The Entertainment Factor

Фото: The Entertainment Factor

What do I mean by sports marketing? If sport is movement, emotion, hard work, achievement, dynamic, and atavistic rites, then marketing sport is vital nourishment, a tool that amplifies the essence of sport, one that makes sport known to all and helps it grow. As a marketing and communications manager for Montepaschi Viadana, one of Italy’s most successful rugby clubs, the most surprising observation, even at the highest level of management, is that marketing has still not been accepted as a fundamental factor for the development of rugby, let alone any other sport in Italy.

Obviously, my following comments refer to the marketing of rugby but if we consider the fundamentals (i.e., the levers of marketing, as purists would say) to be the same then they can easily apply to basketball. Montepaschi Viadana actually has a particular interest in basketball, since we both have the same title sponsor as our “cousins,” the Mens Sana basketball team of Siena. My first marketing experience was in the manufacturing sphere with air conditioners and refrigerators, and from a marketing standpoint, sport is much more complex in comparison due to the overall spectacle and volatile emotions that are tied up with the sport and a particular team. On the one hand, sport (from sport in general to a certain sport, even to a specific sports unit - in this case rugby and basketball teams) is a sellable product in a large and overcrowded market with thousands of competitors. It is set on a stage that not only includes stadiums, company sponsors, and institutions, but also the media and more importantly, television. On the other hand, sport is an industry, a gigantic money machine: As a whole, Italian sport accounts for approximately 3% of GDP and it is among the top ten Italian companies in terms of earnings, employing more than one million people, including amateurs and professionals. In addition to being a product and an industry, sport is a formidable vehicle for communication. It is a reality capable of involving millions of people, of moving crowds, and provoking passions (even halting or inciting wars) as it embodies both ancestral and emotive values. A fan’s passion and support for an athlete or team is a real addiction that sooner or later strikes us all, even those who do not play any sport. This extreme interest can be as brief as one afternoon or can last for the rest of a person’s life. Over the years, sport has become the greatest spectacle in the world, with competitions of every kind taking place day and night. This includes league play and tournaments as well as national and world championships. Television (public and pay-per-view) is a major vehicle in sports and it offers a variety of events on a daily basis to watch, follow, comment upon, and satirise. This includes local sporting events that attract thousands of viewers, to the 14-day Olympic Games that attracts a worldwide audience numbering in the billions. Olympic organizers have estimated that China, the host of the 2008 summer Olympic Games, earned more than 34 million euros from merchandising profits alone, developing a business of more than 204 million euros.

With these facts as a backdrop, it should come as no surprise that a company at any level would view sport as one of the most effective means of communication, both in terms of associating their name with a team or individual champion (e.g., Puma with Olympic track star, Usain Bolt), or with a venue (e.g., stadium, arena, or track), or having a sports personality as a spokesperson for their brand (e.g., the latest Gillette Fusion Power commercial is an excellent example, with not one, but three different sportsmen: Tiger Woods, Roger Federer, and Thierry Henry).

However, it is important not to be fooled by the numbers; the value of communication in any sport (for any discipline or athlete) can not only be calculated in terms of contact numbers, or targets reached and cost per contact (i.e., by traditional quantitative parameters), but communication also must take into consideration the extraordinary qualitative property, both unique and specific, which is the spectator’s emotional involvement. You should never forget the raw emotions of victory and defeat that captivate the sports fan.

Sports marketing has played a key role in the overall success of Montepaschi Viadana’s rugby team. In recent years, they have won one Italian Championship, three Italian cups, one league super cup, and they were the only Italian team to have reached the final of a European cup). Montepaschi Viadana’ success is due in part to the fact that it is the only Italian club that has a professional structure in place to cope with the challenges that Italian rugby faces by using the sports marketing tools of analysis, evaluation, proposals, and communication. In addition, they have implemented initiatives and projects aimed at maximizing the value of the “sports product” and have acknowledged that at a certain level in sport, growth not only depends on winning on the playing field, but also by taking part in the game of marketing, just like any other company in any other sector.

The factors for growth are the same: product, target, competitors, and strategies. However, there are some basic differences:

• A team’s competitive success is immediately identifiable and without it no marketing strategy would be able to function or sustain a sports club.
• The social objectives, educational and formative are the very nature of sport in relation to the area in which it may operate.
• A sports club’s economic results are linked to their sporting achievements and often is relegated to second place and substituted with social and political standing.

In Viadana, I started with an analysis of the environment and the target market and verified the strengths and weaknesses of the club and the first team, as well as our competitors. Subsequently, I formulated a strategy and goals for the long term (5 to 10 years), for the medium term (2 to 4 years), and for the short term (this season and next years: 1 to 2 years). All goals are based on these fundamental points:

1. Constant planning of goals to be and youth division) and determine the sources of revenue and the time necessary to achieve them.
2. Elaboration of a strategy to improve economic resources.
3. Elaboration of a development plan and the professionalism of human resources.
4. Diversification of Club’s revenue sources (see the above diagram); an overall increase in revenue but with a gradual redefining of the percentage of revenue coming from sponsorship (uniforms and stadium: the most variable depending on the team’s success) and increases from other sources: merchandising, hospitality, players’ image, and new projects. TV rights are the most controllable and least linked to the team’s results.

The balance between sporting and economic results is the most crucial point. The chart on the following pages illustrates the optimal relationship between sporting and economic results, an increase in revenue (more funds available for the team), greater competitiveness, and bigger games (and therefore higher revenues). However, it must be adapted according to each case, e.g., rugby in general, rugby in Italy, and, finally rugby in Viadana. Therefore, it is a theoretical diagram offering a guideline and reference for a strategic starting point.

Over the past three-and-a-half years, thanks to the constant implementation of marketing and communication, Montepaschi Viadana has significantly expanded its horizons. In no particular order:

• Earnings have increased threefold (625%), thanks to an effective communication campaign using various media and season ticket holders.
• One of Italy’s largest banks, Montepaschi, already a long-time sponsor of basketball, has become the title sponsor of Viadana.
• The formation of a Business School and Performanager, a managerial course based on the principles and rules of rugby, has enjoyed unprecedented success among international companies such as Fiat, Conad, Auchan, Sole 24 Ore, and Mueller.
• The stadium, with its new stands, has increased its capacity from 3,000 to 5,500 seats, including sky boxes for corporate hospitality.
• The Leonero mascot, the black lion (the only one in the super 10), with the Leonerine cheerleaders provide pre- and post-game animation as well as promotion of social and youth initiatives.
• The mascot has its own personal sponsor (Epiu milk, which is part of the Sterilgarda Group): a personalized car, a cuddly toy, three jingles, and in collaboration with Conad, a leading Italian supermarket chain, the launch of an informative campaign to promote nutrition and a healthy diet for young fans, and information about the rules and values of rugby.

Looking to the future, the marketing strategy that I have termed as the “Entertainment Factor” was not something that I invented, but rather imported (benchmarking) and one that I would like to continue applying. It is a well-known strategy abroad, but it is quite new for Italian rugby. The Entertainment Factor means associating a sporting event (which must remain the centrepiece of the show) with entertainment and with initiatives that complement and add value to the spectacle. The aim is not only to open up this great sport to a larger audience and gain new fans, but also to make the game more enjoyable and exciting. In essence, we want to create something that is more than just a sporting event or a final score.

For example, the hugely successful Montepaschi Viadana Night was a step in this direction. The Italian singer and rising star, Giusi Ferreri, was invited to entertain and the club literally moved away from the stadium to the local Mynt Park Nightclub for a night of local celebrations, all in the name of rugby. In English rugby, entertainment is already a well tested and widely used strategy valued as a means of increasing a club’s revenue. Another excellent example of combining entertainment with sport comes from Max Guazzini, long-time president of the Stade Francais Rugby Uumpreynion team in Paris. Guazzini has brought in the popular singing group, the Gypsy Kings, and stars from the Moulin Rouge music revue and his team regularly achieves attendance figures of more than 70,000 to 80,000 per game. Not even football can match these astounding attendance figures. A club’s ability to turn sporting success into revenue depends on how well they take advantage of opportunities to reach a wider audience: ticketing, merchandising, sponsorship, and hospitality are the areas most closely linked to the available target market. However, the other side of the coin is that without sporting success entertainment loses its value and therefore, its ability to attract spectators in the long term. The bottom line: The team has to win a high percentage of its matches.

Could this strategy work for European basketball? Certainly, although some distinctions have to be made, due in great part to the differences in nature and histories of both sports. Rugby is an outdoor sport while basketball is an indoor sport. European basketball, already professionally active for many years, is more advanced with regards to its existing marketing and communication strategy, whereas, rugby is an emerging sport in Italy; rugby is a contact sport, while basketball is a more “geometrical” game.

The Entertainment Factor for an indoor sport, such as basketball, becomes even more important in a confined space, though it poses fewer problems because weather is not a factor, yet attention to planning and detail is still required.

While they are two sports set in different arenas, with a different number of team players, and different dynamics and organization, both have one common denominator: for Italian rugby as for basketball (and other sports) their future is in transforming the sporting event into a show. With entertainment, it is possible to significantly widen the audience watching the sporting event, whether it is at the stadium or on TV. A larger fan base means more opportunities to sell sport as a product. More fans generate higher revenues for the sporting industry, which in turn leads to greater mass media appeal for communication partners. And larger markets also translate to more sponsors. To paraphrase Humphrey Bogart, “It’s sports marketing, kid.”