Attendance thread

[Toby Chopra]

2 hours ago, Chronicler of Chiswick said:

The lack of any publicity in London is inexcusable. Back in the eighties and early nineties (don't know about later as I moved) the Underground aways had ads for the CC final, particularly on the escalators.

Was there ever a big turnout from southerners at the CCF in the 80's/90's? That's not my recollection. It was the north's big day out in the capital that filled Wembley when we did. I think it's a lot to ask southerners to fill the gap now far fewer neutral fans from northern clubs attend.

And adverts on the tube aren't going to be effective if London tube-goers' perception of rugby league is poor/non-existent. Ditto their perception of the event in particular.

Tube advertising is the "last mile" of promotion, but you have to do the hard yards first of raising the perception and interest of RL in many more people's minds, so when they see a big game is on, they might think it's something they'd be interested in. At the moment they're just not.

There is of course a RL fan base in the south, but by and large we're well connected with the sport and know the game's on. But beyond that, the game has next to no profile in the south, or where people have heard of it they have a pretty fixed idea of what it represents. There's no latent fan base like for instance cricket or rugby that can be activated for things like the big one-off Saracens games at Spurs, or Blast/Hundred.

All this of course is IMG's main task and is much easier said than done.

[Man of Kent]

While I'm thinking about this, the lack of promotion for Wembley through tag rugby is baffling.

TTR is affiliated to the RFL, we even play with balls with RFL logos. Yet I haven't seen anything at all about the Challenge Cup in emails etc. There's about 10,000 players, mostly in London. Daft.

[tiffers]

2 minutes ago, Damien said:

It always seemed pretty effective in the 1980s and 1990s whether that be Challenge Cup finals internationals.

As far as I can see the RFL's digital efforts are cheap and simply reach out to the converted.

But as a marketeer, you have a finite amount of resources and in the 1990's you had a significantly smaller volume of channels to reach your audiences. Therefore you accept that you need to do some radio/tube ads to the masses because you couldnt be as targeted as you can be today. The fundamental problem with that approach .is you don't know which is being effective or isn't and its blooming expensive to change things if they aren't cutting through and working. Quite often its too late.

If you do it in a digital space, it costs negligible amounts to adjust and change things. It provides you with infinitely more intel and data on which audiences/demographics are responding and how they are converting, therefore you become more efficient with how you spend your money over time.

The RFL may well be doing it cheaply and not stretching out beyond the converted. That is a sign that the budget allocated to this is not enough to drive higher ticket sales. I'd be frankly amazed if they aren't working with some sort of digital marketing agency to do this. Whether they are capable of asking the right questions and setting the right targets etc. is a wholly different kettle of fish.

[Toby Chopra]

20 minutes ago, Man of Kent said:

I'm not sure how effective tube advertising is. If we were smarter/not useless, there'd be exclusive interviews in the Evening Standard/Metro/Time Out.

But more than that, we don't even promote it to our own. There should be promotions with tag and touch rugby leagues in London (thousands of players sort of playing league, many with cash to spend). We would be doing more to entice Broncos fans, Skolars fan, Antipodeans playing for London clubs, Antipodean league fans, the families of London/SE league minis and so on.

 

What makes you think these people don't know the Challenge Cup final is on? I think they most of them probably do.

[Man of Kent]

Just now, Toby Chopra said:

What makes you think these people don't know the Challenge Cup final is on? I think they most of them probably do.

Maybe not the sizeable touch/tag community but the RFL will very likely know who is the London/SE RL community through player registrations, ticket sales databases and so on.

But do we actively seek their support with promotions? Maybe we should.

[Spidey]

11 minutes ago, Toby Chopra said:

What makes you think these people don't know the Challenge Cup final is on? I think they most of them probably do.

Its a different date every year for one

[gingerjon]

32 minutes ago, Man of Kent said:

While I'm thinking about this, the lack of promotion for Wembley through tag rugby is baffling.

TTR is affiliated to the RFL, we even play with balls with RFL logos. Yet I haven't seen anything at all about the Challenge Cup in emails etc. There's about 10,000 players, mostly in London. Daft.

Go and check your settings for your account with TTR. Is there something about receiving emails about marketing and/or from partners?

(This is a genuine, for interest, question). I don't really want to know what you've ticked just whether it's there.

Without it, the RFL can't get in touch with you directly through it and TTR may also only be able to contact you about tag rugby not anything else.

[The 4 of Us]

54 minutes ago, tiffers said:

The problem is with such limited marketing spends, your tend to target your money on platforms that your can prove conversions and ROI with. i.e. digital.

I have been involved with organisations that have purchased tube station ads / out of home advertising in the past and when tight marketing spends are all entirely focused on conversion activities (not awareness building and "promoting the game as a whole" as is the case here with the RFL), the strongest tendencies are to spend on channels where you can monitor results and adjust accordingly. If I was in the chair marketing for the RFL, I would not be spending on radio ads or tube ad's with a small budget. I would be working other channels significantly harder.

Now I am not defending the approach taken, don't let me be misconstrued. I am just merely stating that when you have small budgets, the ability to adjust and cut through to your target audience in digital spaces is far more appealing to a marketeer vs. static advertising on radio channels or in tube trains and stations. A previous organisation I worked at had this exact dilemma and I stopped the tube ads. I didnt have the budgets to be spending on raising awareness in London and cutting through to the masses. I needed to target my advertising to conversion activities for those that were already aware of my organisation where I could prove ROI that is the crux of this issue.

Brand building is a different ball game to conversion marketing.

Yep, get it which is why I referenced awareness separately. Always hear that when the going gets tough the marketing spend is sure to follow. RFL needs to bite the bullet though if they seek to build as opposed to marketing an individual event, although having scannable QR and/other codes on adverts could give desired date for source if needed?

[Toby Chopra]

1 hour ago, Spidey said:

Its a different date every year for one

Again, that's a 'last mile' issue though. The NFL London games move around a bit, but UK NFL fans that look forward with baited breath for the fixture dates, and usually it's far less notice than we give.

We have 10 months notice now for the 2024 final, which is good. There are ways to let people know when it's on, but first you've got to make RL and the CCF something that people think is something that might be for people like them. At the moment, we don't have that emotional/lifestyle connection with anywhere near enough people, especially in the south. 

The issue isn't that enough people don't know the game's on, it's that enough don't want to come regardless.

Edited August 15, 2023 by Toby Chopra

[Man of Kent]

2 hours ago, gingerjon said:

Go and check your settings for your account with TTR. Is there something about receiving emails about marketing and/or from partners?

(This is a genuine, for interest, question). I don't really want to know what you've ticked just whether it's there.

Without it, the RFL can't get in touch with you directly through it and TTR may also only be able to contact you about tag rugby not anything else.

It's not the settings, just a lack of joined-up thinking.

[The 4 of Us]

Interesting and relevant update which no one else seems to have referred to. Puts a lot of the other crowds into perspective and puts the date of reductions, if any, to the change in the calendar. Not sure if Neil is on here, he should know!

 

 

Edited August 15, 2023 by The 4 of Us

[Tommygilf]

43 minutes ago, The 4 of Us said:

Interesting and relevant update which no one else seems to have referred to. Puts a lot of the other crowds into perspective and puts the date of reductions, if any, to the change in the calendar. Not sure if Neil is on here, he should know!

 

 

People have made this point on here, quite often.

Even then, and even taking the higher 15k number not a single cup final with pre sold club Wembley would have been under 60k in attendance.

[The 4 of Us]

5 minutes ago, Tommygilf said:

People have made this point on here, quite often.

Even then, and even taking the higher 15k number not a single cup final with pre sold club Wembley would have been under 60k in attendance.

If Wigan v Saints or Leeds v Warrington or similar combination get’s less than 60,000 next time out, that’s when the sport needs to reassess 

[Tommygilf]

1 minute ago, The 4 of Us said:

If Wigan v Saints or Leeds v Warrington or similar combination get’s less than 60,000 next time out, that’s when the sport needs to reassess 

Totally agree that such a figure would be concerning. I expect that they would achieve more than that however. It is also reasonable to point out though that whilst they are "big clubs" the likes of St Helens and Warrington aren't very "big places". Certainly not that much more so than Wakefield, Huddersfield or Castleford for example. They have arguably been punching above their weight on recent success. Leeds and even Wigan to a lesser extent can draw on a far larger latent support base.

I was disappointed by the Grand Final crowd last year between Leeds and Saints, I think the trend isn't good.

[Tommygilf]

I think, from the RFL financial perspective, they need at least one big club to make the final, one grade A perhaps. That reduces the impact of having smaller, less well supported clubs reaching the final. The smaller one finalist club is the greater the need to have the biggest club facing them to balance it out. There is clearly a significant gap.

Its either that or they start charging bonds...

[tiffers]

5 hours ago, The 4 of Us said:

Yep, get it which is why I referenced awareness separately. Always hear that when the going gets tough the marketing spend is sure to follow. RFL needs to bite the bullet though if they seek to build as opposed to marketing an individual event, although having scannable QR and/other codes on adverts could give desired date for source if needed?

Scanning a QR code is a good way to attribute spend and understand where someone has seen the ad. There are other technologies now being embedded in physical screen advertising to give you an idea on footfall and eyeballs that have seen adverts. Although, to do some form of awareness building for RL we need to be really clear what we want to be famous for (I've never seen anything to suggest the RFL know what that is). What are our attributes and does that match with the audiences we are looking to attract. For me this is where there is a massive gap between RL die-hards and the general sports fan in the south of England with little to no awareness or at worst a parochial view of RL stereotypes, we have a long way to go.

The investment required to turn that round is a long-term mission. An expensive one at that. Now I am all for expansionism into new markets, but we need to be selective, innovative and strategic about how we do that in order to cut through with the limited resources we have. I would be dead against a scatter-gun approach as we just don't have the resources to do it effectively. If we had tens of millions then I would be all for a proper holistic brand marketing approach. The fact is we don't and so that is why it makes much more sense to spend the money on audiences that are in traceable channels.

[Snowys Backside]

54 minutes ago, Tommygilf said:

I think, from the RFL financial perspective, they need at least one big club to make the final, one grade A perhaps. That reduces the impact of having smaller, less well supported clubs reaching the final. The smaller one finalist club is the greater the need to have the biggest club facing them to balance it out. There is clearly a significant gap.

Its either that or they start charging bonds...

Who cares who is grade A?  The best 2 sides at the time deserve to be in the GF. 

Unfortunately, this is the attitude of the modern day RL fan as the perception are that the guarentees are that the big boys run the game. I want 20 strong RL teams who can beat each other week in and week out in a stabalised way, not because it's some big place in the UK. 

Let the romance begin. Let Featherstone ruffle some feathers and hopefully someone will make the 6 out of the blue and cause stir (I think Hudds or Hull) 

Is the Salary cap many years on finally working and the big 4 now having to rely on homegrown players and not pinch juniors from other Towns? 

Attendances will look after themselves should we have a good league to embrace and no foregone conclusions! Maybe we are bored? 

[Tommygilf]

31 minutes ago, Snowys Backside said:

Who cares who is grade A?  The best 2 sides at the time deserve to be in the GF. 

Unfortunately, this is the attitude of the modern day RL fan as the perception are that the guarentees are that the big boys run the game. I want 20 strong RL teams who can beat each other week in and week out in a stabalised way, not because it's some big place in the UK. 

Let the romance begin. Let Featherstone ruffle some feathers and hopefully someone will make the 6 out of the blue and cause stir (I think Hudds or Hull) 

Is the Salary cap many years on finally working and the big 4 now having to rely on homegrown players and not pinch juniors from other Towns? 

Attendances will look after themselves should we have a good league to embrace and no foregone conclusions! Maybe we are bored? 

You didn't read the full post did you? Romance doesn't pay the bills, big fanbases do. Ideally from a financial standpoint the RFL will want at least 1 big fanbase at Wembley each year.

[Snowys Backside]

6 minutes ago, Tommygilf said:

You didn't read the full post did you? Romance doesn't pay the bills, big fanbases do. Ideally from a financial standpoint the RFL will want at least 1 big fanbase at Wembley each year.

No it doesn't. Attendances heve been massively Inflated anyway as they have included club Wembley tickets until recently so how can you explain the 60k plus attendances that have been sub 50k? 

All a fantasy. 58k is the build up number. 

[gingerjon]

2 minutes ago, Snowys Backside said:

Attendances heve been massively Inflated anyway as they have included club Wembley tickets until recently so how can you explain the 60k plus attendances that have been sub 50k? 

 

There are no Challenge Cup final attendances that drop under 60,000 if you remove all the Club Wembley numbers.

About which, in addition, two things:

(1) Club Wembley was sold to include the Challenge Cup final. The reason the RFL couldn't sell the seats was because those seats were technically already sold for the Challenge Cup. This was not true of every event at Wembley at the time as not all were included in the CW offer.

(2) Club Wembley was also not empty. So removing the total number of seats is wrong in the first place.

[Tommygilf]

10 minutes ago, Snowys Backside said:

No it doesn't. Attendances heve been massively Inflated anyway as they have included club Wembley tickets until recently so how can you explain the 60k plus attendances that have been sub 50k? 

All a fantasy. 58k is the build up number. 

As Gingerjon says, this is nonsense

[ATLANTISMAN]

Catalans Dragons v St Helens in 2007 was the only time Club Wembley was full

[yipyee]

Its interesting that if we  ant sell every ticket we should re-assess there are lots of games (soccer included) that don't sell out wembley and no one bats an eyelid!

[gingerjon]

9 hours ago, ATLANTISMAN said:

Catalans Dragons v St Helens in 2007 was the only time Club Wembley was full

Interesting, isn't it? I just went to check a video of it as I couldn't remember either way and whilst not full full, it's definitely pretty close to it.

[Leyther_Matt]

Re advertising on the Tube, this was on the escalators down to Euston tube station on Friday night