tiffers

@Chris22 You are absolutely correct here. Society is becoming more and more mobile in two folds. 1) Geographically more mobile. More young people than ever before are going away to university. Increasingly from RL heartlands. This just wasn't happening 15 years ago anywhere near the same level. More young people than ever before are moving locations at the age of 18. This in turn means they are not spending cash in their childhood/family clubs. Both professional and amateur. Pretty much all of my friends moved away from Leeds and no longer go to Headingley. Or if they do it is no more than a handful of times a year as we all are scattered all over the country. We are however watching online/contributing to forums and engaged in a different way. Bringing me to my next point... 2) Digitally more mobile. I.e. People want to consume content online. Gen Z are very, very different to previous generations and I see very little from clubs to address this audience. Warrington have come a long way and clearly leading from the front (with Toronto). But with tiny budgets and lack of recognition of this will lead to a demise in 2030 unless addressed. Despite been exponentially better off (as a working adult), Leeds see a far lower revenue number from me vs. when I was 16. They just don't monetize my way of consuming content very well at all. Therefore I expect some clubs will wake up to this. They will be forced to become far more digital/content-led and monetize through other channels than the traditional ticket revenue and sky sports money. If they do not do this they will lose that traditional mechanism of revenue by family association. Clubs will also be required to address those audiences that have moved into their towns at 18 years or older (university towns particularly). This audience is much more difficult to acquire given our existing culture in the game around customer acquisition being centred on family association, clubs will have a tougher job in retaining them as loyal supporters (customers)!

I first met Rob right at the start of his career. Only being 8year old, and playing for a local club in Leeds, he instantly became my guy on the field and the one I was always trying to emulate. Always looked up to him from then until now. His spirit on the field was immense. It motivated people in the right way. Everyone respected him. Opposition and all. Well you can be sure as hell the RL family will respect him now more than ever before by supporting him through this... Look at the outpouring of love and respect today. Phenomenal. The humble response was heartbreaking. Absolutely gutted for him and his young family. Absolutely gutted.

Agreed with most of your statement here. All clubs should be rigorously looking at this type of data on ticket sales, membership sales etc. Data informed decision making comes across strongly in their approach and its refreshing to see. Not something we hear much about in RL. The basics of just understanding your audiences (and non-audiences) are key to understanding the actions, beliefs, feelings that drive decision making. How can Warrington influence that and tap into it in order to push their agenda in a way that appeals to that person. I get the impression clubs largely treat all supporters the same. i.e. Mass marketing. They should be capturing data and information to produce more personalised marketing content. If they hold demographic data, geo data and putting it to use then good on them. It's not expensive or difficult to do these days. Do all Super League clubs use a CRM system for instance? If yes, how are they using the data captured... I've mentioned before that when I have bought tickets at SL clubs in the past, I've walked in, given over my cash and not had any data capture at all. Very short sighted, and they walk away with nothing but the £25. They have no way of trying to market to me in the future. Lifetime value of that sale = £25. They also have no way of capturing my feedback as a new customer, or even to thank me for my custom. Capture my data and re-market to me effectively, lifetime value = more than £25. Potentially a lot more than £25. I do disagree with you re. Wolfie being a nob on social media. It works at a brand awareness level. Keeping the Wolves at the forefront of the more casual fan that may not turn up every week, generating excitement in the week building up to the game. The key is linking it up to other harder campaigns (email perhaps) that specifically says - "BUY A TICKET". Its all about multi-channel approaches, generating excitement and then getting people to part with cash. Most people's buying patterns go through several stages before parting with cash. It helps to soften the GIVE ME CASH message with giving people reasons to part with cash/justifying parting with cash. Instilling the thoughts that its unmissable i.e. Wire vs. Wigan is a critical game in the season. You need to be there etc.

I quote: "has been in his current post since May 2018"... Only just lands a strategic vision... EIGHTEEN MONTHS It took 18 months to get a vision together... never mind attempt to implement anything. Dont rush Nigel...

Paddy the Vet be employed as physio??? Surely.

I like what you did there. Particularly the Wembley ref!

Certainly does!! Cost efficient, mind.

Seeing as silly season has erupted, arguably directly after the GF and just before GB landed in the southern hemisphere... Here's a bit of fun... It may also cause palpitations for some of our less inclined friends. What town would you like to see develop a professional RL team? There are a couple of structural rules: Name your town/team Nickname for the club Club colours & why Kit main sponsor & why Home Stadium Name your marquee player. So without further ado... Truro, Cornwall. Known as the Cornish Marauders RLFC. Will play in the Cornish colours of black with a gold & white cross - think England RL shirt. Main sponsor will be Cornish Rattler, 7% local cyder that gets you from A to B very efficiently, delivering a cracking hangover the next day. To play at the "Stadium for Cornwall" when completed (8k expected), prior to that will share Truro FC's home ground Treyew Rd, cap. 3,200. Should meet SL standards. Marquee player would be Martin Taupau, he fancies swapping Manly beach for Fistral beach. I didn't fancy Zak Hardaker with alcohol at that strength around the joint...

Could not have put it better myself... And to top it off, I now have the latest google trend data at the end of the tour (thinking back to our previous conversation on another thread) . It's a stark gap compared to the amount of google "noise" that England RL has made in recent years. Utter failure that detracts from the progress that we have been making in terms of branding. RFL + Marketing = Flop. Meanwhile, Woman's soccer "Super League" generates audiences into the tens of thousands and RL falls further down the pecking order in the conscience of your average sports fan.

The proverb "timing is everything" comes to mind... I like the concept. Execution poor. Great idea to build excitement up for 2020 and RLWC 2021. Definitely incentivises people to buy a ticket to live games, part with cash and build revenue. So what isnt to like about it... Well besides the fact we have no fixtures confirmed for 2020 yet... Surely you launch this with the added incentive to buy your ticket for next year, now... BASICS!! Very clear call to action and reasoning why you would by it. The fact everyone is arguing "its pointless" tells you everything! Why would you launch a loyalty scheme with no sight of the clear benefit of being part of the scheme... I wont go on...

That's exactly the type of person that should be engaging with during the world cup! It's a similar story down in the deep SW where I live now. There is zero interest in RL outside of internationals. I've lived in all 4 corners of the country and its the same old story. Zero interest in teams located in locations people have never heard of. Your average person hasn't heard of Cas, nor do they care as it isn't relatable. They are however, naturally, intrigued about England/GB. If we cannot talk to that general sports audience (with a plan in our back pocket for 2022/23!). Attempting to engage those people to come along and buy-in to RL. Stage 1) get them interested in the world cup. Interested enough to deliver you their email addresses/contact details/rights to market to them. Stage 1a) actually market to them. get them excited and engaged in the world cup. Stage 2) get them along to another game in 2022. Challenge cup. GF. Internationals. Makes me wonder how many touch-points/engagements RL needs for you to become a lifetime supporter. Naturally in the heartlands, touch points are frequent (from birth). Yet, obviously, non-heartlands needs many more touch points to develop understanding and engagement. i.e. we have to work harder. This doesnt mean spending masses of cash. It means being smart in our marketing strategies. Following up with a series of home internationals is a necessity. Following up to those same audiences.

And the way to change that is to build a PR team to pump out as much compelling content as possible during the most high profile moments. The board minutes do not exactly suggest they will do that... If 2 FTE is all of the capacity they wish to instil in a marketing team then god help us.

Couldnt agree more! Minor changes in the set-up of super league smack of an insular looking sport. For me, the fact we will have just 2 full time staff working on a world-cup marketing plan (with agency support), tells me we just arent taking this seriously in any remote way... this is fundamental to why we are behind. The fact they needed to pay Deloitte to tell them this, is incredible. 2 people are not enough to develop a strategy, implement said strategy and then manage a bunch of suppliers/agencies. Not to mention, they need to be all over the PR bandwagon. That isnt enough in my workplace and we are substantially smaller than what a RL World-cup should be! Bearing in mind we are now only 2yrs out. That is just too little, too late. Yes, we may well be able to drive a good attendance in the grounds. But this is just one aspect of the marketing mix. Have we maximised our ability to create PR opportunities (as per the above graphs), with that low level of staff!? This is what gets you into the wider consciousness of the public. This is where growth comes from and this is where our heads should be focused. A lot of this doesnt necessarily cost masses of money. You just need the capacity to drive content... What about corporate opportunities off the back of that? Feels like we are focused on Joe Bloggs, he attends the Halliwell every other week and trying to get him to part with £20 quid, hoping he doesn't pick up a discount code on Group-on.

You raise a very good point... this is how it compares to the England RU data. Shockingly, where they play games (autumn internationals/6 nations/world cup) they see spikes. Then added for extra interest is how this compares to the national soccer team and cricket teams... RL (in blue) is far behind all 3. Very far behind. Its interesting to look at the respective world cups. Especially as we have had both RU and cricket in 2019. They are both fairly even in terms of traffic... compare that to RL world cup... Think of the marketing/corporate revenue opportunities and conversations you can hold with these audience sizes. It is a wholly different level. I wonder what the RFL are targeting in terms of audiences... Interestingly, digging into the recent world cup board minutes: Deep Dive 2 –Digital Roadmap The Board noted the digital roadmap report provided by Sara Piper and the work that had recently commenced with Deloitte. The Board was supportive of the recommendations to appoint a Digital Manager, Head of Customer and some agency support. Perhaps we are going to take this element a little more seriously in 2021... the fact we needed Deloitte to recommend we need a Digital Manager and Head of Customer however, is beyond me... Surely this is a core part of any international tournament set-up this day and age!?

So... Google trends (shows loosely how much brand awareness you are gaining over their networks), shows just how much the England brand has been building... GB traffic is almost dead over the barren years. Then this year, a little more than England but not overwhelming. We shall have to see what rolls out at the end of the tour this month... For me it shows 2 major things. 1) England's brand awareness (via google) has been generally increasing over time. 2) World cup years generate the largest audiences and interest. Finally, reintroducing GB has diverted energy and online traffic away from England RL. Even if you have a large google driven audience from the GB tour, it still raises the point (purely from a marketing perspective) that you have to manage TWO brands. That is difficult with such small resources. I'm not sure its the most efficient way to manage these resources. The on the pitch action and the other political arguments (re. Tonga/triple headers/etc.) are not considered from this post. I have looked at it purely from a google and online perspective in brand awareness.