Assume the San Antonio Firedogs are a new team in the National Football League (NFL) that began play in 2016

Subject:BusinessPrice: Bought3

Share With

Assume the San Antonio Firedogs are a new team in the National Football League (NFL) that began play in 2016. It has adopted a marketing strategy that focuses on growing a new fan base by providing world-class entertainment and engaging, unique experiences. The Firedogs' goal is to create deep connection to the community and build new fans, while strengthening the fandom of existing fans. This approach will help maintain the fan base even if the team performance is off. The Firedogs believe that if fans feel a deeper connection to the team and the team has become part of their lives, they will have accomplished their goal.
As a member of a robust league, the NFL has suggested the Firedogs focus on providing access and content that is relevant to their fans' respective life stages. As you know, youth and high school football offer huge participation opportunities for young boys in Texas. The Firedogs have focused on that segment of the youth market to create early connection to fans and their families. The team has mined data from fans' social media accounts. Their data taught them that football participation, especially as a young person, makes a person significantly more likely to become a lifelong football fan. Therefore, the Firedogs' goal in youth marketing initiatives is to drive participation in the sport of football. The Firedogs provide exclusive opportunities for youth football players. They also work with local and statewide teams and leagues to boost their offerings through an alignment with the San Antonio Firedogs.
The main youth initiative is the Firedogs "Fire Station" youth outreach program. This program has many components, all targeted at different youth through the game of football. The Fire Station and Fire Truck are key components of the program. The Fire Station is a traveling exhibit that is a replica Fire Station and the Fire Truck is actually a Food Truck that prepares Tex Mex Food.
The core elements of this program consist of the following:

-Team at the "Station": This core component of the program targets existing players and teams in the San Antonio region. The Firedogs encourage youth teams in the marketing region to register as an official Firedog youth team. Enrollment is free and teams that register receive a "team pack" delivered by the Fire (Food) Truck. The package contains items to excite the players and encourage safe play. Items include Firedog-themed mouth guards, helmet stickers, bag tags, Sparky (mascot) dog tags to wear, and exclusive offers and opportunities from the team sponsors. To be a Fire Station team, the team and league are required to comply with USA Football safe coaching/Heads Up Football certification. This helps the Firedogs identify teams and leagues that may need resources to ensure they are teaching safe participation in football.
-"Play like a Firedog" Football Clinics: The Firedogs sponsor weekend clinics targeted at youth who have little or no playing experience. The Firedogs provide a USA Football Master Trainer to support the coaching staff to teach the kids the safe basics of playing the sport, which are skills they will need throughout their football careers. The training is focused on on-the-field as well as off-the-field lessons. They also provide a Firedogs player or former NFL player to speak to the children about the life skills they may learn from football along with why it's important to learn to play the game safely.
-High School Football Game of the Week: This program supports high school football teams from communities throughout Texas. Each week, the Firedogs will select four upcoming games and host a poll through its media partner, The San Antonio Herald, to allow fans to vote on which game should be recognized as the Firedogs Fire Station High School Football Game of the Week. The game that gets the most votes on The San Antonio Herald's social media page is chosen for that week's game. The Firedogs feature the game in a number of ways. The San Antonio Herald sends a staff member to the school to feature the team/players on social media throughout the game day by following the team through their school day leading up to kick-off and throughout the actual competition. The Firedogs' spirit staff members travel to the game with their mascot (Sparky, the Dalmatian), cheerleaders, and youth football staff. At the game they set up the Fire Station and bring along their Fire (Food) Truck. The Fire Station has team exhibits to entice the fans to learn more about the team. At the Fire Station, the staff also hands out Firedogs-branded items, facilitates giveaways to the fans in attendance, and presents a game ball and a financial contribution to each school participating in the game. The Fire Truck sets up in the tailgating area and in addition to serving Tex Mex food items, it hosts a tailgating food contest among fans. The contest is an "eat-off" where fans vote for the best tailgate chili, best tailgate appetizer, and best tailgate dessert. So far, the program has done a great job engaging communities around the Firedogs, as evidenced by the fact that in the first season they routinely have more than 1 million votes per week for the Showdown (almost 10 million votes for the season). This program is a very strong grassroots initiative for the Firedogs. In addition to these event-based initiatives, the Firedogs communicate with parents through a monthly newsletter. This newsletter provides information on upcoming opportunities, such as hosting games at the stadium, equipment grant process, USA Football initiatives, and football safety lessons, just to name a few.
These programs are promoted through the Firedogs' social media accounts. The team's social media becomes a resource for coaches and parents. The Firedogs hope to use the platform to educate parents on safety, exercise, appropriate weight training, and other football training tips. Ideally, the team would like to provide youth football participants with tickets to games, but tickets are sold out for the season. The team's primary goal for the program is to develop these children into fans of the game and ideally fans of the Firedogs and the NFL; therefore, creating a connection with them at a young age is critical. The hope is that they watch the Firedogs on TV and when their parents can no longer keep season tickets, the children may be willing to take over their tickets.
The Firedogs use metrics to evaluate both direct (attendance, participation, higher level of engagement) versus indirect (likes, shares, comments, and other lower levels of engagement) reach. Thus, the Firedogs evaluate the youth programs by assessing how many players they are reaching. Likes on social media sites, page hits, and shares are monitored. The team carefully tracks the enrollment of football players in its programs. For instance, last year in the Team at the Station program, approximately 400 youth teams registered, and with approximately 25 players on each team, the team estimates a direct reach of 10,000 kids. More than 1,000 kids participate in the youth clinics the Firedogs host throughout the area. The High School Game of the Week received over 1.2 million votes last year. The San Antonio Herald viewed that as a good value and renewed its partnership with the Firedogs.


The Firedogs are sold out for every game, so the young people they are attempting to entice to become fans cannot attend an actual Firedogs game. What are ways for the Firedogs Marketing staff to deal with this dilemma? Can you come up with any way, despite a sold-out season, to give young people a game experience?
Much of the outreach discussed above is geared toward youth football teams, presumably made up of a majority of male players. What implication does that have on the Firedogs attempt to grow the fan base? What ideas do you have to grow the game among young female fans?