Quote: sergeant pepper "Having just digested the details on the micro site, I'd sum my feelings up as extremely disappointed.
I'll lay my cards out on the table for this one;
1 - I work in Marketing. It's what I do every day, it's what my qualifications are in & I've got a real mix of B2C and "big brand experience" behind me.
2 - I know I'm going in at the club here and, tbh, that sits uncomfortably with me. I've been massively supportive (& still am) of IL, but with point #1 in mind, I can't stomach this at all.
3 - I'm not a traditionalist, or closed off to new ideas. I was supportive of the club and their efforts to get more corporate partners. I've got first hand experience dealing with Geoff Warburton and know how hard the club works to bring in new business. The criticism and vitriol aimed off the back London/Australia was wrong imo.
I can't however get onboard with this one.
If this was the final throw of a dice, after a period of really trying to engage with the fan base, I'd understand it (see point 3 above), but it isn't.
They talk about the change being done to engage with younger fans, but that's just BS. I can tell you with first hand experience, that it won't work. I'm of the age that the last badge update was kinda aimed at my age group - I don't know anyone who started watching the club because of it. I'm not sure how this new badge will be silver bullet to their problems now?
Have the club tried everything to engage with younger fans? Going on TikTok and posting generic/bland copycat video's doesn't cut it imo. There's loads more ideas I'd have hoped the club could have explored before taking such a big step. After that I'd have only liked the badge to be used for the kids they want to engage with. Kids are the future, but they've also vexed off a massive % of the fan base that have years left.
On the whole I think our Marketing dept is dross & has been since Simon Collinson left. The very fact the video on the micro site they've created is buffering due to traffic is laughable. The new profile pic on FB is/was pixelated - it's amateur hour.
Sadly for the club this is looking like they've shot themselves in the foot. The engagement across all the social platforms is overwhelmingly negative. Granted some on here aren't too fussed & that's fine, but I'm yet to meet anyone that actually likes or wants this.'"
I read this after I posted, but this is exactly what I was getting at in my last post. It’s more a sign of how out of touch some of the marketing teams are in the sport they think this is a genuinely good way to attract new fans.
We should desperately trying to get the likes of Amazon or Netflix on board to do a well produced behind the scenes documentary. Rugby league is so far behind the times with these things most of the time the boat has been completely missed by the time the clubs get up to date with current trends.
