Professor Bill Sutton tweeted out an idea about virtual season tickets that is very similar to the way I’ve been pushing folks to think about looking at the membership models at other clubs around the world over the last few years.
As, I think, Rahm Emmanuel said, “don’t let a good crisis go to waste.” Right now is a great time to rethink the value proposition between sports teams and their fan bases, around the world.
Here are 3 ideas to help accelerate that thinking:
A real membership platform:
For the last few years, American sports teams have been calling their season ticket holders “members” in a lot of cases, while raising prices and offering little or no additional real or perceived value to consumers.
If I could find a link to the benefits and the community built around the Supersonics season ticket holders back in 2001-2002 when Howard Schultz was first taking ownership of the team, you’d see that the program was still advanced compared to what most teams offer their fans today.
The windup here is meant to convey that the membership model needs to improve and there are actually great examples around the world.
In retweeting Bill’s tweet last night, I pointed to the example of Melbourne FC in the Australian Football League as a great example.
Last year, I had a chance to give a keynote at the AFL’s Fan Day and one of the things that the staff at the AFL League Office wanted was for me to come out of the event with a favorite team, Melbourne FC. The Demons, the originators of the game…
I only bring that up to show that despite being in the US, I can still connect with the team in many ways that reflect and allow me to connect with my team anywhere in the world.
The same goes for the great programs put together by Premier League clubs like Manchester City and Tottenham Hotspur as well.
At the core of a real membership platform should be at least these three ideas:
- How can we give our fans something valuable no matter where they are?
- What can we do to help them be a part of our community, virtually and in person?
- Why should our offer be worth their attention?
Relationships:
I’ve felt for a long time that far too many teams have allowed their relationships with their fans to deteriorate.
Maybe when people were feasting on cheap credit and endless TV money, the need to develop and keep a loyal fan base was less important or perceived that way, the reality is that if we aren’t creating and keeping customers consistently, we don’t have a business and in the case of a sports organization, we’ve allowed our brand to become a commodity.