Unless you're like my old man who falls asleep during sporting events on his couch because he's 60 and sports gray hair, you need to have social media in the form of a smartphone at your fingertips on college football Saturdays.
A recent study conducted by the National Association of Collegiate Marketing Administrators (NACMA) and the Warsaw Sports Marketing Center at Oregon delved into ways to get fans — particularly students — to the stadium in the fall and keep them there until the clock hits zero.
"It's definitely a huge concern to capture their attention and get them to games while they're in school because once you lose them, it's that much harder to increase that fandom," said lead investigator Andrew Guerra. "You can get fans there but if they're not engaged in the game, not only does it deplete the fan experience but it depletes the home-field advantage that these teams have."
Alabama coach Nick Saban's whined about students leaving early from games in the past. Michigan's dumbfounding attempts to get people to fill seats explain themselves.
The NACMA study offered many thoughts as to why people choose to stay at home instead of visit the stadium on game day, among them crystal clear picture on their HDTVs, connectivity and spending time with those who can't afford to go.
Among the findings:
- Students indicated their favorite parts of the game-day experience were watching live game action (23%), in-stadium atmosphere (17%) and tailgating (15%);
- Of students who follow the team on Facebook, 72% attended three or more home football games. Of those who didn't, 44% attended three or more games. Facebook followers of teams were 63% more likely to attend three or more home games than students who didn't follow the team on Facebook, and that trend held for other social media. Twitter (61%), Snapchat (47%) and Instagram (48%) made students more likely to attend three or more home games;
- Nearly a quarter of respondents reported leaving before a game is 75% complete. Potential incentives for them to stay for the entire game included free T-shirts, a sponsored post-game party, loyalty points and concession discounts, in that order. Loyalty points and meet and greets with players yielded the strongest results.
So basically, the Internet has to be readily available wherever you want to watch a game. Those damn millennials (including me) always gotta have those smartphones in hand.
