Sport for a lot of people is everything. Be it participating or watching, it’s something that a lot of people look forward to. Some sporting occasions can be the biggest TV audiences or trending topics on the likes of Twitter. We are starting to see a lot of telcos the world over sponsoring the world’s biggest sports teams or even sports stadia. Telcos have spotted this opportunity and want to be associated with these teams, especially ones that are doing well and have a good footprint in the community.
There is one thing in supporting your local team, but when it comes to international sporting occasions it takes it to a new level. Telcos have noted this relevance to their customer base. A great example of this is Telenor in Norway are offering an extra 1GB of data if the Norwegian football team wins a match. The Norwegian ladies football team are taking part in the Women’s Euro 2017 football championship. As they are two-time champions of this tournament, it’s a big deal in Norway. So Telenor spotted this passion and launched a brilliant offer. For every Norwegian victory at the championship, they are giving their 3 million subscribers an extra 1GB of data. This is not only a unique type of engagement with their customer base but also a great customer experience initiative. This type of offer will appease both the heavy data users but it might also encourage some of your lower data users to engage more with their devices.
This example is brilliant by Telenor but there are so many other ways that telcos can engage with their customers around sporting occasions. Some examples could include:
– Free rate data during the duration of the sporting fixture or free rated mobile TV during the game
– Speed boosters during the sporting fixture
– Free social media passes for the day of the game so you can connect and engage with the game
– Data gifting to commiserate your friend or family if your team lost their game
– For your VIP customers at the sporting event, give preferential data speeds during heavy congestion
– Access to restricted sporting content as a loyalty reward for tenure or upgrade
– Team up with third party companies associated with the sporting team to offer discounts off merchandise, content etc.
– Sponsored data is another way of working with third party companies associated with a sporting fixture. The user can get access to data to use at a game or around the game in response to watching an ad or liking a page on social media for example.
We have also seen recently that Snapchat has teamed up with Formula One. Formula One has spotted an opportunity to engage with new fans on a different platform. This is another great example of tying up sports and sporting content with digital engagement. I wonder if any telcos piggyback on this deal and offer this content free rated if they don’t have this already in place for snapchat.
The other example of leveraging sporting content will be for the next Olympics. This will be the most watched Olympics on other screens through social media or other content platforms rather than traditional TV. Eurosport won the European rights the Olympics from 2018-2024. They are looking at new and innovative ways of bringing this content to new audiences especially on mobile. The CEO of Eurosport Peter Hutton says “Sport can be such a powerful telco story and we know people will pay for premium sport. We can unlock some of the power and emotional intensity behind it.”
As you can see there are many ways in which you can engage with your customer base around sporting fixtures. Once you gather information or know what sport or sports team they like, then you can tailor contextual offers to them. Customers will feel more loyal and engaged with their operator and thus stay longer or recommend to friends or family.
