If data is the new oil then Customer Relationship Management is the process of mining and refining the information for business use.

Although I am a consultant in content strategy by trade, CRM is increasingly touching my area. But then, by definition, an intelligent, joined up approach should be resonating in all areas of a sports organisation.

Over the last few years, major clubs have spent millions of dollars on getting the right message to the right person at the right time on the right platform. But what if money is tight, you don’t have the scale and those who run the club would rather put their resources elsewhere.?

Bas Schnater is an international fan engagement consultant. He has just left Dutch football team AZ Alkmaar after two years running the marketing department.

He built a CRM ecosystem from the bottom up. Appointing a partner, dealing with internal stakeholders and the changes they must accept, managing the messaging, commercialisation v content.

There is a lot to consider but the improvements can be significant.

Bas takes us through some of the lessons he learnt.

TOPICS

Moving from academia to the practical side of football

How they started their CRM system

Where the data was stored in the early days?

Connecting established and disparate databases

What conversations did you need to have internally

Narrowing down the scope of your CRM

The specific issue: how to arrest a fall in season ticket sales.

Surveying

How do your message each segment correctly?

The relationship with the content teams

What other campaigns do you create

Who does the analysis?

Those ‘cheap early wins’ what were they?

What did not work?

When the critics jump and say: "look it won't work"

Demographics v sentiment segmentation

AZ's clustering campaign

The idea of promoting content, not just transactional campaigns

Using the fans for mutual benefit

How do you plan for scale?

What metrics prove success?

What about the influence of team performance

LINKS

Bas Schnater LinkedIN | Twitter

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