Quote ="Donnyman"I've been with you all the way on here but we are poles apart. When we have been to Twickenham we did get there OK, we did stick around a bit whilst the crowds cleared and we did get home fine and we did it again. I do not agree with you at all that "Marketing" is our problem and it's a shame you don't acknowledge the immense number of people in and around London with a great affinity to Rugby Union. Marketing can encourage people to attend an event but in the end they decide. Sure Marketing is needed to sell a product, service or event but you forget that when we offer people an event like the Challenge cup final, they also have a myriad of choices other than that event. Marketing isn't a hypnotic mind changing method of persuasion it just puts something on offer in a good light, but people make the choice.
This is why I always say look at the big clubs marketing departments like Leeds, they do everything they can to pull the fans in but at the end of the day there comes a point when the cost of extra marketing isn't covered by the extra tickets sold accordingly.'"
I think you're confusing marketing with advertising somewhat. Advertising is the thing that you use to shout about yourself. Marketing is the thing that gives you something worth shouting about. They're very different things. People might ultimately make their own choice, but get the marketing right and you make it much easier for them to choose what you're offering. Apple don't make the best mobile phones, but they sell more of them than Samsung and Sony.
I agree that RL can't advertise its way out of the problems it has got itself in, but it can market its way out most of these problems.
What's clear is that RL is a product that has too many imperfections for the market it is operating in. Come out of the echo chamber of RLFANS and you realise that it isn't something that appeals to the sorts of audiences the game needs to start attracting if it is going to reverse the declining crowds, declining profile, declining participation and declining media attention.
Marketing is the thing that develops the sport to make it appeal to those new audiences. I think the evidence of our falling attendances and media profile show that we aren't doing that.
Marketing is the bit that develops the matchday experience so that people want to come back again and again. Compare the matchday experience at the CC Final to other events held at Wembley and tell me that we're coming across as cutting edge, fashionable and welcoming to new fans.
Marketing is the thing that makes it easier for people to "buy into" RL. At the moment, it's hard to do that if you don't live in a very small part of the country or have an expensive TV subscription - the sports digital presence is non-existant and it's difficult to buy decent merchandise without looking like a business card for a local skip hire firm.
Just shouting "TGG" at people, insisting "the product is right, we just need to shout about it", or thinking that cheaper tickets is going to help is not going to solve the problem. RL's appeal is getting less and less, the average age of our supporter is getting higher and higher, and the clubs seem too ignorant, reluctant and/or stubborn to do anything about it.
