| Rank | Posts | Team |
| Player Coach | 1822 | No
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| Joined | Service | Reputation |
| Jun 2007 | 18 years | |
| Online | Last Post | Last Page |
| Nov 2016 | May 2016 | LINK |
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TO BE FIXED |
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I'm gonna take a swipe at the whole of RL for a lack of investment in marketing. We seem to rely on the product, and in London we seem to tow the party line of the game will sell itself, for it is an exciting game to watch. We seem to have got ourselves into thinking we have an inelastic product that people will want, they just need to know they want it. There is a lack of investment to properly do that, but as others have said there is little point in advertising a weak team.
The other point is that RL is an elastic product as the market is not as simple as RL or RU, it is obviously much more diverse than that as London has a myriad of options for the sports enthusiast. Furthermore there is the social angle where the sport itself matters little, it is more the experience and the event that is of importance. Anyone who attends rugby union fixtures will tell you of the event nature of the sport, that fixtures mean something and that they are varied. People want to sit in big crowds, and feel like part of something big, even if they don't fully understand the sport.
Having attended many games of RL, football cricket and a few RU games I can safely say that you can have a conversation throughout two of those sports and keep up, but for two of those you will have to wait until half-time. Union can be encapsulating, and league certainly is, but the social angle is one that hits London hard; we are not attracting the 18-25 demographic anymore, and whilst that may not be a major issue now, it will harm long-term growth. It is though a worrying example of how why have become a social leper, as no-one wants to be associated with a club who was outwardly dying a death, fielding a weak team, decreasing crowds, increasingly poor post-match entertainment, younger and younger cheerleaders for costs purposes (in no way sexist, just bad business), dull tactics, demoralising defeats, etc.
I believe we have bottomed out, and with a better team, with key recruits we have showed signs that we can challenge on the field, but there we cannot truly be expected to go from basement to anywhere near the penthouse inside a year. If we can spread the word then we can increase the desire to want to go to the Stoop for RL fixtures. The rot has stopped, but it has some way to go, and IMO the Wakey game would have been perfect to make the game look socially acceptable to people who aren't northerners. We could have targetted this game or a future SKY home game as a Help for Heroes day (insert any other idea that benefits the club) and have the ground filled by whatever means, and that includes papering the house for that one fixture. Get the free tickets out thru SKY, local radio, paper, internet, whatever and get the image of the club back towards where it should be. We changed the name of the brand or product because our last name was tainted, and that move was IMO not expected to yield immediate, but long-term results, ones that we would ONLY have seen with a truly competitive team, one that is challenging in the play-offs, not one challenging for play-offs.
We are selling what is percieved as an inferior product in a competitive marketplace. We have already have low prices to increase market share, and operating at a loss is not a problem, and one that DH should continue to do as long as he can, not for our sake but that we are at the beginning on the rise, not falling further into the slump. Our product as London RL lost credibility with our continually low crowds, and our name change to escape the low consumer credibility was the first step, addressing the people's need to feel part of something big, exciting and important is next.
People are massively underestimating how much the proles or pretty much everyone wants to be liked, feel part of something big and important. RL has largely missed this in its entirety and is paying the price for letting the game sell itself. Game has to address this or a less interesting game will continue to dwarf us because of the ourobos cycle that we are in; we can't afford to market and can't see if we are growing, they can afford to market, take hits on holding fixtures and marketing them to fund further growth, all while making the slower code look more socially acceptable.
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