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Join WillowTree's sports marketing all-stars as they tackle the world of sports media and its interconnected revenue streams. Collaborating with valued tech partner Braze, the team devises personalization strategies to boost online streaming, live event ticket sales, merchandise spend, and customer lifetime value. Their vision for “WillowTree Sports Network” will score major points for fans, athletes, leagues, networks, and sports marketers everywhere.
Sporting events are great connectors. A shared passion for a team or player has the power to unite thousands of people — regardless of age, gender, ethnicity, geography, or any other demographic.
Unfortunately, modern sports can feel intensely disconnected, despite or even because of all the digital channels and devices at our disposal. Every sports organization operates differently, and it’s increasingly difficult to cut through the noise and keep track of the best ways to watch a game, find athlete info, and connect with other sports fans.
Luckily, we can leverage a digital platform like Braze to personalize the sports marketing experience and bring fans together again, so we developed the fictional “WillowTree Sports Network” app — powered by the Braze platform — to create a better experience.
Sports fans are not a monolith. In any given sport, we find a wide range of audience personas, including:
We identify with different college, amateur, and professional sports at different times of life. Why not empower fans to tell us who they are and the information they find valuable?
Through some (really fun) field research, our team caught some games at Madison Square Garden, Ohio State University’s Schottenstein Center, and Fenway Park, analyzing in the in-person experience with fresh eyes. We also convened focus groups with fans — who expressed varying engagement levels and reasons for engaging with each sport, team, or player — to identify underlying motivations and pain points.
The sports marketing experience requires some complex Journey Mapping. There’s an opportunity for media and sports brands to be more aware of whether a fan is watching a game live on their mobile device, watching on time delay at home, or watching in-stadium. Messaging should always be relevant and spoiler-free. And we have the digital marketing tools to make this happen.
Budgets are tight, so it’s crucial to examine the technical lift and the potential return on investment associated with engaging these complex audience segments. WillowTree’s Prioritization Workshop charts these varied combinations to help clients understand the lowest-hanging fruit and the higher-lift, higher-ROI concepts. Given the time constraints of our two-week sprint for sports marketing, we focused on hardcore and casual fan segments with the highest potential ROI.
Generic, impersonal pop-ups. Privacy concerns. Unclear value exchange for user data. Average app adoption rates are abysmal, but proper in-app onboarding helps boost long-term user retention.
With WillowTree Sports Network, we capture critical fan information, leveraging a robust preference center and well-timed in-app messaging to optimize user experience and boost long-term retention. We employ sport-by-sport customization of push notifications and email subscriptions, plus a personalized understanding of whether a fan wants in-depth stats and analysis versus basic information to learn the ropes of a new sport.
Most importantly, we honor these preferences and provide opportunities to update as user preferences inevitably change.
In today’s highly fragmented sports marketing landscape, fans consistently seek information on when and where to watch.
Using customer profile data, we can send targeted push notifications to ensure fans never miss a minute of the action. But for fans watching on time delay who are worried about spoilers, we can still make real-time messaging seamless while allowing users to “mute” notifications or social media updates for individual games.
For fans headed to the game, we need to provide differentiated pre-game and in-stadium experiences for first-time attendees vs. returning visitors.
Using Braze, we can surface critical information to new visitors, such as navigation assistance and travel tips, while creating “surprise and delight” moments for returning sports fans, such as personalized merchandise recommendations or integrated Spotify playlists.
Above all, just because we have these sports marketing tools doesn’t mean we have to use them. Let fans keep their focus on the field. Say less.
Skip the impersonal content that ignores user interest and expertise. Customize and enrich content seamlessly using features like Braze’s Content Blocks, Liquid Logic, and Connected Content.
With a customer data platform (CDP) serving as a single source of truth across channels, we can serve users the content they crave, whether it’s a deep dive on sabermetrics or delightful insights into your favorite player's workout routine and walk-up song.
Most brands focus on improving campaign performance rather than boosting customer lifetime value. This episode focused on high-impact, low-lift sports marketing activations that would address fans’ pain points and needs. We align on KPIs and craft dashboards carefully to ensure we can effectively measure how each tactic influences fan engagement over time.
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