Atlanta Falcons or Branding and Marketing Challenges - Assignment Example

Atlanta Falcons: Branding & Marketing Challenges Name Course Instructor Date Case 7.4 Major reasons for the Atlanta falcons brand being in the bottom tier of the NFL club brands at the time of change of ownership? Some of the major reasons why the company was below other NFL club brand are because some other clubs like the Dallas cowboys had commenced on a tremendous job in branding themselves as the America’s team. Other teams like the Green Bay Parkers had already established itself as a community based organization. One disadvantage that hit the Falcons is the reason that NFL had fewer games than any other sport. This translated to fewer branding opportunities. Sequence of losing results in the history of the Falcons also gave the funs a bad perception and people were not attracted to a team with a chain of losses. Another bad tragedy that hit the team is being in a black out in most of its playing times. This is because it did not meet the regulation of selling it tickets 72 hrs before the game commenced. Falcon had 2 out of their previous games being watched on TV in Atlanta. As a result fans did not attend games in persons and had inconsistent connection with the team. The strength of the new Falcons management The Atlanta falcons marketing and branding started by overhauling their ticket pricing structure. They also updated their official website and introduced e-commerce solution to broadcast the changes. Updating of the website also was a measure to securely processing season tickets sales. Atlanta Falcons introduction of cyber works was to provide the solution for the institution. In today’s marketing and branding new categories in products and services are rapidly emerging and diminishing. Some of the key challenges that were faced by Atlanta Falcons management were to establish a plat form to work from. Strengths of the new Falcons Management The online season tickets resolution was designed and integrated in the Atlanta Falcons’ website. The project requires computer programming skills and be in an interface that is user friendly so that customers could easily understand and communicate when purchasing season tickets. Information fed to the system by customers buying the tickets would be collected on the order form; the system also required real-time and secure credit card processing. The information from the order form would then be directed to the database. At the database information could be extracted for marketing purpose and to provide sales reports. A detailed graphic illustration of the stadium section numbers and stadium seating was made so that customers buying tickets could choose specific section they desired. The seats in the illustration were color coded to depict ticket prices for each section. The ticket prices were to be adjusted frequently with the section sell out. Atlanta Falcon has increased its season tickets and builds great success from advancing in its IT programs. Online sales of tickets and choice of seating positions and the pricing structure, Atlanta Falcon made a record signing of half million dollar if June 2002 from sales of season tickets alone. Broad areas Sullivan and the falcons management should consider in developing a new brand/ marketing strategy? Brand energizing: Branding Atlanta Falcon needs more energy to be up with the competition and to attract more people to pay for the seasonal tickets. The equities at Atlanta Falcon declined with lack f brand energy resulting to reduction of season’s tickets to attract back its supporters. When the team is not winning then the offering is not exciting. The management with then opt go for high quality players at a cost and to increase players salaries to maintain the already established players at the team. When the Atlanta Falcon lacks an exciting offering or if it between breakthrough innovations, there is a chance for the team to find something with energy like proprietary sponsorship, the branded social programs, than can be attached to the brand. The other approach that has been taken by Atlanta Falcon is deployment of programs that involve frequent customers and potential customers like the loyalty benefits. In building liaison with the season tickets buyers, Atlanta Falcon gains quality basis of marketing perspicacity for improved marketing strategy (Gefen, 2002; Lampton, 2003). Atlanta Falcon has empirically examined the exact impact on the strengthening of Customer Relationship Marketing. This has consequently helped in better sales of tickets main maintain of the relationship between the client and the Atlanta Falcon and in achieving great levels of customer loyalty. Defining the products category and subcategory: It the biggest opportunity in creating a point of differentiation between seasonal tickets costs in the field by pricing them according to the positions. It is difficult to get to a point of differentiation that is prized by the market and not quickly adopted by other market players. It takes more than the customers’ insight, the ability of the organizations to execute that insight. It requires ability to generate the constant innovation to prevent other persons from enjoying the benefits of the new offering, and build barriers around customers’ relationships. The emergent consumer is connected and empowered with information from the internet and I-phones. Digitally connected consumers are brand polygamists. It is critical in current times to evaluate who the business will survive in such conditions. In this regard Atlanta Falcons have built a passionate brand advocate, which will attract more and more followers from the community to buying season tickets. Community Dominate Brands will cover all the changes altering the Atlanta Falcons business by engaging in social media marketing that will bring people towards recognizing brand Atlanta Falcon as the dominating team among other local competitors. Recommended series of implementation steps starting in April/May 2002 Customer Based Brand Equity Model (CBBE) The CBBE model at Atlanta Falcons approaches brand equity from the customers’ perspective. According to Taylor (2005) CBBE model provides a unique view point as to what is brand equity and how best brand equity can be developed, managed and measured. In keeping with Taylor (2005) the power of brand lies on what the customers have seen learned, heard and felt about the brand as a result of continues experience. The biggest challenge for the Atlanta Falcons is ensuring that the customers get the best experience in the field. In order to achieve this Atlanta Falcons has come up with a marketing program in the best way that fits in to the minds of the customers and then linked the brand to the customers, desires, thoughts, feelings, actions and belief. This is how Atlanta Falcons has come up with CBBE, Taylor (2005) argues that this is the differential effect the brand knowledge creates on customers’ reaction to the promotion of the brand. Customer-Based Brand Equity Pyramid Brand performance: This is how well the brand meets the needs of the customer. Creating a brand from an average team was a challenge that posed to make the management struggle to improve. In reference to Gratton & Ghoshal (2003), the brand performance is directly related to the features of the brand that differentiate it from other brands. The Atlanta Falcons came up with online booking strategy that gave them a niche over other facilities available. Introductions of promotions and customer loyalty programs turn the brand in to a lifestyle and more people were attracted to buying more season tickets to go and watch football for their entertainment purposes. Customer in Atlanta Falcons form of a business always measure performance in one major way i.e. reliability; they want to follow a team with a consistence good performance that will give them satisfaction. Atlanta Falcons has developed brand salience. The aim of the management is to make sure that brand Atlanta Falcons is easily thought of and has gained the largest level of following. This will ensure constant full capacity attendant. Brand salience associates the brand to product cues; Atlanta Falcons in this case, has made its brand to be considered as a predilection from the category. Brand Atlanta Falcons have been associated with several cues; hence it has increased the brand customers. On the whole, building the brand salience has boosted the number of customers in the Atlanta Falcons thinking of brand and the clients think about season’s tickets in buying situations this has resulted to increased brand profit. Cyberworks helped to create E-commerce Solution for Atlanta Falcons by creating customized CMS tools which took the company only 10days. The CMS tools were database driven and could handle thousands of users simultaneously with utmost reliability, security and stability. The online season tickets that were developed were incorporated in the Atlanta Falcons website and provided a friendly interface for the ticket buyers. Brand Imagery: this mainly depends on the intrinsic properties of the brand. This includes how well the brand attempts meet both social and psychological needs of a customer. According to Gratton & Ghoshal (2003), imagery refers to the intangible aspects of the brand it helps the consumers to form imagery association with the brand directly from personal experience or other sources like through advertising. Brand judgments: this is the third phase of the CBBE model. it can be split into brand feelings and brand judgment. Brand judgments entail customers own evaluation about the brand while brand feelings is the emotional responses to the brand. Brand resonance: this is the final step to the model and it focuses on the definitive relationship and how the customer identifies him or herself with the brand i.e. behavior loyalty, attitudinal attachment, sense of community, active engagement. CASE 7.5 What information can be gathered to evaluate the branding/ marketing decisions made in June 2002? Blank and Sullivan evaluated the teams brand position in June 2002. The management of Falcons started with lowering their tickets to attract more customers and therefore increase sales and create fun base. A key element of the management plan was the e-commerce project of the online season tickets. In the contemporary society, building and sustaining a strong and distinct brand of any sort, the marketing terrain has continued to be a great challenge. Arguably, the challenge becomes more daunting when dealing with services provided by an institution like a professional football club or any other entertainment oriented field. This reflects the power of the current customers who are highly internet connect and highly empowered with ability to spread both good and bad experience with the experience they get in an instant. What changes would you recommend for 2003/2004 season in its branding marketing? The Atlanta Falcons credit card that were being processed inn real-time and securely were confirmed immediately and their clients would receive an e-mail confirmation of their seat position and number within five to seven working days. The receipt of the order reflected immediately in the database, for quick update on the seating charts and availability of tickets. The Cyberworks’ Modular (CMS) that was introduced allowed Atlanta Falcons to gain complete control over all the information on the page, this helped in provision of special tickets packages and promotions. CMS also allowed all the information that was collected in the database to be accessed by the management of the Atlanta Falcons for easy generation of sales and marketing reports. Analyzing of reports would then help in understanding any time frame sales information. There are various parameters to assist search and sorting information i.e. highest sales, total sales, the amount to an individual or group. They could also assist in looking up specific orders placed for the upcoming matches. The privacy policy at Atlanta Falcons has been availed from the initial page to provide assertion of their security and intention any time they are processing credit cards and taking voluntary information. The Atlanta Falcons chose Cyberworks for their all time management and hosting services and e-commerce solutions. How should falcons handle the Michael Vick August 16 2003 accident from branding / marketing point of view? A plan to hold on the excellent players for longer period with the team could help Falcons management to make more sales. This would only happen by increasing the players’ salary and extending their contracts. The main aim of the company is to create it a brand that would extend for a longer time and with such an opportunity the management could than be in a position to attract young and excellent professionals who would fall in the foot steps of their predecessor, creating a culture of excellence could make Atlanta Falcons maintain a fun base for a longer time should build a brand on its professional team which would attract many customers. References Gratton. L. & Ghoshal. S. (2003). “Managing personnel human capital: new ethos for the volunteer employee.” European management journal. 21(1), 1-7. Kania, D. (2001). Branding.com: online branding for marketing success. Chicago: NTC Business Books in conjunction with the American Marketing Association. Kumar, S. (2007). Marketing and branding: the Indian scenario. New Delhi: Dorling Kindersley (India. Maguire, M. (2007). Brand Marketing: Image - The Key to Success. München: GRIN Verlag GmbH. McCubbrey, D, Donovan, R, Haag, S, Cummings, M., &Pinsonneault, A., (2006).Management information systems for the information age (3 edn). New York: McGraw Hill Perrey, J. (2011). Retail marketing and branding a definitive guide to maximizing ROI. Chichester, West Sussex, U.K: Wiley. Potosnak. K. (2000). “Human factors, tools, techniques and concept to optimize user interface.” A Human Factor Magazine. Aston Tale. California. Taylor. D. (2005). People Resourcing, 3rd Ed. London: CIPD Publication. Tungate, M. (2008). Branded male marketing to men. London Philadelphia: Kogan Page. Read More