digitial sports – Fanisko

The Importance of an Integrated Fan Engagement Platform

Enhancing the fan experience at the stadium has always been on the mind of sports clubs, ever since sports became an industry. But as technology is progressing and we are finding ourselves in the midst of yet another technological revolution, the focus has been slowly shifting away from the ‘match day’ and more into the ‘every other day.’

Some, more forward-thinking sports teams have realized that fan engagement plays a crucial role in their growth strategy and that there is much more to it than what’s happening during match day. There are four other fan engagement strategies, all tied together by a fully integrated fan engagement platform.

Hosting Fans

Non-match days provide an excellent opportunity to entertain fans at your venue to make them feel more like part of the team. A tremendous and intimate experience is stadium tours. The Minnesota Vikings, on the other hand, use virtual reality to bring the club’s history to life for their fans. The club’s stadium has a 10,000 sq. foot interactive experience, known as the “Vikings Voyage.”

Connecting Fans

Sports fans are tribal, and they want to communicate with their fellow fans almost as much as they do with the team, itself. Facilitating those connections is a sound fan engagement strategy. Behind-the-scenes experiences with the help of virtual and augmented reality (VR and AR,) as well as 360-degree video are a great example of fan-team connectivity. It is how the New England Patriots do it with their “Travel Inside the Game” initiative. Fantasy football and other such eSports are a great way to connect fans.

Bringing Fans Closer to the Live Action

As sports clubs grow, so does the fan base. But as it so happens, not everyone can attend the matches, mostly because of geographical distances. But as VR technologies continue to develop, it is possible to make these fans feel like they’re on the pitch, from the comfort of their own homes.

Enhancing the Live Experience

Empty stands can and will result in a flat atmosphere, even for those watching at home. Improving the live experience and drawing in the crowds, is and will continue to remain an essential factor. AR/VR technologies like MLB At Bat app is one example of bringing people back to the stadium. On-location free Wi-Fi is a given.

The Integrated Fan Engagement Platform

More sports teams recognize the importance of having a fully-integrated digital platform where they can stay connected with their fans and have fun and interactive activities happening 24/7, 365 days per year. The best such platforms, like Fanisko Engage, will integrate operations from all the four fan engagement strategies mentioned above.

Conclusion

With the staggering amount of sports content available, as well as the overwhelming number of channels where fans can interact with their teams, it’s next to impossible to keep track of and provide any cohesive fan experience. But with an SDK integrated platform like Fanisko Engage, every sports team can. If your team doesn’t have its mobile app, Fanisko creates it. You can check out our website for more information about what it means to have an integrated fan engagement platform.

Latest Trends Shaping the Future of Digital Fan Engagement

As a software development kit (SDK), Fanisko can either enhance a team’s already-existing app or develop one from scratch. This platform powers the first ever Mixed Reality fan experience by combining augmented reality (AR) for gamification with AI for personalization, thus, allowing sports teams to connect with their fans wherever they are.

With over 66% of sports fans going online at least once per day to check out the most recent developments about their favorite team, it should come as no surprise to anyone that digital engagement with the fans is becoming increasingly more popular with every passing day.

This trend, however, presents both a significant opportunity as well as a severe challenge for sports clubs and teams to engage with their fans in an ever more content-saturated environment such as the internet. Here are the latest trends that will influence the digital fan engagement in the foreseeable future.

Reorganizing Fragmented Content

With the internet quickly becoming the preferred source to follow up on sports news, fans can keep up with their team’s activities whenever their heart desires. The internet brings a ton of bite-sized content such as instant replays, highlights, or behind-the-scenes previews, found on all sorts of social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Twitter, or Snapchat. For all the marketing benefits that this fragmented content brings, sports clubs have a tough time engaging with their fans.

Even if some sports teams have their mobile apps, many fans prefer to keep themselves up to date by making use of the previously-mentioned social platforms. Fanisko Engage, on the other hand, can help sports clubs get back in touch with their fanbase by funneling all of this content on the platform.

The Rise of eSports

In the Kleiner Perkins Internet Report 2017, it was highlighted that eSports are gaining more and more ground over traditional sports. In fact, 27% of Millennials said that they have a ‘significant preference’ for eSports, 13% slightly prefer it, as opposed to 27% who strongly favor and 15% who only slightly prefer traditional games. The remainder of 18% is comprised of millennials who have no inclination either way.

These percentages come in comparison to non-Millennials who noted that 45% prefer traditional sports and only 13% strongly favoring eSports. Of this group, the remaining 20% were indifferent, 13% had a slight inclination towards eSports while 11% said they slightly prefered traditional sports.

This trend comes at a time when McDonald’s, a Worldwide TOP Olympic Partner since 1976, has ended its deal with the International Olympic Committee (IOC) ahead of time. It was also in 2017 when McDonalds Australia partnered up with Blizzard to sponsor their Starcraft II World Championship Series. Vodafone Spain, on the other hand, launched its own Twitch Channel to live stream esports gameplay and other gaming news.

Globalization

With the internet, many sports leagues have seen a surge in the size of their overall the size of their overall fanbase. Nevertheless, most of these fans will never physically attend a match only because of their geographical location.

It is why certain sports teams such as Manchester United, have decided to partner up with regional sponsors, in an attempt at reaching to their ever-growing international fanbase. Manchester United is the most dominant football team online in China.

The Bundesliga and the English Premier League are the first two soccer leagues concerning popularity in the world, quickly followed by the Spanish La Liga. The last one, however, has since opened several permanent offices in the APAC region to counter this shortcoming and outpace the others regarding fan engagement.

Conclusion

These trends presented will become increasingly more transparent and widespread as time goes on. Other such macro-trends will also present themselves in the upcoming years as new technologies will be reshaping the sports industry like never before.

How Fan Analytics Plays a Key Role in Promoting Fan Engagement?

It is safe to say that humanity would not have reached very far if everything was left to chance and speculation. All marketing and other business strategies, in general, function the way they do because they make use of hard data and statistics. Understanding one’s fans, their habits and behaviors, their likes and dislikes, is the only sure way to drive better and more efficient engagement. Fan engagement analytics is not only useful for enhancing the live game experience and even increase the overall fan base, but it can also help in increasing sponsor partnerships.

The NFL is even taking it a step further. Back in 2015, it partnered up with SAP, an enterprise software company so as to bring high-quality, relevant analytics to their fans. Avid sports fans have always been analytically-oriented, using all sorts of data and other statistical information at their disposal in an attempt at predicting the outcome of various games or seasons.

With this partnership, the NFL is now providing their fans with relevant information for driving more fan engagement. Unsurprisingly, it works. Though technically, that is not fan analytics, per se, it, nevertheless, proves the point of just how useful andcrucial hard data really is – and in the least expected ways, no less.

Fan Engagement and Fan Analytics

Fan-based analytics can be gathered from many sources such as social media, the internet, the stadium, or all sorts of other channels of communication. By putting all this information together, sports teams can better understand how their fans interact with the sport and with the club’s brand. With having this detailed information, decision-makers can devise better strategies that are specifically tailored to fit their objectives and can cater to their fan base exactly how and when they want to.

Trends can also be predicted better, which, in turn, results in higher ticket sales, higher TV ratings, and more profitable sponsorships. In short, fan data is a cumulation of the fans’ overall feelings and expectations in regards to the team’s performance. The key is to know how to access that information and put it to good use.

But as useful as fan analytics is, its main downside is that it’s somewhat hard to get. As fragmented as sports co ntent is nowadays – spread over social media, broadcast TV, stadium attendance, and so on – it can become quite a challenge to get all the necessary data in time.

Enter Fanisko Engage

Fanisko Engage is, as its name would suggest, an all-encompassing fan engagement platform. In short, it is an app that individual teams or leagues can use to attract and entertain their fan base with all sorts of content that they would otherwise find spread out all over the internet. Be it short videos, behind the scenes moments, highlights, fantasy sports, or VR/AR gaming, this platform has it all. With it, fans can keep themselves updated on the team’s progress without having to shift from Facebook to Twitter to Instagram and TV. Everything exists, conveniently, on this platform.

Asfar as the teams are concerned, this is excellent news since they can better connect and interact with their fans without having to look for them all over the web. What’s more, this platform provides analytics services. It gathers and presents data and metrics regarding performance, activity on the platform, fan behavioral insights, and predictive analytics.

Conclusion

Sports clubs will, thus, have the chance to understand their followers better and drive better fan engagement in the process. Information, after all, is power.

Fan Engagement Through Fantasy Sports

Fantasy sports are a common online activity that can combine both the traditional fan base and various interactive components to enhance the overall sporting experience.

Fantasy sports are a common online activity that can combine both the traditional fan base and various interactive components to enhance the overall sporting experience. In a study published in the Journal of Sports Management, in 2011, it was revealed that this player-specific activity has a positive influence on the overall team loyalty of those involved.

It shouldn’t come as a surprise, then, that the number of fantasy sports players in the US has seen a steep rise from 18 million in 2006 to over 59.3 million in 2017. If in 2012, players were spending over the course of one year roughly $5 and $60 onDaily and Traditional Fantasy Sports, respectively, and in 2016; those sums reached $318 and $184. With that being said, many leagues and clubs have identified fantasy sports as an incremental tool for generating fan engagement.

The Implementation of Fantasy Sports Play in Fan Engagement

As the number of fantasy sports is continuing to grow, the obvious next step for sports leagues would be to make a seamless connection between themselves and these fantasy gamers. To make this happen, however, a compelling fan engagement platform is required, that can bring both elements together.

One such platform shouldn’t focus just on fantasy sports, per se, but on other entertainment and educational elements as well. This way, both avid fantasy gamers and traditional sports fans who want to stay updated, can be serviced equally.

When it comes to fantasy sports gamers, in particular, one such engagement platform is beneficial as it can feature all sorts of relevant news, upcoming players, and various other team events that help gamers stay updated during matches. It also aids them in their decision-making during fantasy games, enhancing their overall knowledge.

As for those who are not particularly interested in fantasy sports, one such platform offers them all sorts of other entertainment, socialization channels, and information hubs. One such all-encompassing platform will be able to provide predictor media, game highlights, short videos, photos about the teams, both on the field and off it, as well as all sorts of other fragmented content that would be hard to reach otherwise.

To make things even more pleasurable and engaging, such platforms can be reward-based where users can be awarded points or various perks that can give them an even broader sense of involvement. Fanisko Engage is one such platform.

How Do Leagues and Clubs Can Benefit from Fantasy Sports

It should be somewhat obvious how fantasy sports, and by extension, the engagement platform that facilitates them, can benefit sports teams and leagues. Fantasy sports offer a way through which fans can feel more connected and more as an active member of the team, while the engagement platform itself provides a one-stop shop that caters to all their sporting needs.

Sports fans do have access to this sports-related entertainment even without the use of these platforms. Nevertheless, it is often spread over a large number of social media outlets and various websites where sports clubs have no power to capitalize or engage with their fans.

Conclusion

With Fanisko Engage, however, both fantasy sports gamers, as well as their teams, can now congregate on a more personal level. It offers the fans all that they require keeping themselves updated and entertained, while the teams can stay in constant contact and understand their fans even better.

How AR is Used in Fan Engagement and Sports Media

Software companies have noticed this shift in sports content consumption and changing behaviors, and are now delivering all sorts of high-end and easy to use solutions to fill in those needs. Either working in collaboration with sports leagues or catering to the fans directly, these companies are changing the way we interact with the sporting world.

The overall sports experience is not as it used to be. If in the past, most of what implied fan engagement revolved around Sunday Football or Baseball October, today’s sports fans want to be connected and interact with theirteams and favorite players, 24/7.

If high-depth TV and nationwide fantasy leagues made fans feel more close to their teams and even engage in a more active role than before, present-day audiences are looking to immerse themselves into a participatory-style viewing experience further.

The Rise of Augmented and Virtual Realities (AR/VR)

Even though the MLB is notorious for its willingness to stick to tradition through thick and thin, not even it can deny the need for some technological innovation to keep up with the changing times and consumer expectations. Back in September 2017, major league baseball announced the launch of its new app, aptly called At Bat.

This AR app allows fans to use their phones or tablets by pointing them at the field, look at each at-bat and instantly obtain a comprehensive view of each player’s stats. That’s not all that At Bat can deliver. It can also analyze every play happening on the field, displaying useful data such as speed and trajectory for every single hit.

Let’s also not forget about Hawk-Eye, the VR technology that’s been part of tennis, cricket, badminton, curling, rugby, or volleyball as early as 2002. Its technique makes use of several high-performance cameras positioned at different angles that, combined, generate a 3D image and depict the ball’s trajectory.

As of late, the NBA has also joined the AR/VR club. The league announced, not that long ago, that it partnered up with Next VR and that it has plans to broadcast all of its future games in virtual reality. Even the major league soccer (MLS) is delving into this realm. DC United has been experimenting with various ways of incorporating augmented application technologies to drive more fan engagement.

Sports leagues aren’t the only ones taking such a proactive approach to these relatively new technologies. Individual developers are coming up with their solutions regarding VR/AR to satisfy the fans’ needs. One such example being Fanisko Engage. Not only does it provide its users with these technologies, enhancing their overall enjoyment, but it manages to funnel all other content about their favorite teams under the same roof.

Conclusion

In short, augmented and virtual reality technologies are here to stay. Regardless of whether sports leagues are willing to implement them or not, consumers want to feel more engaged with the teams they love, and AR/VR is quickly becoming the norm in this regard.

Meet CSK AR : Fan Engagement Innovation

READ : http://www.fanisko.com/fan-engagement-innovation-meet-csk-ar/

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