Players come and go, and win-loss records can drastically fluctuate from year-to-year. Subject to such significant inconsistency, professional sports franchises—even those with decades of legacy and hometown support--cannot rely exclusively on their products to retain customers.
Their pathway to customer loyalty must flow through the experience. For teams to stand a fighting chance of keeping fans—and especially season ticketholders—coming back for more, they must craft an experience of value so immense that what happens on the court is rendered virtually moot.
Though all NFL, NBA and MLB teams encounter this challenge on the road to financial success, few know more about the need to build a standalone fan experience than the Orlando Magic.
After a lengthy period of hostility, the Orlando Magic this past offseason officially parted ways with franchise player Dwight Howard. Seen as a necessity for the future of the organization, the trade nonetheless removed a superstar from the Amway Center floor and instantly jeopardized the team’s playoff ambitions.
But on-court realities do not change the reality of business, and the Magic’s attendance objectives remain intact. Still in need of strong customer retention to achieve those objectives, the experiential element of attending an Orlando Magic game is as pivotal as ever.
Luckily, the team employs a state-of-the-art customer analytics strategy to meaningfully connect with its customers. And in this exclusive podcast interview with Customer Management IQ editor Hannah Hager, Orlando Magic Vice President of Business Strategy Anthony Perez reveals how his team uses detailed behavioral insights to create a uniquely-valuable experience for each customer.
Topics discussed include:
- Unlocking the business case for using detailed customer analytics in loyalty strategy.
- Specific ways in which the Orlando Magic organization uses customer intelligence to personalize the experience.
- Facing resource limitations and variations in the team’s on-court performance, how does the team manage such a high customer retention rate?
- An analytics-driven customer experience sounds good on paper, but how are customers actually responding?
- How will the Magic’s customer loyalty strategy continue to evolve?
You can learn more about Perez’s innovative strategy for retaining customers at the Customer Loyalty Marketing Summit, taking place January 28-30 in Orlando, FL.