Six reasons why digital adoption isn’t a cost
If you are a club looking at options to increase digital adoption then I’m sure one of the first questions you are going to ask is, what is the price I’m being asked to pay? - either in the form of transaction fees, website/app development or hiring experienced professionals.
Almost always, our brain interprets this as a cost where in fact, with all the benefits that a digital toolkit brings, it should be viewed as an investment. Now, the question you should ask when making an investment is, will I see a positive return on investment?
If you are committed to increasing digital adoption then, with Fanbase, the answer is almost always yes.
Here’s why we can be so confident:
Increase your ticketing revenue 💰
Giving fans the opportunity to buy tickets 24/7 from the comfort of their own home not only improves their experience but with extended opening hours results in extra sales that might not have happened if barriers were in the way. In fact, one of our partner clubs in the East of Scotland League noticed a 250% increase in revenue after providing digital ticketing.
Having data such as spending patterns and email addresses for GDPR compliant contact will help you better communicate with fans about the likes of merch and tickets which should result in an increase CTR rate that can lead to an increase in sales.
Keep revenue from no-shows 💰
Not something that you would usually think about but no shows are a big part of revenue at clubs with digital ticketing. The revenue from someone who bought their ticket in advance and has a change of plans is still collected by the club.
One of our partners have had a total 81% attendance rate for their first three games of the season, resulting in them effectively paying for Fanbase for 7 months through additional ticket revenue from no shows. If you’re only offering pay at the gate, you don’t stand to benefit from this.
Upsell and cross sell with push notifications 💰
Push notifications are one of the most effective marketing tools in today’s world, consumers have their phone with them 24 hours a day so a push notification can lead to engagement at anytime, anywhere.
Retaildive reported that the average engagement rate for push notifications is 21 percent, in comparison to email which might be a little lower depending on the quality of your database and content.
With Fanbase, clubs can send push notifications to fans sharing messages such as when tickets are released, merchandise is on sale or game day information. For a push notification sent on a Thursday prompting fans to buy tickets for a Saturday fixture, we estimate this can boost sales by 5%.
Retargeting with Fan CRM 💰
One of the reasons we started Fanbase was so that fans could feel recognised by their club, if a fan is paying cash every week it’s almost impossible to keep a record of how they engage with the club.
Using Fanbase allows clubs to start to build a profile of their fans so they can understand how each individual interacts with the club and then group together fans into audiences based on their behaviour. For example, an audience might be those fans who attended the first 4 games of the season but haven’t been since for a month or those fans who have been the highest spending within a month.
Sending a personalised communication will have much greater levels of success, improving sentiment and, ultimately, revenue at the club.
Digital sponsorship opportunities 💰
Digital partnerships are a whole new way for you to sell sponsorship, a new way that you can bring in new sponsors with an offering that is more measurable and more appealing to companies looking at advertising opportunities.
Within the Fanbase platform, clubs have several sponsorship spaces at their disposal to bring in extra revenue and cover the cost of Fanbase. After a ticket has been purchased clubs have the option to upload an image or embed a youtube video and the release of match centre soon will provide another option.
The sponsor placement upon booking a ticket is lucrative due to the numbers of fans seeing that page weekly. One club has sold that space and recouped four months of Fanbase.
Hospitality bookings 💰
Our brand new hospitality management feature gives fans the opportunity to book hospitality packages within the Fanbase app, gone are the days of spending hours emailing back and forth then paying with a bank transfer. As a club you are more likely to sell more spaces if it’s easier for the fan to book and staff that are responsible can spend time focussing on promoting rather than the admin tasks involved.
We also have the option to collect dietary requirements when a fan is checking out, which be found a hospitality specific export accessed from the club portal.
Our clubs have seen on average a 10-15% uplift in bookings since advertising their hospitality packages through Fanbase.
Many of our partner clubs are taking advantage of the features to realise many of the benefits outlined above, making a huge return on investment and making the monthly platform fee look insignificant.
It’s our mission to empower clubs to realise all of the benefits above (and more) to grow sustainably for the club, the community and the fans.
If you think Fanbase is the platform for you, we’d love to hear from you. We charge no monthly fee up to 250 active fans (someone who has made a purchase and follows your club) then we have a monthly pricing model starting at just £150 a month once you have reached that level of adoption.
This means you can sell as many tickets, memberships or hospitality packages as you like for one cost, unlike other competitors we believe you shouldn’t be punished financially for growth!
*Payment processing fee of 1.4%+20p per transaction still applies with Stripe.
