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InCrowd Welcomes Simon Thomas as Chairman

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With significant growth in the UK and International markets in the last three years, InCrowd has appointed Simon Thomas, as Chairman of its Board of Directors. A leader in the evolution of commercial sports marketing during his time at TEAM Marketing, FIFA and Fox, Thomas will guide the Board and shareholders, whilst offering strategic advice and support to the senior management team.

“We are absolutely thrilled that Simon has agreed to join InCrowd as Chairman. His appointment adds to a number of new senior executive appointments we have made in the past year. The level of experience that Simon brings both in terms of his standing in the industry and as a specialist in organisational transformation and development, should turbo-charge our next phase of growth across multiple new territories .”

Thomas adds, “I have great respect for Aidan; as the founder of Opta Sports, he has a great track record and enormous experience in this area. At InCrowd he has built a strong team and the progression of the business in just 6 years is impressive. Product innovation to crack the digital challenge is paramount, along with client success and the creation of strong and trusted relationships. It’s an exciting era for the business and I’m very happy to join the team.”

Over the last 18 months, sport has seen a distinct acceleration in its digital transformation, as organisations realise the importance of truly knowing, connecting and engaging with fans on a deeper and personalised level through better use of first party data and premium fan facing platforms.

In response to this, InCrowd chose to focus on product development, ideating, building and delivering new and innovative solutions to respond to the rapidly changing requirements of clients and their commercial partners. Over the last 2 years, InCrowd has almost doubled in size to over one hundred team members, with 65% of the workforce focussed on R&D.

At the heart of InCrowd’s product innovation is their Customer Data and Experience Platform (CDXP), Bridge, a “one stop shop” for querying and using customer data to create personalised fan experiences across digital platforms via a best in class headless CMS and direct to fan content, messaging and engagement tools, all analysed across a range of tailored reporting suites.

“The very foundation of our business lies in our belief that fans are your greatest asset and that creating great digital experiences through high-quality fan facing platforms, data driven content & messaging and innovative activations is the most effective way to drive swift ROI.” says Cooney. “We empower clients to be bold in their digital and data transformations and support them fully at every stage of their journey. These are the organisations that are now reaping the rewards and we’re excited to help others reach their full potential.”

Thomas agrees;

“We are in an era of digital disruption, and clearly the industry is moving towards greater and more effective use of data. InCrowd are market leaders in this space. Everyone’s talking about the need to connect directly with fans and consumers, but at the moment it seems to be more talk than action. InCrowd are actually making things happen, facilitating monumental digital changes for their clients and demonstrating tangible returns, which is one of the things that sets them apart.”

About Simon Thomas
A sports industry veteran, Simon will take on the role of Chairman alongside his role of Partner at Colgan Bauer. An influential boutique firm, Colgan Bauer offers international sports strategy consultancy for many of the world’s top governing bodies, rights holders and investors. Prior to this, Simon was Chief Commercial Officer at FIFA, where he extensively restructured the digital and commercial teams. His further experience includes 15 years at TEAM Marketing, UEFA’s commercial agency for the development of UEFA Champions League and UEFA Europa League competitions in various roles culminating in Chief Executive Officer; and 3 years as EVP Global Sport and Content Sales at Fox where he acted on rights acquisitions for Fox Sports internationally and established a global content sales team selling entertainment, factual and sports content. Simon also established his own advisory agency, Talisman Sport & Media.

For more information, contact enquiries@incrowdsports.com

NEWS: Success Story – The RFL, InCrowd & Rewards4 blend engagement and loyalty

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The RFL and InCrowd have worked together with Rewards4 to expand the highly successful Rewards4Rugby League loyalty programme, utilising fan data-driven push notifications to increase engagement.

Overview

Over the last 3 years, InCrowd has worked closely with The RFL and their partners to produce Our League, a world-class membership platform that boasts over 145,000 active members to date. During planning for the 2020 season a priority was placed on an enhanced integration with loyalty scheme provider Rewards4. For the launch of the platform back in 2017, Rewards4Rugby League, InCrowd and The RFL built a scheme that rewarded predictor performance. The predictor is a season-long engagement feature in which fans votes for match outcomes and try to climb the leaderboard to win money can’t buy prizes. Points won during the season counted towards discounts off a variety of rugby league tickets including The Coral Challenge Cup Final, and the Betfred Super League Grand Final. Since the start of the 2018 Betfred Super League season, nearly 27,000 predictor players have won a combined total of £70,000 worth of Rewards4Rugby League points, from this single touchpoint.

Given the unprecedented level of engagement with Our League’s predictor along with polls and player of the match voting, all parties were keen to build on these the strong foundations and further enhance the Rewards4Rugby League experience for Our League members.

The Solution

In time for the 2020 season, InCrowd, The RFL and Rewards4 collaborated to introduce an advanced push notification integration that would drive further engagement with the Rewards4Rugby League platform, through tailored and automated notifications in relations to points accrued by the fan. With this new development in place, predictor, polls and player of the match participants receive an automatic push notification informing them that they have earned points. This push notification’s call to action is relevant to the individual user’s Rewards4Rugby League account status. If they are already registered, the push prompts them to directly access their account. If new to the Rewards4 programme, the push encourages them to create an account at that moment. 

Integrating this smart push notification system increases the benefits of the loyalty scheme beyond those who perform well on the predictor, to Rugby League fans who take part in any of the fan activations within Our League. The programme now delivers four ways in which Our League members can accrue points:

  • Achieving streaks of correct predictions
  • Participating in the predictor, polls or player of the match voting

How it works

Results

The launch of the Rewards4Rugby League push notification integration has surpassed all expectations, with Our League members responding positively to seeing tangible benefits from their enhanced engagement with the Our League platform. 

Over the course of the 2019 season (February to October), Rewards4Rugby League members participated in 14.4% of the polls, player of the match and predictor questions available.

During the period of February to mid-March 2020 (pre Covid-19), participation from the same users rose to 32.9%, a 128% increase.

Nichola Spencer, Membership Manager, RFL: “For The Rugby Football League the further integration with Rewards4 and InCrowd has been a real win for our Members. We are able to offer members an extra financial incentive which encourages further engagement fans can spend on Rugby League ticketing and retail with no additional costs for The RFL. The integration is now a seamless experience for users and we look forward to adding more engagement touchpoints for them in the future.”

The numbers:

  • 85,000+ interactions with Our Leagues polls, predictor and player of the match vote.
  • 15,177 users have linked their Our League and Rewards4Rugby League accounts since the launch of the programme in 2018, an average of 419 accounts a month.
  • 2,305 accounts were linked in February 2020 as a result of the push notification integration.
  • 9,500 unique members have collected points as a result of Our League engagements.
  • 6,900 of these were existing Rewards4Rugby League members
  • 2,600 were new members
  • 1.7 million cumulative points have been collected.
  • 9, the average Rewards4Rugby League related engagements per member, where points have been collected

Tom Cowgill,  Director Rewards4: “It’s clear from these early results that if you make it simple and seamless for a fan to collect points for engaging with your app and those points actually have a value to the fan then, a) you have happy fans and b) they engage more with the content in your app.  Our integration with InCrowd enables OurLeague members to collect points within the app for voting on man of the match, entering a predictor or a poll.  This has clearly resonated with fans and the feedback has been wholly positive (as is evidenced by the Trustpilot review from Lee).  We are looking forward to working with the RFL and InCrowd to introduce more points collection touchpoints within the app and seeing even higher levels of engagement once the season recommences in August 2020.”

Benefits

  • Fans receive clear, monetary benefits for engaging with the sport that they love. These can be redeemed against ticket purchases such as the Coral Challenge Cup Final.
  • The RFL benefits from both greater engagement and satisfaction from rugby league fans, and increased revenue from discounted purchases by the fans using the programme.

Lee left a five star review on Trust Pilot: “An excellent concept. I earn points for picking man of match for instance by effectively a few clicks. Those points turn into pence which add up to pounds and recently turned the pounds to a voucher which was spent easily. A very good and easy way to earn money for that jersey you want or tickets to see your team.”

Darren Parsons, InCrowd: “We were confident this addition would be well received by the rugby league fanbase that are already highly engaged with the Our League platform, but the numbers seen straight from launch were even more positive than expected. As a result of a few strategies consulted on by InCrowd and actioned by the RFL, there has been a marked increase in engagement across a wide variety of Our League features which is great to see. We’ll continue to monitor this closely and explore how we can develop the offering to fans further.”

BLOG: The Engagement Game – how to balance editorial and brand content on social

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The attraction of a sports property’s social media offering is becoming an increasingly important element in partnerships with brands – but maximising this relationship in editorial terms to the satisfaction of both parties requires a delicate balance, with engagement at its heart.

Read more

How to Increase Fan Engagement in Cricket

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Cricket’s administrators should follow the women’s Ashes structure to increase fan engagement and TV revenue.

In 2013, the women’s Ashes was restructured to give one winner, taking into account performances across the Test, ODI and T20 formats. It was a huge success with greater national media interest than ever before. I think parts of the men’s game should learn from Clare Connor’s brilliant initiative.

Cricket has a problem – with three different formats it is hard to keep track. I have read a paper on David Kendrix’s ICC ranking system and studied how the County Championship points work. That probably defines me as a cricket nerd but I still have no idea which is the best county or even the best international team!

By combining the three formats into one competition, it would enable fans to understand what is going on throughout the tour.

cricket_format

International Example

Firstly, let’s take a typical England tour to India with 4 Tests, 4 ODIs and 4 T20s. I would then allocate:

  • 4 points for a Test win
  • 2 points for an ODI win
  • 2 points for a T20 win
  • Half points for a draw or tie

Enhancing Narrative

Work is then needed to make every match matter.

I think tennis does this fantastically well. Each game reaches regular climaxes with big implications for the overall match. The pressure boils over at the end of a set where risks are required and mistakes are costly.

We could do the same with cricket. Each “set” (1 x Test, 1 x ODI, 1 x T20) would take two weeks and could be repeated across the summer, providing broadcasters with regular scheduling:

Week 1

MonTueWedThuFriSatSun
Test 1Test 2Test 3Test 4

Week 2

MonTueWedThuFriSatSun
Test 5T20ODI

Each of these matches are important for the set and each set would be vital in the context of the overall series.

Consequences of points system

  • Match 1 (5 Day test): Starting the set and generating most points (4) allows test match cricket to retain its status as the most important match to win. Winning it would guarantee at least a draw in the set.
  • Match 2 (T20): Whatever the outcome of the test match, there would be everything to play for in the Friday evening big ticket T20. Off the back of a test victory, a team has the chance to clinch the set. A test defeat would position this a must win game.
  • Match 3 (Sunday ODI): Unless a team has won both the test and T20, there is still everything to play for in this deciding match, perfectly placed for a family day on the Sunday.

That would complete the set before we are back for another scintillating round starting with the test match.

Squad Dynamics

Player selection, rotation and management would become key strategies and talking points over the series. Perhaps, like in limited overs tournaments, the squad size could be restricted forcing players to excel at all formats or be tactically rotated by management. Would Cook be good enough to retain his place in a squad of 15 or would this give a chance to Alex Hales in test cricket?

An initial issue with a proposal like this is that players might find it hard to make constant format adjustments but shouldn’t that be part of the game? This is a proposal for fans not players.

Easy to Follow

The greatest advantage of this structure is how easy it is for fans to follow. With a consistent narrative built throughout the tour, we would remember key moments and know who the best team is rather than it being broken down by format. This is a big part of the 2013 women’s Ashes success.

When fans find sport easy to follow, it usually has positive implications for broadcasters. That, at least, should give encourage the game’s administrators.