with the towel in their hand, and the other with their phone in their hand. Without a doubt, there is second-screen usage during games as 12% off all smartphone users check sports content two to three times daily (SBRnet.com). However, is it to the point where it is a fan’s top priority on deciding whether or not to attend a game? The hypothesis for my study is that many fans would enjoy having their phones handy, but they would still rank other aspects of the gameday experience ahead of smart phone use.
Technology is changing sports in a variety of ways, especially the way fans interact with their teams. As graduation approaches and the ticket sales world calls my name, understanding fans preferred channel(s) for interactions is essential. Email and instant messaging appear to be effective and cost efficient ways of contacting your season ticket holders, but there is not enough data to prove that they have overtaken a phone call.
The research from this study will reveal not only how a team should market to their fans, but also what is most important to their overall experience. So far, my survey has found that the three most important things for fans when attending a game is:
- Quality of the event itself (team performance)
- Ticket price
- Overall ingress and egress experience (entering and leaving the stadium)
To my surprise, the functionality of their mobile device is not even in the top seven after 300 responses. According to Darren Rovell, the Patriots paid $6 million to upgrade their in-stadium Wi-Fi in 2012. After reading an article by Paul Brown, a contributor to Forbes.com, you may think that wasn’t the best investment. Brown, was a season ticket holder for the Patriots since their 2-14 year, but recently decided to not renew for the upcoming year. What’s apparent is that those three bullet points are what retain customers on an annual basis and that Wi-Fi is simply an additional benefit. At this point, it does not seem to be a deciding factor for fans when it comes to deciding if they should purchase a ticket or not.
While Wi-Fi is going to be installed in every major venue as soon as possible, simply having Wi-Fi is not enough. The teams should be focused on using technology to enhance the factors that matter most to their consumers. By the end of this survey, I am looking to answer different components related to the modern sports fan, including:
- How does the sports fan differ from the average person?
- Are sports executives on the same page as their fans?
- What factors of the overall gameday experience matter most?
If you work in sports or are simply just a fan, please take five minutes to help me out in my independent study for Ohio University Sports Administration. Feel free to contact me at rs868313@ohio.edu or on twitter @Rsibbitts.
You can take the survey here and the results are anonymous. Thank you for participating!