How to increase regional memberships?

[ME SO HORNBY!]

Hey guys

I'm a student at the University of Wollongong and as part of an assessment I am currently doing, I am getting the great opportunity to work with a club in the NRL and their marketing department in order to increase sales of regional memberships in the Wollongong and South Coast (down to about the Shoalhaven).

Many clubs gather information at matches through raffles and competitions in which you give your details and can win a prize. The clubs then put these names into their databases for use in the future e.g. for memberships.

Now this is just a poll to see where fans would most like to be intercepted when clubs are trying to gather information. The options are as follows:

1. Outside the stadium before you enter e.g. waiting for friends or waiting to buy tickets.

2. Once you have entered the stadium but before you get to your seat e.g. as soon as you scan your ticket and get inside the stadium.

3. Once you have found your seat but before the first grade match starts e.g. during the under 20s

4. During the 1st grade match

5. After the match has ended and you are on the way out of the stadium.

6. Other (please specify)

I would greatly appreciate some help.

Also feel free to give me any opinions on what the club could do to increase regional memberships in the Illawarra. Anything will be of great help.

Thanks.

 

[Doug2234]

Im guessing the Dragons

 

[ME SO HORNBY!]

No actually its not the dragons surprisingly.

 

[jc155776]

I hate being touted to outside and just inside the ground.

I always ignore them.

I am happy to buy raffle tickets, doubles etc once seated and watching Toyota Cup etc.

 

[Eels Dude]

To be honest I hate being hassled by people trying to sell anything when I'm at the footy. If i'm just being handed a phamplet, sweet. But i'm not going to spend 5 minutes listening to someone talking up the benefits of membership or filling out a survey when all I want to do is have a fun day/night at the footy. I'll ignore them and keep walking. Just like i'll ignore the people in shopping centres who try to sign you up to various charities. I'd happily throw 5 bucks their way, but i'm not interested in wasting 5 minutes talking to a salesperson and let them try to convince me to sign up long term.

 

[thorson1987]

To be honest I hate being hassled by people trying to sell anything when I'm at the footy. If i'm just being handed a phamplet, sweet. But i'm not going to spend 5 minutes listening to someone talking up the benefits of membership or filling out a survey when all I want to do is have a fun day/night at the footy. I'll ignore them and keep walking. Just like i'll ignore the people in shopping centres who try to sign you up to various charities. I'd happily throw 5 bucks their way, but i'm not interested in wasting 5 minutes talking to a salesperson and let them try to convince me to sign up long term.

+1

 

[ME SO HORNBY!]

To be honest I hate being hassled by people trying to sell anything when I'm at the footy. If i'm just being handed a phamplet, sweet. But i'm not going to spend 5 minutes listening to someone talking up the benefits of membership or filling out a survey when all I want to do is have a fun day/night at the footy. I'll ignore them and keep walking. Just like i'll ignore the people in shopping centres who try to sign you up to various charities. I'd happily throw 5 bucks their way, but i'm not interested in wasting 5 minutes talking to a salesperson and let them try to convince me to sign up long term.

Well to be clear that isn't what i'm thinking of.

My idea is more like consumers (NRL fans attending games) being intercepted at some point during the game to fill out some quick details on a raffle ticket for your chance to win your clubs jersey signed by the entire first grade squad and coach. Examples of the details could be:

Name

Address

Contact Phone number

Club you support

Are you a member of your club?


Then seperating the fans who are not members and during a set day (or a few days) in the offseason using the players of your club as telemarketers and getting them to call up the fans to see if they can get them on board for the next team.

The hope is that the stigma given to telemarketers will be less of an issue because of the fact that the players are celebrites and heros. And hopefully this would lead to getting more people on board through direct marketing rather than mass marketing.

 

[Scott Gourley's Lovechild]

If anyone is going to do that kind of thing, I would prefer it to happen once I am inside the ground (option 2, I pressed option 1 by mistake). By that time I'm more relaxed and willing to help out rather than when I'm in a queue.

And on a different note, did the Uni there help to place you? When I was there the bloke in charge of the Commerce dept was so inept it must have been embarrassing for the Uni to have him on the books.

 

[Eels Dude]

Well to be clear that isn't what i'm thinking of.

My idea is more like consumers (NRL fans attending games) being intercepted at some point during the game to fill out some quick details on a raffle ticket for your chance to win your clubs jersey signed by the entire first grade squad and coach. Examples of the details could be:

Name

Address

Contact Phone number

Club you support

Are you a member of your club?


Then seperating the fans who are not members and during a set day (or a few days) in the offseason using the players of your club as telemarketers and getting them to call up the fans to see if they can get them on board for the next team.

The hope is that the stigma given to telemarketers will be less of an issue because of the fact that the players are celebrites and heros. And hopefully this would lead to getting more people on board through direct marketing rather than mass marketing.

I'm against the whole raffle contest thing to begin. Once I entered a competition at a shopping centre to win a years free gym membership, next thing I know someone rings me and tells me I didn't win, but they'd offer me a discounted membership if I signed up for 6 months... even when saying no I still got several more calls over the rest of the year. Or the time I entered a contest to win a Blues jersey promoted by one of the mortgage companies, they rang me 3 or 4 times trying to sell me a mortgage even though I was a 21 year old student working part time. So after that no more entering raffles in that form, it's not worth it and I bet a lot of people would agree. It's a good marketing ploy, but is slightly dishonest and fans should be treated with more respect than that.

In response to your latter idea, clubs have tried this before and it can really have mixed success. I know Parramatta have tried it, probably still do. The problem is players are often not very well spoken, do not explain things correctly, and cannot answer questions you put to them. Having players directly calling and trying to sell something they know little about could be a waste of time. In the off season at Parra they had a competition between the players as to who could sell the most memberships. This involved players marketing face to face in Church Street, and sending emails themselves (probably ghostwritten) to fans trying to convince them to sign up. That works a lot better in my opinion.

 

[ME SO HORNBY!]

And on a different note, did the Uni there help to place you? When I was there the bloke in charge of the Commerce dept was so inept it must have been embarrassing for the Uni to have him on the books.

Yeah the Uni made contact with different organisations including the Wollongong Hawks, Sydney Swans etc. They then placed us with an organisation and the organisation gave us a problem that they would like us to help them with. I was lucky enough to get an NRL team which is good because I already have a bit of background knowledge on memberships and things of that nature in the NRL.

I was given a a Sydney NRL club which is looking to expand their membership down the South Coast.

 

[ME SO HORNBY!]

In the off season at Parra they had a competition between the players as to who could sell the most memberships. This involved players marketing face to face in Church Street, and sending emails themselves (probably ghostwritten) to fans trying to convince them to sign up. That works a lot better in my opinion.

All great ideas mate. As a consumer of the NRL as a product their are no wrong answers. I'm sure that if these are your feelings than their are MANY more who feel the same.

 

[Fui!!!]

When I'm seated.

The most stressful part is getting to your seat through all those people.

Gets very annoying when one person in the group decides to stop and fill stuff out. Then the rest of us have to stand and wait with heaps of people walking between us and pushing and shoving.