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Do MLB giveaways and special events influence attendance?

kirk_wakefield 2018, Research, Tickets October 18, 2018November 2, 2018analysis, analytics, attendance, bobbleheads, explanation, giveaways, major league baseball, models, predictive models, pricing, promotions, relevance 0 Comment

by Kirk Wakefield – October 2018

Forbes reported before the 2018 season started that clubs planned over 1800 special event promotions, including about 28 giveaways per team on average. The Cardinals (49), Dodgers (42), and Cubs (41) all topped 40 giveaways. The Marlins (11), Athletics (14), and Diamondbacks (15) were the least giving. If you’re already seeing a pattern, you may be onto something.

Not everyone follows MLB attendance with the same passion as I do. I’ve been tracking and analyzing MLB attendance trends decade by decade since 1990. In the 1990s and early 2000s, it was the rash of new stadiums drawing fans to the game. As we move into the current decade, the strongest predictor of attendance is the presence of star players (represented by total payroll) and the fact that each new year brings overall lower attendance. Winning has always been important, but always behind star power and stadium-related factors (including capacity). Ticket prices, as we’ll see shortly, rarely influence annual attendance. Instead, we can reliably predict next year’s prices based on this year’s attendance.

What about giveaways and special events?

We don’t have historical, annual data on the number of giveaways and special events offered by team. But, thanks to Forbes, we have them for 2018.

It’s not enough to ask, “Are more giveaways and special events correlated with attendance?” You must account for anything else that might influence attendance. Thankfully we did this for you.

To explain average attendance (right) we include the following factors for each team:

Total payroll in dollars
Won/loss percentage
Stadium capacity
Special Events
Giveaways
Population/Franchise Index ¹

Fan Cost Index (see Team Marketing)
Park factors: Runs scored; Home runs

The results

We can explain 91.3% of the variance in attendance with these factors. If you think that is high, you are correct. We rarely explain over 90% of anything. If you’d like to play with the data yourself, click here to download. ²

We numbered the factors above for a reason. They represent, in order, those factors with the most influence on attendance. Total payroll (B = .411), winning (B = .328), and size of the stadium (B = .313; i.e., bigger stadiums like the Yankees and Dodgers) each strongly predict average attendance.

Special events (B = .224) and giveaways (B = .198) significantly influence attendance (p < .05). But, not so fast. We took a deeper dive on the relationship of giveaways on attendance. The relationship is not linear.

As most readers likely guessed, what we see is the classic sideways-S curve of a cubic function. Ok, maybe you don’t hit these kinds of curves very well. But, you can see from the graph that teams offering few giveaways (e.g., Marlins and A’s) fared poorly. As teams offer 10-20 giveaways, attendance increases. However, the dip in the curve shows a good many teams with 20-40 giveaways actually decrease in attendance. This is bad.

What is good? Going all out. The teams offering 40 or more fared very well. This finding is consistent with the philosophy of making the big even bigger. Rather than using promotions only to shore up lousy games, make the big game weekends too big to ignore. The spillover excitement offers a windfall to attendance overall.

What is better? More giveaways and special events give fans more reasons to go. Without, you’re just selling baseball. With, you’re selling entertainment. Want baseball fans to bring less motivated family members and friends? Give them a reason. Many reasons.

The unconvinced are saying, well, those are the Dodgers, Cubs and Cardinals. They have bigger or better stadiums, or winning teams, or maybe bigger markets. We accounted for all of that, remember? These numbers don’t lie. The number of giveaways explain or predict attendance (apart from everything else), and the effect increases at an increasing rate.

Conclusion

The results also show that special events significantly increase attendance. Teams like the Padres (172), Brewers (136), and Royals (126) benefitted from these appeals to different market segments to increase attendance above what it would have been without them. We can argue those with the fewest special events (Red Sox, Mets & Yankees) didn’t need them because of the other factors going in their favor. What might they have done with them?

Finally, it’s always interesting to note the cost of going to the game doesn’t influence average attendance. Neither did any of the park factors, like runs scored or home runs. The total market size and inter-city rivalries help attendance, but just as it has from 1990-2015, it is the least (although significant) effect.

The PFI accounts for larger markets + total major league franchises in the DMA. The New York teams lead the way with the largest population and the most (9) major league teams. ↩
To get 91.3% R-Squared you need to include the quadratic and cubic functions for giveaways. ↩

Increase Season Ticket Renewals by Identifying At-Risk Accounts

kirk_wakefield 2015, Sell, Tickets September 8, 2015October 31, 2018analytics, attendance, first year, identify, renewals, sales analytics, season tickets, tenure, usage 0 Comment

by Daniel Venegas – September 2015

Identifying At-Risk Accounts

Many factors go into the buying decision whenever customers receive renewal invoices. Team performance, usage, cost, and value are just a few of the buzz words we hear every year. The issue is knowing which accounts will bring these up and how to identify them beforehand.

Simplifying the renewal process has been one of our paramount objectives for the past three seasons. We focus on identifiers of at-risk accounts. Team performance is important and measurable, but beyond our control. We chose two metrics to identify at-risk accounts early in the process:

Season Ticket Tenure
Attendance

Understanding these two elements and what they indicate allows us to influence accounts at the beginning of the season as opposed to waiting to hear objections.

Season Ticket Tenure

You can tell a good deal about customers by how long they have been with the organization. Over the past two seasons alone we can tell that first year customers are 9% less likely to renew than second year customers and 17% less likely to renew than third year customers. Obviously, new season ticket holders should be a major focus of your renewal campaign. You know who they are from the very beginning so there is no excuse for not being proactive with these accounts.

“When it comes to first-year season ticket members, education can help drive success. It’s important to educate the client on every possible aspect to utilize their tickets in the most efficient way. Don’t assume a first-year account knows everything about their membership.” -Karlis Kezbers (@karliskezbers), Director, Retention and Ticket Operations, Oklahoma City Thunder

Season Ticket Attendance

Attendance at games is another great quantitative measure to identify at-risk accounts. Customers with an attendance of 61-70% are 6% less likely to renew than those customers that attend 71-80% of games and 9% less likely to renew than customers that attend 81-90% of games.

Tracking attendance early on in a season can help you identify customers that may have issues utilizing their tickets. Be proactive with these accounts and to help them identify ways to better use their tickets.

“The responsibility for getting a ticket used is slowly but surely transferring away from the client and onto the team.” -Karlis Kezbers (@karliskezbers)

Face to Face: The Throwback Solution

Now that you know the potentially risky accounts, what do you do with them? You can’t change their tenure. You may be able to influence their attendance, but probably not much.

Go meet them in person!

Take time out of your week to show customers how much you and the organization care about their business. It is your job to consult with them on the product you sold. Let them know 1st year STHs often aren’t aware of the best ways to utilize season ticket benefits compared to tenured accounts. Walk through the benefits to see how you can help. Tell customers when you notice they are not utilizing their tickets as frequently as most. Offer solutions to manage missed games or to better utilize future games. When you have done this:

Go see them again!

Sam Bays, Director of Business Development at the Arizona Coyotes, shares,

“Whether it’s at the arena, in their office, or over a lunch, nothing solidifies the relationship between an AE and a client like a face to face meeting. As a sales professional, the more you can make yourself the ‘face of the franchise’ in the client’s eyes, the more likely they are to renew.”

You may or may not be able to influence attendance or utilization of seats, but your actions influence renewal rates. Accounts that use 61-70% of their tickets renew at a rate 10% higher than average if their reps visit them more than once during the season. You also can’t change the fact you are working with a first year account, but you can show them the real value they purchased. First year accounts that have more than one face to face visit from their reps during the season renew at a rate 6% higher than the average rookie account.

Day one of your renewal should be the first day after your deadline. These numbers are specific to my organization but the relative impact can be the same for you.

Cover photo courtesy of PresseBox.