7 Sports marketing in an omnichannel world

Introduction

In today’s fast-paced and ever-changing business landscape, marketers face new challenges and opportunities to connect with their customers like never before. With the rise of digital technologies, consumers have become more empowered and demanding, expecting seamless and personalised experiences across multiple channels.

Omnichannel marketing is founded on the understanding that modern consumers frequently switch between various channels during a single transaction. These channels include retail stores, computers, smartphones, tablets, in-store kiosks, and social media sites^[1]. Both customers and sports organisations utilise these channels and touchpoints regularly, interchangeably, and simultaneously^[2].

In the context of purchasing sports merchandise, omnichannel marketing enables customers to utilise various channels and devices throughout the entire buying process. This process typically involves discovering the product, researching relevant information, making a purchase, completing payment, receiving the order, and handling product returns.

Traditional marketing vs omni-channel marketing

As we have already discussed, marketing is about creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging products or services that are valuable to customers, clients, partners, and society. Throughout history, marketing was mostly the same until radio, television, and billboard advertising made it possible to reach more people. Now, with the internet and mobile devices, marketing has changed even more, allowing companies to connect with many more people using advanced tools and techniques.

Today, sport companies must make sure they tailor their marketing strategies to reach their customers. This means that they need to provide a seamless and personalised experience for consumers across all channels and devices, whether they use a physical store, an online website, a mobile app, or social media. It’s important to make sure that customers have a consistent experience, no matter how they engage with a company.

To make this happen, sport companies must understand what their customers want and need and make sure that they can provide a consistent and seamless experience across all channels. As we discussed last week in Week 6 (Market research in the sport industry), this involves doing research and thinking about the customer’s point of view and integrating the customer experience across all channels to create a seamless and consistent experience.

Overall, omni-channel marketing requires a deep understanding of consumer behaviour, preferences, and needs, and a commitment to delivering a seamless and personalised experience that exceeds their expectations.

In one of this weeks additional reading Maximising Sponsorship ROI in an Omni-Channel World^[6] the authors work through some examples of omni-channel marketing in sport.

As the authors note, omni-channel marketing is the practice of creating a seamless and integrated experience for customers across all channels. It means that customers can move between different platforms, such as a sports team’s website, their social media profiles, and a physical store, while still experiencing a cohesive and consistent message. One successful example of omni-channel marketing is when NASCAR drivers interact directly with fans on platforms like Facebook Live.

This has resulted in higher engagement and delivered a younger audience. NASCAR has also partnered with Twitter to create fun, interactive content, including The Hashtag 500, a NASCAR fan race on Twitter. During the DAYTONA 500, fans were able to use DAYTONA 500-themed emojis and a Snapchat live story was created, resulting in significant social media engagement.

The NASCAR Mobile App is another key part of their omni-channel strategy. This app features race highlights and lifestyle content for all three national racing series, allowing fans to access the latest news and media experiences with greater multimedia support. Through digital and social media, NASCAR has been able to engage core fans while also reaching new audiences and introducing them to the sport.

Their social channels have amassed 11 million followers and 1.9 billion social impressions in 2016^[7]. By utilising a data-driven approach (remember last weeks insights!) and understanding the roles of each platform, sports marketers can successfully win over the crowd and create lasting connections with their fans.

Take a closer look with this weeks second reading

The second assigned reading for this week is on vUWS (titled: What omnichannel really means?) provides a detailed and comprehensive explanation of the practical application of omni-channel marketing.^[8].

The article emphasises the importance of supporting customers in one channel through another, for instance, enabling them to place online orders and collect their products in-store, especially outside regular business hours. It stresses the importance of supporting customers in one channel through another, for instance, enabling them to place online orders and collect their products in-store, especially outside regular business hours.

The author also argues that retailers should offer support for returns and exchanges of products purchased online at their brick-and-mortar stores. I recommend reading this short article carefully and attempting to answer the questions provided^[9]. The authors argue that retailers should offer support for returns and exchanges of products purchased online at their brick-and-mortar stores- has this ever happened to you? It can be very frustrating.

After reading this short article (again it is on vUWS) carefully and attempting to fill in the right answers below to check your understanding of this weeks content.