The Travelling Circus - playing home games around NZ

You obviously don't know about (good) marketing then. 

Welnix's business model was to break even, any dumb c**t knows that that isn't going to happen, unless they start winning, (even then they probably won't break even)

I pay thousands of dollars a year going to see the Phoenix, & most of the time it is to watch sub standard players trying to do their best. I'm used to that sort of s**t, I've followed a s**t team most of my life, but the shark team I've followed in NZ seem to be taking this piss a bit too much!

Dale if the fans down here don't pull their fingers out their kids won't have a team to want to play for. So yes it is partially  our own  fault but these are the very people  the club should be  targeting . 

The focus needs to shift from why we/they won't to how we/they can. Sure criticise, ut be constructive and offer a (realistic) solution (that hasn't been tried/failed previously).

This continual oft-repeated spiral of woe and negativity is pointless. For mine, until the on-field performance improves, consistently (not a good game here and there), we can play wherever we like for whomever we must please (FFA, sponsors, Fever, etc) but the simple fact is mediocre performances will attract mediocre crowds.

If Welnix are unable (or unwilling) to invest in, and/or attract, talent both on and off the pitch that can provide this - WE'RE DOOMED!!!

immhoo (and on goes the spiral lol).

If people want to be willfully ignorant about the context we are in, then that's their prerogative. Personally, I'd rather have all games in Wellington, but that's just not feasible in the current environment so I've accepted the circumstances. Unfortunately we support a minor code, in a small city, with the club's fate in the hands of those fudgewits at the FFA. If this is what keeps us afloat, then who am I to complain. 

"Good" marketing campaigns cost. Lots. Especially if you want any cut-through in the events market, cos there is a fudge-ton of things on and the Nix aren't just competing against other sports, but other events around town for your spending money. 

I'd have to assume that the advertising/marketing there is probably isn't targeted towards avid football fans either.

I feel it's probably the avenues that the Phoenix don't have control over that will build hype, get people through the gate. Word of mouth, fluff pieces and positive articles in the local papers every week etc. Possibly should try social media influencers also (if there are any in Wellington!)

I quite like the faux-away trips we get to do for these games. Granted, I can't make them all this year, but they are a nice substitute for jumping on a 2 hour train to go to an away game, for example.

The other factor to consider is whilst other clubs marketing budget is spent (predominantly) locally, ours is not - so we may well be spending comparable $$$$ overall but that budget is layered more thinly due to the breadth of our "home" games.

What Welnix must do (as well as the onfield stuff) is be smart with their promos, and probably a little leftfield (pun intended). The bus/shelter thing has become a little anonymous now and whilst I'm sure it's great "value", I would be surprised if their weren't other avenues that would provide a better ROI - in particular consideration of the niches in which we can, and should be, targeting.

We have a stable base (us, and the others who make up the 5k or so people that turn up rain/hail/shine/fri/sat/sun/5pn/7pm/3pm/whatever) but the club NEEDS to directly engage the other 5k who would probably come come if we were winning, and the additional 5k that will come when the Nix are the "hot" thing in town... all of this becomes a lot easier; and cheaper - when the team is winning regularly (regardless of the style of football).

I don't think the crowds are bad at all, they are definitely favourable compared to the Lions and not far off the Hurricanes (who play in the top competition in the world, in the national sport and play less than half the games that the Phoenix play at home) and also compared to other leagues like the SPL and Serie A.

The business plan has to work at just under 10k in bad seasons and over 10k in good seasons, with a period of bad - neutral seasons in rebuilding phases between title tilts. But the TV audience and membership numbers definitely have to go up, which is where the traveling circus comes in.

As part of the new license the FFA has agreed to increase the advertising for the A-League as a whole in NZ, one of the problems is that people watch the Phoenix but they don't have second teams in Australia to support and watch. Sky is only going to up what they pay if ratings for the A-League as a whole improve, not just the Phoenix.

That's the problem though isnt it?

To any reasonable person we have a great dedicated fan base, that other teams in other sports in the same situation would beg for with reasonable numbers turning up consistently.

The problem is trying to marry the word reasonable and the FFA together.

The Phoenix talk about fan responsibility (turn up, bring a friend). What about organisational responibility, Dome has been in the job 5 + years? with the club failing on so many fronts.

http://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/rugby/super-rugby/101...

in 2012 and 2013 they were averaging around about 10k per game. So that's pretty favorable considering they play fewer games and have a larger fan base.

Doloras. Please try to not be deliberately antagonistic. 

The opposite to the Phoenix's marketing, which is not working, hence the reason for the traveling circus!

We get only 1k less than Melbourne City and they have a 9 million dollar squad and the entire marketing push of the A-League behind them, not to mention a population base of millions to draw from.

#squattingonalicence

See, I honestly don't believe you know what (good) marketing is either. I think you have unrealistic expectations of what marketing can accomplish, which is shown in that you don't actually make any concrete suggestions.

The best marketing in the world cannot sell a dud product. 

We(lnix) need to fix the product before any upping of the marketing game can expect to have an impact (and conversely, the marketing will become increasingly irrelevant as the product will sell itself, as we've seen in the past - in a range of contexts, not just this one).

I am not in the business of producing marketing campaigns for football clubs, so you are correct in saying I don't know what a good marketing campaign for a football club is. 

There are marketing companies, that  will invoice you varying amounts for their services. If you choose a marketing company that isn't very good at marketing your product or service, you choose another one, & hopefully they will be able to achieve better results.

If, on the other hand, you decide to stick with the original marketing company, the chances are very high that the results of subsequent marketing campaigns will achieve similar poor results. 

Case in point being Hamilton last weekend - very poor marketing=very poor turnout.

I hope this has helped you Doloras. Judging by the tone of your previous comment, you probably already know a significant amount about marketing, so maybe YOU could develop a marketing plan for the WELLINGTON Phoenix? 

(Although in hindsight, your skill at producing highly unimaginative memes indicates a lack of marketing nouse!)

I think if you stick with one marketing company (a good one), chances are actually better that over time you will get better results. 

As a creative it takes time to develop an understanding of a clients business, you are always learning what it is they do or researching what competitors are doing and building a knowledge base to draw from when coming up with advertising/marketing plans. You only get that with time.

Granted, if the creatives doing work for you aren't doing these things and results are continually poor then do give them the flick.

My mum says i'm creative.

Better be careful she doesn't give you the flick then.

They changed marketing companies a couple of years ago IIRC, also wasn't the Hamilton game supposed to be marketed by the Hamilton City Council? 

The best marketing campaign that the Phoenix ever had was the fans and sponsors putting nix scarves everywhere, you want Wellington to be bathed in black and yellow on game day. It seems like Wellington Scaffolding is no longer a partner of the team? That's a shame because they did a lot of free advertising, and there's going to be plenty of scaffolding around Wellington for the foreseable future.

I have to stand up for Doloras on this

There are marketing companies out there that created all sorts of shark campaigns - the Jerry Seinfeld/Vista adverts come immediately to mind as being horrendous and very expensive. That got past creative and went to market. Walmart had a 'Fat Girl Costumes' thing on their website and again, that got past marketing and out in to the market. #susanalbumparty is another. There are all sorts of failed campaigns out there that have flopped and have cost a crap load. Expensive marketing campaigns do not equal results but at what point do you keep throwing money at something until you realise it wont work?

Marketing costs money and they have tried that and its not worked. They are not bottomless pits of money because previous attempts have given enough of a fair indication that it does not work. 

Your position of you keep going until you get results is fine in theory but its not always practical. You may not have an idea about good marketing and I know I do not either but just because its not to our tastes, does not mean its bad. It just means sometimes you have a product you cannot sell. I give you Vegemites iSnack 2.0 and New Coke as examples.

Hey, I think I went to that.

Hopefully the fire north of Auckland is going to have a Phoenix rising from the middle of it!

Brilliant piece of advertising!!! ?

Holy crap is that true? I thought both Melbourne teams got huge crowds.  If we are underperforming then Melbourne must be already out the door with numbers like that.

which would get worse if South Melbourne get in. Gonna cost them heaps if they DONT get into the A League.

There are half a million people within one hours drive of Wellington, my opinion is that the club haven't conducted a sufficiently adequate, prolonged marketing campaign to those people. The club do half arsed promo's which are sometimes quite good, but they don't appear to follow them up, or they play two games out of wellington, or they play absolutely s**t, so any momentum is lost.

We need an additional 2500- 3000 at each game through the turnstiles at Westpac Stadium to get our average up to 10000, we aren't that far off. 

You have so much confirmation bias on this its not funny

The Trump example is a tough one.  I feel like if we followed the Trump campaign we would tell the rugby fans that football is rugby, we would tell the vegans that all the Nix players are vegans, we would tell anyone not interested in sport its not really sport, take all of that back in an interview and somehow against all logic win the a league.

It has been touched on several times in this thread and commented on before. Good crowd numbers seem to correspond with a good run of results. It seems to me that Welnix have tried every dam thing to increase crowd numbers EXCEPT doing enough to ensure the team is good enough to perform well, win games and attract people through the turnstiles. If the mystical number is 12,000 through the gate to remain viable, then - for Christ's sake - spend some serious money in getting the right coach and the right players to get us fudgeing winning......