*This post was written by Kirk Wakefield – June 2017 Do you answer a call from an unknown number? Neither does anyone else. Americans spend upwards of 4 hours a day on smartphones, but odds of answering an unidentified caller are about one in four. Millennials are even less likely to answer: Phone calls are seen…Continue Reading How to Sell Tickets to People Who Won’t Answer the Phone
by Kirk Wakefield – May 2017 In a league of its own StubHub sells a ticket at least once every second. Over 21 million unique highly qualified buyers visit StubHub every month. Last year (2016), StubHub sold over $4.2 billion in tickets. That total essentially places StubHub in a league by itself, comparable to the…Continue Reading StubHub Ticket Insights: Changes in Who, How & When People Buy
by Kirk Wakefield – June 2016 Juniper Research classifies ticketing as one of the primary commerce applications driving eCommerce, estimating over one-fourth of ticket purchases will go mobile in the U.S. by 2020, and over half of ticket purchases outside of the US and Europe to be mobile-based by 2020. Teams like the Portland Trail Blazers…Continue Reading Selling Experiences Online: Announcing the BAV-S3 4V® Brand Index
by Lynda Carrier-Metz – December 2015 What is the first sponsorship question? The first question we ask as we develop each partnership with a sports team is: How can our involvement benefit our customers? The second question quickly follows: Will this partnership ultimately drive sales for our company? When I was in college (quite a…Continue Reading How sponsorships can add to the fan experience
by Carson Heady – May 2014 How to sell: Put the ball in play Fundamental to any activity or sport is to put the ball in play. This necessitates action on the part of the participant(s) and begins with how and when we make contact. On the field, it is about formulating strategy, addressing the…Continue Reading Making Connections: Contact Puts the Ball in Play
by Anne Rivers – February 2014 Why do brands line up to sponsor The Olympics & the Super Bowl? Below are five truths you might have suspected, but didn’t have the evidence or the details that explain why brands do what they do. 1. The Super Bowl and The Olympics are the two most powerful…Continue Reading Why Sponsors Flock to The Olympics and Super Bowl: 5 Things You Didn’t Know About Their Fans & Brands
by Lynn Wittenburg – August 2013 I got this headline “Market Like a Rock Star” in an email after I read the book Radical Marketing. They were trying to sell me a book about the Grateful Dead. No sale, but it caught my attention. What if I really did market like a rock star? What would…Continue Reading Market (Sell) Like a Rock Star!
by Kirk Wakefield – May 2013 My favorite is AT&T Park. You don’t have to love baseball to love going there. And that really is the business issue: How do you build or maintain a park that attracts people who don’t really care about baseball? The Cubs aren’t spending $500 million in renovations because baseball…Continue Reading What makes a great ballpark?
by Phillip Grieco – March 2013 It’s been nearly 18 years since the famous Seinfeld Soup Nazi episode aired. Yet “No soup for you!” still seems to roll off the tongue every time someone has the liquid delicacy. For Hale & Hearty, a popular NYC lunch destination, soup is truly at the core of their…Continue Reading Soup for you!
by Kirk Wakefield – January 2013 What makes a passionate fan? A passionate fan devotes heart, mind, body, and soul to the team. The consequences of a passionate fan base are increased ticket, media, merchandise and sponsorship revenue to the team. But what are the antecedents to fan passion? What causes fans to be passionate?…Continue Reading What drives fan passion?