CC final attendance

[Dave T]

45 minutes ago, saintspete83 said:

I wonder how cost effective it is to employ marketing agencies to sell the big game like what was used at the WC13

Interestingly one of their big tactics was..... cheap tickets for a double header! In fact way cheaper than the Cup Final.

[Dave T]

36 minutes ago, saintspete83 said:

It's these graphics that are misleading. In reality 30-40% of these could be unsold. 

I noticed last night they were still selling alternate rows, so it suggests there are plenty still available.

[RP London]

17 hours ago, kev p said:

 Unfortunately it’s a sorry state of affairs if you need discounts for a major final in any sport. Changing date or venue will not change interest. So much in London to see after CC final or night before, top class shows, which can be booked with show/hotel deals. Great value all round. Is skylarks or broncos play Sunday then home!

we're going down.. my boy and I will watch the CC and 1895 cup while my wife, daughter and mother in law go to the west end and "take in a show".. then on the Sunday we are heading to the notting hill carnival before heading home by car dropping my mother in law at the airport.. I did get a good deal but bought before we knew the semi finalists so i think that is fair and a good way to do it.

[RP London]

dp

[RP London]

tp

[Tre Cool]

twp

[SilentAssassin]

2 hours ago, Denton Rovers RLFC said:

A quick graphic to show attendances from 1980 on, the finals when Wigan got there/won it a fair few years on the trot didn't seem to lower the attendance but it had already down-turned since the mid 80s though I can't recal off the top of my head when Wembley had he reduced capacity, I don't it actually affected attendances.

Maybe the simple fact is that Wembley is 15k too big at least for the current needs of the CC final, that has been significantly affected by pushing it to August and the GF being pushed far more plus of course the cheap tickets situation for events such as magic weekend. I reckon without magic weekend and it been replaced with the Cc final at that point with ladies CC final beforehand it would add a significant number to the event.

 

 

yes the capacity went down to around 80k in the late 80's i believe. 

I see your point regards Wigan but you have to also factor in they were winning on all those occasions; usually in style with some of the best rugby players of all time on show at a time when the CC was THE big one as opposed to being second fiddle to the grand final these days.

[Moove]

3 hours ago, saintspete83 said:

I wonder how cost effective it is to employ marketing agencies to sell the big game like what was used at the WC13

Difficult to know I guess. I don't think we make best use of what we have though.

I think someone mentioned GDPR rules earlier which might affect the RFL's ability to market people, something I hadn't thought of when complaining about the lack of emails they'd sent me about tickets. Although looking back I can't see that they used GDPR to email out to update marketing preferences like most companies did. They've perhaps instead relied on registration of the OurLeague app for that. Interestingly through the app I can opt for the RFL to share my details with my chosen club, however I can't do vice-versa when updating my details with Saints.

Similarly, there's little interaction between the various social media accounts about the cup (SL account, non-participating clubs etc). When the RFL negotiate things like sponsorships and TV deals they really need to start looking at some of the non-financial aspects we can make better use of to build wider knowledge of the cup (and RL in general). A week out and there's sod all on the BBC Sport twitter account, surely someone in the sport can give them a nudge or start tagging them in stuff or whatever it is on Twitter.

Tiny things but the RFL and the clubs at all levels can be joined up far better than they are currently. The cost of that is zilch.

FWIW though I can't help but wonder if we're a bit hard on the sport for the cup final attendance. When you consider how few people actually attend RL matches, to get 70k+ to two finals per year is a pretty good effort. The FA Cup final didn't even sell out last year which is frankly unbelievable considering the huge corporate aspect to that, plus even Watford (one of the finalists, not a huge club) still have an average attendance of over 20k. Yet we expect our clubs to find two or three times their regular attendance and are massively dependent on two of the 'big' clubs being the finalists.

[Dave T]

Considering the challenges that the Cup faces, many of which we have gone through before (poor date, poor marketing, 2nd best to Grand Final, the sport's internal battles etc) - the fact that we still command 65-70k is decent. But we shouldn't be settling for decent, we need to be looking at how we move that on to 75-80k which is back to the 90's levels and means that Wembley is the only stadium that is suitable for this game. Being able to fit the crowd into other grounds will continue to raise questions about where this game should be played. 

One thing that surprises me is how quiet it has gone from a promotional point of view. I am seeing no push - who is the entertainment this year, if there is any?It has gone quiet in the last 2 weeks, maybe this was the time to tap into the neutrals with a big headline act to nudge those who are considering going. 

I would be offering tickets to every youth organisation, school etc. in London and surrounding areas in an attempt to fill the empty 20k seats that are not even open, but playing during the summer holidays is obviously a problem for this. Maybe next year will open up new opportunities.

[Bring back GB]

2 hours ago, Dave T said:

One thing that surprises me is how quiet it has gone from a promotional point of view. I am seeing no push - who is the entertainment this year, if there is any?It has gone quiet in the last 2 weeks, maybe this was the time to tap into the neutrals with a big headline act to nudge those who are considering going. 

 

Why does the fact that the RFL's promotional work is poor surprise anybody ????!!!!!

[fighting irish]

I could effing weep. 

[saintspete83]

3 hours ago, Bring back GB said:

Why does the fact that the RFL's promotional work is poor surprise anybody ????!!!!!

Because as soon as Saints and Wire reached the final Rimmer put his feet on his desk and lit a big fat cigar. 

[saintspete83]

5 hours ago, Dave T said:

Considering the challenges that the Cup faces, many of which we have gone through before (poor date, poor marketing, 2nd best to Grand Final, the sport's internal battles etc) - the fact that we still command 65-70k is decent. But we shouldn't be settling for decent, we need to be looking at how we move that on to 75-80k which is back to the 90's levels and means that Wembley is the only stadium that is suitable for this game. Being able to fit the crowd into other grounds will continue to raise questions about where this game should be played. 

One thing that surprises me is how quiet it has gone from a promotional point of view. I am seeing no push - who is the entertainment this year, if there is any?It has gone quiet in the last 2 weeks, maybe this was the time to tap into the neutrals with a big headline act to nudge those who are considering going. 

I would be offering tickets to every youth organisation, school etc. in London and surrounding areas in an attempt to fill the empty 20k seats that are not even open, but playing during the summer holidays is obviously a problem for this. Maybe next year will open up new opportunities.

With regards entertainment what has it been the last few years. Off the top of my head I cannot remember anything. 

[Man of Kent]

15 minutes ago, saintspete83 said:

With regards entertainment what has it been the last few years. Off the top of my head I cannot remember anything. 

It’s all dance troupes and school choirs, isn’t it? That’s the ‘entertainment’.

[Dave T]

23 minutes ago, saintspete83 said:

With regards entertainment what has it been the last few years. Off the top of my head I cannot remember anything. 

Very little. The odd classical singer as part of the singing.

It's odd that we seem to under sell the event of this. It is enjoyable enough, but no more.

[Smudger06]

Should be a world class, well known singer to provide the vocals for abide with me and the national anthem. 

[Smudger06]

Book a low level fly past by the Red Arrows. 

[Marty Funkhouser]

7 hours ago, SilentAssassin said:

yes the capacity went down to around 80k in the late 80's i believe. 

I see your point regards Wigan but you have to also factor in they were winning on all those occasions; usually in style with some of the best rugby players of all time on show at a time when the CC was THE big one as opposed to being second fiddle to the grand final these days.

The 87/88 and 88/89 crowds give you a slight hint...

[cookey]

It would be nice and appropriate if Totalrl would ask what promotion the RFL do for the Challenge Cup Final. However,the answer is that we send e-mails and texts to people already on our mailing lists.

I dont know what a professional marketing campaign would cost,nor the likely benefits but at least Rimmer could say that we tried.As it stands they appear to do absolutely nothing.

[Lobbygobbler]

Emails and texts are a waste of time.

A big tube/bus billboard campaign and tv ads in London are the answer

[RP London]

54 minutes ago, cookey said:

It would be nice and appropriate if Totalrl would ask what promotion the RFL do for the Challenge Cup Final. However,the answer is that we send e-mails and texts to people already on our mailing lists.

I dont know what a professional marketing campaign would cost,nor the likely benefits but at least Rimmer could say that we tried.As it stands they appear to do absolutely nothing.

dont know if its the likes of totalrl not asking the questions or the rfl not giving answers but i do think it would be useful for the RFL to actually come out sometimes and give us an idea of what they are actually doing. We constantly say they could do more but maybe they are and by telling us they would potentially get a lot more respect. If they were to just look at this board and the opinions of many fans about the RFL this could change just by being more open and we would all think "they are actually doing stuff its just not working/we are not that big" etc rather than at the moment we just think "they do nothing so what do you expect"... 

Of course the silence may just be because they are doing nothing!

[gingerjon]

32 minutes ago, Lobbygobbler said:

Emails and texts are a waste of time.

A big tube/bus billboard campaign and tv ads in London are the answer

A 2013 article says it costs, on average, £64,000 per site on the London Underground. For two weeks.

How much are you willing to spend?

[RP London]

1 minute ago, gingerjon said:

A 2013 article says it costs, on average, £64,000 per site on the London Underground. For two weeks.

How much are you willing to spend?

the worst bit is they are not "the answer" but only "part of the answer" so how much more?

[whatmichaelsays]

17 hours ago, Moove said:

I think someone mentioned GDPR rules earlier which might affect the RFL's ability to market people, something I hadn't thought of when complaining about the lack of emails they'd sent me about tickets. Although looking back I can't see that they used GDPR to email out to update marketing preferences like most companies did. They've perhaps instead relied on registration of the OurLeague app for that. Interestingly through the app I can opt for the RFL to share my details with my chosen club, however I can't do vice-versa when updating my details with Saints.

GDPR doesn't in itself prevent companies from doing email marketing. What it does do is demand that companies know and evidence where they got that data from for that email marketing and that they have permission to use it for those purposes.

The reason why so many companies were sending out "do you want to stay on our mailing list?" emails before it came into force is because they didn't have the paper trail to prove that they could satisfy that criteria - either because they'd bought lists, mis-led people into opting-in (confusing tick boxes for example) or because they didn't sufficiently log permissions. 

The RFL should know where it gets its data from. I can't believe that it has bought-in lists (unless there has been data-sharing from clubs, but this should have been declared when the RFL and clubs were collecting that data) so if it genuinely believes that it can't email people that were on its database, then there are two likely reasons; either it has poorly managed its CRM database and can't prove that it has permission to use it, or it has misinterpreted the GDPR regulations. 

However, what GDPR doesn't prevent is using the data it holds to build an audience. It can, for example, use that audience to create 'lookalike' audiences on Facebook or Instagram and advertise to them. It doesn't prevent them from using demographic audience profiling data to build audience personas. It doesn't stop them sending players down to London to drum up support and it doesn't stop them holding interviews with the media. There's actually very little it does stop them doing. 

As for the point about using a marketing agency, it would be touch-and-go as to whether that would pay for itself for the CC Final in isolation (and remember, the Grand Final and Magic Weekend are not an RFL properties any more).

If we assume that the base level for a CC Final with two English teams is around 60k (roughly the attendance when Sheffield played Wigan), that leaves around 25-30k tickets to sell. Assuming an average of around £30 a ticket, that's a potential £900k of additional pre-tax revenue. I've got no idea what the costs of Wembley and putting on the event are when you amortise on a per-ticket basis, so I'll leave that out for now. 

However, I can't imagine that the margin on a £24(+VAT) ticket provides you with much leeway to pay for much in the way of media spend and creative as it is, never mind the various agency fees. On media spend, most decent paid-media agencies will be working on a management fee of around 12% of media spend at least whilst on creative, you're paying a not insignificant hourly rate for those ideas and the research behind them. Agencies aren't cheap.

Personally, I'd much rather see the RFL just try and get the basics right first. I genuinely don't think they've even got the four P's right any more. I don't think the product is right when you consider what a modern sports-goer expects (entertainment, fan parks, etc). I don't think they've got the placement right (why hide all of the content on Our League or only where existing fans can find it?). The promotion is pitiful and I don't even think they've got the pricing right any more - as a regular fan, I know that if I hold off long enough, a discount code will soon turn up in my inbox or on Groupon. Either this is the premium, must-see, blue ribboned event that we keep being told it is, or it's a Sports Direct "stack it high, sell it cheap, closing down, everything must go" sell-off. It can't be both. 

If Red Hall can genuinely say that it is getting all of those right and things still aren't working then fine, bring in the consultants. But if you bring them before you have those things ready, you're going to pay them a lot of money just to get you to the position you should have been in before you gave them the call. 

[cookey]

One of the best and most professional messages I've read on here. Someone should send a copy to Rimmer and ask for his response. Unfortunately,I doubt he would be able to understand it.