I will volunteer to organise meetings etc....but not the cash side of things. Sorry, but I have seen what it did to arthur fowler and I don't want to go there


IF people think it is worth re-creating the Independent Supporters Group, as a seperate entity to the club (but with their backing of course), then I will tap Ian Lenegan for the use of the area of the Sports Cafe in Haymarket once a month FOC to host a meeting of the ISG. That said, I will not offer to handle any cash....subs....or the like. Maybe the club would do that for us?

If the club would agree to this idea, I don't see why they could not handle the cash side i.e. be a post box and promote the idea. Without their co-operation this idea is dead, but with goodwill it could work. A lot people put a lot of work and time in at the Broncos on a similar voluntary effort and we could do it again. A good number would be sleeping partners and just put up the cash. I think it could be done, and will volunteer to help.

There have been about a dozen posts in response to GF`s proposal and I am already fed up with the level of bureaucracy!!



Should it ever get off the ground you can count me in for a monthly contribution.

Would have thought it would have to be set up as a stand alone company, with all the ususal baggage of Director`s, AGM`s, meeting minutes, fiancial accounts, external audits etc etc....I am sure there is someone out there who can advise on the legal aspects. But before it gets that far the strategy and aims of the group would need to be sorted, before you can `sell it` to the punters and see if there is sufficient interest and likely funds to make it work. How it might work with the club and the flow of information and co-operation needed between both groups is another story.

I am sure this is a well trodden path for others who have already tried to organise similar groups and club support in the past......would be good to hear comments from those people (along the lines of Al the Bronco`s comments)

Some interesting ideas.

What form would the marketing take?

How will you measure responses?

What do you consider a good return on investment?

If we had 750 @ £60 a year, then we would have £45,000 to play with. The elected commitee would meet as often as required to discuss proposals from those who have contributed (the 750) and select the best way to spend the money available for each game.
I would think that as an organisation, we would need to have backing from the club to be able to negotiate deals and build relationships with the local press and community, but I would imagine that with £3,500 available for each game, we would look at a voucher in the local press, some PR coverage on local radio stations, maybe a poster at Twickenham station (oh, how i'd love it for Quind to sponsor the station..flowes, clean and tidy thanks to Quins RL), leafletting at the station on Thursday/Friday nights...blah blah blah...
I would consider a 5,000 increase on the annual total (£9 A POP) a fair return on investment...but more importantly, we would attempt to get feedback from the newbies on what they liked/didn't and encourage repeat business.
This may or may not be a pipe dream, but I feel it might be worth the club considering it NOW rather than in February.......which is what will probably happen

This highlights the first hurdle.....Key to getting anything moving is funds and being out of season I would have thought it necessary to use the club`s data base (yes I know this was mentioned/derided on another thread), to send out a mail drop and gauge the level of support/interest/funding that existing fans may give....get some money through the door and things could be active before next season. Working arrangements with the club and their general appetite to co-operate will need to be sorted sooner rather than later to give the initiative some direction.

right, with the few on here that seem keen, we have about £180 so far.....whose round is it

I'd in addition to you ideas give all local schools free tickets for two children and one paying adult for the opening game. The club should do this. Then all those who bought into this can be offered a reduction for the next game and so on.

All houses in the TW1 postcode should be direct mailed with a book of discount tickets and a warm invite.

The club needs to take a huge gamble and have a concerted push with the locals as I'm more inclined to try something new if travel is not a problem.

Have I been cloned.
Simon, all of the things you say are true ('sept for the station flowers....it works for surrey county cricket and the estate agents that sponsor putney overland station...cheap brand awareness).
I have (if you can be @rsed searching through the ,000's of posts) said everything and more that you have and this is why we are having this discussion.
I also said PR through local radio, as I wouldn't spend a penny on that or TV.
Vouchers....last one I remember seeing was in Metro for £10 in and 6 VB at Griffin Park when we had an "inside man at Metro"
Leaflets at the station depends on how you do it. I have in the past suggested that a couple of fit players and a couple of fit cheerleaders should actually tour the regions bars and pubs for a couple of evenings, handing out leaflets and selling advance reduced price tickets.......at little or no cost to the club. Let's face it, of the 250,000 odd population who reside in the borough....about 1% if that know we exist.
5,000 bums is a realistic target at a CPA of £9.....20,000 at £2.25 or even £1.25 with the revised 25k total is insane and I for one would worship at your door if it could be achieved. My target is 10% yours 40%....let's split it down the middle and aim for the stars!
As for a big splash at the begining to get repeat business, if there were to be a big push, I would leave it to May/June when the competition are OFF season. Also, let's not push us v Saints.....why not us ve Celtic (a win is good for the soul)
I believe that above the line marketing is best left (in most parts) to the P&G's of the world. What we need to do is look at clever ways of promoting the club to the locals. Cleaning up the station which must see 100,000+ journeys, 2 times a day, has got to be a start. FFS......even I would give 2 hours a week to sweep, paint and generally keep it tidier.
As for the free kids and adults with reduced return tickets....I am sick of banging on about this, The CRM at the club is non existant. As for mailing
and the club speculating....do not get me started. Nobody on these boards will thank you for it!



SIMON....IF YOU DON'T BELIEVE ME...i POSTED THIS IN APRIL2007
RANT
I have just been reading the post on the VT about the attendance for the Wakey Game and I think it's about time that the club took a risk to get our attendances up.
Offers to transiant fans in TNT is all well and good, as is the occasional advert over a urinal in pubs, but I would like to see more "above the line" (as against "above the urine"icon_wink.gif marketing from the club.
The Evening Standard/London Lite/The London Paper/Metro have a combined readership in excess of 2,000,000. Why not give away 1,000 tickets on a first come first served basis, with late comers offered a taster ticket for £5 a pop. This would not be "advanced purchase", but turn up on the day.
The expense of such an exercise, I believe would not be too taxing, given the extra (potential) revenue at the bar/food outlets. THEN......if we do get an extra 5,000 through the gates, offer them another £5 taster ticket for use at ANY FUTURE home game this season.
Estimated cost: £20,000 on advertising and £3,000 on additional stewarding.
Potential result: Depending on what the club can squeeze out of the London Press and Radio stations, (PR) I would hope that 5,000 extra bodies would show up, with 4,000 coughing up £20,000 at the gate and an additional (£3 each minimum) £15,000 in residual spend (hotter the day, colder the beer!)
Hard to estimate the number of secondary tickets sold, but if the voucher to get the free ticket required an address to be filled out, we would get 5,000 extra targets for future offers.
If the £20,000 advertising cost is deemed too much, reduce it by targeting commuters at Waterloo and Victoria Stations, using the Harlots and a few players and volunteers. Also, possibly target our union brothers for the same game with a fe kids and cheap ticket offer.

I don't know if this would work, but it's got to be worth the club taking a risk on SOMETHING other than the "slowly slowly catchy monkey" approach that so obviously isn't working.
RANT OVER

THERE HAVE BEEN MANY MORE LIKE THIS, DATING BACK TO 2003, BUT THE SERVER SWITCH BINNED LOADS OF THEM.

Seeing as I have been asked for my views on this, I shall give them.

The club did indeed back the former Supporters' Action Group (SAG) which raised funds through things like try sponsorship etc. Once year zero had been declared - 2006 under Lenaghan - this few quid was not wanted anymore. There has been quite a long history of the club getting into financial bother, turning to the support for assistance and then declining said help when things seemed more settled. Based on this, it'll only be a matter of time until...

That said, some sort of crowdbuilder scheme which saw cash assistance and ideas with regard to marketing could help things. QRL has to get it right within the next three years. The fact that fewer than 4k people sometimes out of a population of 8 MILLION attend fixtures regularly is a disgrace and something really needs to be done. All of GF's, Simon M's (hi mate) and Poplar Panther's (hi Dave) ideas are sound and should be actioned before next season starts.

For want of a horseshoe nail, the battle was lost...

well you can have £100 off me and my time to do leaflet drops flyering etc. at weekends. Would a big push with 1000s of flyers with all the home fixtures on, prices and an image of LMS on it be a good place to start? raising the visible profile is the key i think so getting into local homes, pubs, an ad at the station, in the local papers has to be the place to start?

I will match Your 100 smackers

I think it would be easier if we did put £100 up front, it will feel less painful, show we are committed (we should be) and less admin. This would be fairly unque (some clubs have squadbuilder schemes) but none have a marketing armed wing! Someone with some savvy and previous contact some should bell or email Hoggy to see if they would let us do it.

I would be happy to let GF run the whole show, but that is not democratic and no one is perfect. But I do like his style and persistence, We would need some semi-formal group as money is involved but there are many mutual outfits out there and there is no reason why we can't be one of them. I really think we should tread carefully, but with a new CEO soon I think we may be knocking at an open door.

flattered as I am, I would feel happier with the collective rather that the singular....not bottling it, just the old strength in numbers malarky ....
Like the idea of a refreshment fund though

This all sounds great, and I would add my support by joining up if this does materialise. (£100 or £60 is OK for me, though I think £60 would be more likely to get more people to join).

I must say as well I have been following the club since the last year as London Bronco's, and this is the most promising and serious idea I have seen to really raise the profile of the sport/team. I know the first game as Quins RL got a full house but a dissapointing loss that day to saints didn't really help.
I also think saturday ko's this year will help attendances, I haven't looked at official attendances (even though they don't always seem 100% reliable) but I seem to recall that the attendances were slowly creeping up until we changed to Sundays.

p.s. I think sponsoring the station is a brilliant idea. A lot of trains go through Twickenham everyday, and most people in the country associate Twickenham with 'rugby' whether they actually watch games or not, so going through Twickenham station and seeing 'HOME OF HARLEQUINS RUGBY LEAGUE' will raise awareness of our club and our sport, then after that, pulling them in with ticket offers etc in theory should be more successful.

Good Post GF and it is amazing how close our ideas are, but tbh all we are suggesting is stuff that is proven to work!

I'd still go with a mailshot to all local homes. In fac, the ones who are very close by and get affected by our crowds should be given free tickets so they can see what all the fuss is about.

The local schools who QRL Coach should all get free tickets.

The local rags should be able to give out free tickets.

Why am I going on about free tickets?

The reason is simple, this works. The biggest barrier is the initial spend. Once someone is over that hurdle they are more likely to try something out.

My first game way back in the 90's I turned up with Mrs M (who say hi to Al!) bought a ticket saw loads of people in Broncos shirts, bought a shirt, programme, a few beers, London Calling (those were the days) and the club had me for years after.

If Quins truely believe that they have a good product then they must support this. I know restuarants who have done with and they all made money as people came back, the food was free on an opening night and they made money on booze and rebookings.

If people like your product, they will come back.

I think the true problem is, and I hate to say this, Quins don't believe in themselves. They lack ambition and courage. It has nothing to do with a markteing man, I do all the marketing for my firm and we're a company with a fee income of over £2m!

Quins need to do all the things that have been suggested, they cost buttons and returns are huge.

Rant Over.

Believe me....the rant never ends



A while back i mentioned the power of "social networks" and how for no cash outlay, but with a bit of planning and hard work, it would be possible for the club to build a "group" with thousands of members. This could be done by starting off with as little as 500 fans in the group, who are encoutraged to get "their friends" involved. Then, with the use of clever offers (free booze is always popular and can be arranged with a brewer such as Fullers...) we can attract the bring a friend fans AGAIN. We have all brought friends in the past, but let's face it, for the club to survive, we need to look at lowering the average age of our fans.
so, let's say, that by contacting our existing email data NOW...not in January/February next year, we get them to join the group on facebook.bebo.myspace...etc.etc...Facebook being the favourite. Then, the Group administrator not the club, but ourselves) update this group and its members on a weekly basis on things like training reports, places to watch RL on SKY, other RL related events such as schools tournaments, results from the many clubs in the capital etc etc.....
Then, as the season draws nearer, we post downloadable posters and vouchers for the forthcoming games. IF the club buy into this, then I believe they should offer prizes every week for a/ the person who brings the most NEW fans to a game and b/ a drawn prize from the membership of the group. The prize?? A free box for the person who brings the most NEW fans and 5 Free premium Tickets for the drawn prize, both for either...the next game, of for 1 target game later in the season.
The results may be minimal......but they would be positive, encourage repeat attendance from the newbies and cost 2 10th of SFA.
Little things like this, combined with other marketing and PR can only help.
On the thorny subject of Away fans.....I believe that although we shouldn't rely on them, we should do more to help them. The Social group should have an up to date and comprehensive guide of where to stay, special offers from local hotels and B&B's, pubs, bars, Restaurants, train timetables, taxi numbers. Wwe have Edinburgh, Wales and France to compete with for the away day £ and as much as we should not rely on it, we should do everything we can to encourage it.
Lastly, I noticed that London Lite had a full page ad on Wwednesday for the american bore fest at wembley later this month. Now, I am no expert, but I bet you £1 to £5 they didn't pay anything near full rate for the ad. London Lite ran at 21 x 8th pages on Wednesday.....about 30% of where they need to break even. Why don't the club pre-book some stuff now for next season....in the current climate, the newspaper industry is suffering and they will accept offers for future deals, pre-paid..........

summarised
COULD WE USE FACEBOOK TO GET MORE FANS?


HTH
as an aside....the web doesn't seem to be big on the Quins RL fans agenda

Regarding all of the suggestions made.........rather than reinvent the wheel......it seems that a similar fans group have already got together to support Quins RU. Link is www.Quinssa.org.uk. At first glance it looks as though this `Quins Supporters Association` are talking/working with the club on some similar issues to our own.......would have thought it worth discussing issues, ideas, and collaboration etc before setting off on a different path?

Regarding all of the suggestions made.........rather than reinvent the wheel......it seems that a similar fans group have already got together to support Quins RU. Link is www.Quinssa.org.uk. At first glance it looks as though this `Quins Supporters Association` are talking/working with the club on some similar issues to our own.......would have thought it worth discussing issues, ideas, and collaboration etc before setting off on a different path?

Quote ="Under the sticks"Regarding all of the suggestions made.........rather than reinvent the wheel......it seems that a similar fans group have already got together to support Quins RU. Link is www.Quinssa.org.uk. At first glance it looks as though this `Quins Supporters Association` are talking/working with the club on some similar issues to our own.......would have thought it worth discussing issues, ideas, and collaboration etc before setting off on a different path?'" ah....but the Quins SA are there for the benefit of the Union supporters who: Turn up in numbers to home games Turn up in numbers to away games Sell Blazers for £120 (MENTAL NOTE TO SELF...DON'T SHOW PADDOCK PUNTER THE LINK) and have this [url=http://www.quinssa.org.uk./aims.htmconstitution[/url Whilst I applaud them, we need something slighly more in the way of a QuinsRL Fighting Fund, not an away day organisational committee.

Quote ="Under the sticks"Regarding all of the suggestions made.........rather than reinvent the wheel......it seems that a similar fans group have already got together to support Quins RU. Link is www.Quinssa.org.uk. At first glance it looks as though this `Quins Supporters Association` are talking/working with the club on some similar issues to our own.......would have thought it worth discussing issues, ideas, and collaboration etc before setting off on a different path?'" ah....but the Quins SA are there for the benefit of the Union supporters who: Turn up in numbers to home games Turn up in numbers to away games Sell Blazers for £120 (MENTAL NOTE TO SELF...DON'T SHOW PADDOCK PUNTER THE LINK) and have this [url=http://www.quinssa.org.uk./aims.htmconstitution[/url Whilst I applaud them, we need something slighly more in the way of a QuinsRL Fighting Fund, not an away day organisational committee.

Marketing Fund is a great idea, you can have my money for sure. Happy to help with campaign development if that's any use to you - and if you need someone to edit your copy so that sells stuff then you should use my magic red pen...

For what it's worth for me the strategy should have 2 layers: One is ongoing background activity, mainly cheap stuff, whether PR, promo using in-house people, or all the social/viral/guerilla stuff GF's been dropping in this thread. That can start yesterday. The other layer is where you spend most of any actual cash rather than time: Focused promotion of a limited number of games. Target game criteria include (a) being in first half of season so you have more time to get LCV from new converts repeat buys pluis can offer more choice of dates to come; (b) a game we can win or at least lose valiantly (the biggest factor in sports attendance growth is the entertainment ratio, normally aligned to the gap between teams' scores in a game)

PS: Nah, nothing to add really, just thought I'd add a PS... see, you read it didn't you? So why don't the club always use a PS to repeat the key sell in letters?

Not read all of the thread but saw a figure that said 750 people contributing £60 would generate £45k to spend on marketing.

Not knocking it but agains ta background of bitter complaints about ticket price I just wonder if the same could be achieved by 750 people upgrading to the next level of ticket? What I mean is will 750 people be up for it when they weren't up for season ticket renewals?

I posted the "briali" volunteer request to the 370 face bookers who are members of the Group Harlequins Rugby League.
My favourite reply was:
hello,
i would be willing to help out when possible, its sounds like you have a lot of work to do and if i could assist in anyway let me know.
xxxxxxxxxxx, i think thats my number but when im back in the uk next week ill let you know or you can contact me on facebook.
cheers matt gafa

Now, if you were umming and aring about offering to help I think that Matt's offer should help you make your minds up.

PM briali with your details....it is for the good of the club!

put it up in your staff room/office/local pub etc....
[url=http://www.quins.co.uk/uploads/documents/Quins39603News1.PDFTHANKS[/url

There are some interesting ideas here, from people who know a lot more about marketing than me.

My point is more about the organisation of this whoel thing. With money being involved it becomes vital that everything is done properly and above board so that everyone involved can see where the money is going and who is accountable.

To that end maybe it would be better to form a supporters trust, not perhaps with the aim of taking control of the club like many of them do, but with stated aims of providing marketing support, etc. Supporters Direct wold be able to help, as would some of the ST's at rugby league clubs (Bramley, Swinton,??) and I believe that The Co-op might also be able to help in some way. Might even convince them to sponsor some things.