Quote ="Chico"Permanent presence is the key. With 24-hour shopping, home delivery and ‘click and collect’, it's harder now to silo specific groups. I'm not saying the club shouldn't have players doing this kind of thing in supermarkets, it's just getting harder to promote things to people. That's why schools remain a solid option, because the way they operate hasn't changed.
If anything, publicity stunts are the way to go. You get free advertising, there's a decent chance of local TV coverage and it going viral online. Idiocy, fake or otherwise, is a winner; and the best person to carry this is out is Marwan. But then you have the issue of professional integrity at boardroom level.'"
The club does need to do something to make it more visible in the community, but I don't think supermarkets are the way to go because people, on the whole, don't want to be there. For most of us, it's get in and get out as quickly as you can. A better option would be to have a presence at the various festivals that spring up around the city during the summer. The one at Ordsall Park had a huge turn out and, had the club had a stall there, with maybe a few players doing a few training drills, they'd have made themselves visible to all those people. They wouldn't have to pay to be there either, which I very much doubt would be the case with a supermarket. Plenty of space too, which, again, you wouldn't get at a supermarket.
As regards general marketing, the club has a bit of an untapped resource with its existing fans. They could allow every season ticket holder to bring a newby along for free to a couple of games. Or maybe have a stepped introduction, so the season ticket holder can bring one named person along to one game for free, then one for a fiver, one for a tenner and so on.
As for siloing, there are still some specific groups out there. Students spring to mind. There are three universities in the area. Presumably, they have rugby clubs. Are the club in contact with them? Offer each registered member a free (or discounted) match ticket, and maybe a traffic cone to wear.
Overall, what the club really needs is a marketing/media manager. To some extent, that's what Bradford had with Peter Deakin and it seemed to work for them.
