Written on October 7, 2009
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Submit your favorite sports business issue and how you solved it and we'll put it up online. Send to buffy@teamworkonline.com, and give us rights to publish it online with your email address. John Cimpermanjohn@cenergycom.comLEVERAGING SPORTS PASSION FOR A CAUSEThe sports industry provides many opportunities. Opportunities to work in an energetic, fast paced business. Opportunities for innovation and creativity. And opportunities to do good for the community There is nothing more exciting than a playoff run for the home team. An entire market and its fan base rally around the team, day in and day out. The team is top of mind with the fans and, in many cases, has undiluted share of voice in the market place. This is also the perfect opportunity to leverage this passion to do good. Last season’s NHL playoffs were just that opportunity. The Opportunity Working on the agency side of the business provides us the unique opportunity to work with multiple teams, and multiple leagues, at any given time. It provides the opportunity to look for ways to combine resources for clients that share common goals. In the case of the 2009/10 NHL Playoffs, a number of clubs came to us looking for ways to create additional buzz for the playoffs, further engage fans and, if possible, leverage this engagement for their team’s Foundation. The Challenge The overall challenge was to develop a common promotion and platform that all participating NHL clubs could utilize. It was important to look for a common platform in order to amortize the expense of the promotion among all clubs, rather than relying on one club’s budget to support the integrated promotion. Adding to the challenge was the fact that the promotion must reflect the team’s brand identity and unique attributes of its fan base. The Program The NHL Beard-a-thon was born. For those of you not aware, the playoff beard is a hockey original. Dating back to the New York Islanders’ dynasty of the 1980’s, players would not shave until their team was eliminated from the playoffs or, ideally, won the Stanley Cup. Never before, however, were fans invited to become part of this tradition. The NHL Beard-a-thon changed all that. Modeled after a “walk-a-thon”, “bowl-a-thon” or any other “a-thon”, fans were invited to “grow one for the team” during the NHL Playoffs. By doing so, fans were able to request donations from friends, family, and co-workers for each day their maintained their playoff beard. Fans unable, or unwilling, to grow a playoff beard, could also participate by pledging their favorite player or any of a number of local celebrities that participated in the promotion. All proceed from the Beard-a-thon were donated to the team’s Foundation or designated charity. While the promotion was executed in multiple NHL markets, all dollars raised by the team’s fans were kept in the local market. The Results This past season, nine NHL Clubs participated in the Beard-a-thon. While the web site and back-end programming of the donation engine were shared by all clubs, the front-end branding of the website and all supporting promotional materials (television, web banners, email blast, and flyers) were customized for each club. Additionally, each club leveraged its local PR influence to create special playoff events and local celebrity tie-ins to provide increased exposure for the promotion. The NHL Beard-a-thon raised nearly a half million dollars for local team charities. In all, over 7,000 fans “grew one for the team” and over 10,000 fans donated to their favorite beard grower. As an added benefit, the beard-a-thon websites became a social network for fans. Over 5,000 fans logged onto the sites each day to check their donation status, download their playoff beard photo, and communicate with other passionate fans. Participants included team owners, team presidents, players, rock and roll celebrities, and the everyday fan that wanted to display their loyalty to their team. The promotion was a win for the teams, a win for the fans and, most importantly, a win for charity. It does go to show that sports can give back in many ways. For more information on the beard-a-thon, log onto www.beardathon.com. [back to My Sports Business Problem and How I Solved It...] |
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