Sticky sheet: Fresno State University is one of several college sports programs using digital seat technology at their football facility, Valley Children’s Stadium. (courtesy vendor)
Identify individual seats with fan engagement tools
The sports tech market is flooded with fan engagement tools. Teams and venues strive to get as much data about their customers as possible to increase revenue and better serve their needs.
Among these platforms, digital sheet media has been a firm favorite since it was founded in Fort Worth, Texas in 2018. The company has installed more than 1 million QR code tags on individual seats in 50 big league and college venues, company officials said.
According to Rob Steger, the key to digital seats is the ability to track fan behavior down to individual seat numbers. This is an important detail not found in other fan engagement platforms. Chief Strategy and Business Development Officer for Digital Sheet.
To activate the system, fans use their mobile devices to scan QR codes attached to the armrests of fixed arena seats or stadium bench seats. The portal displays a variety of features ranging from real-time game information, fan polls and surveys, sweepstakes, to augmented reality filters and mobile he coupons provided by team sponsors.
In Premium Space, the code is placed on a small metal stand within the suite’s hospitality area.
The technology can also be integrated with mobile ordering systems for kiosks and merchandise.
Digital Seat doesn’t revolve around mobile applications. It is a progressive web application with the look and feel of native web applications typically found on mobile phones and other mobile devices. The company’s preferred business model is an annual license fee paid by the client. In some cases, there may be revenue sharing with venues and teams to sell platform sponsorships, Steeger said.
“We are a hardware and software company designed to work in low-bandwidth environments,” said a veteran sports marketer with experience covering American Express, Mastercard, USTA, and Learfield. says Steeger. “What we want is for all fans to be involved and make it easier for venues to deliver their content, regardless of their affinity.”
This past bowl season saw the installation of digital seat codes for the R+L Carriers New Orleans Bowl at the Caesars Superdome. Chase Field’s Guaranteed Rate Bowl. The Vrbo Fiesta Bowl at State Farm Stadium. At those three events, Steeger said the codes were displayed on video screens for scanning, rather than being physically pasted onto the seats.
This is the second year the VRBO Fiesta Bowl has used Digital Seat’s platform, and engagement has increased across three levels of measurement.
The New Year’s Eve game in which TCU defeated Michigan in the College Football Playoff Semifinals had 20,768 QR code “loads”, representing 32% of the total crowd that loaded digital seats during the event.
Digital Seat officials said there were 67,000 fan module engagements, up 22% from last year’s Fiesta Bowl’s 55,000. Module engagement refers to the number of times a user of our technology clicks on a module within our platform (e.g. stats, game roster, other features).
Most importantly for those involved in the Fiesta Bowl, it attracted 6,060 prospects. This is significantly higher than the previous year’s total of 1,567 leads, which can be used for the purpose of remarketing products and services to participants who used the platform, Digital Seat officials said.
Two NBA teams, the Oklahoma City Thunder and the Utah Jazz, both use digital seats.
loud applause: Oklahoma City Thunder uses Digital Seats to better understand Paycom Center attendees. (courtesy vendor)
The Thunder signed a three-year deal with the company in 2021 and are in the process of replacing the existing code with a new code as the arena installs all new seats at the bowl, said Scott, the team’s vice president of ticket sales. Loft said. Service and business intelligence.
“I’ve been on[NBA, NHL, NFL]teams for 35 years and one thing I’ve never been able to get in touch with is everyone in the building,” Loft said. “When everything went digital, it helped transfer and resell data, but if you brought a family of four and decided to keep all the tickets on your phone, the other he would have had three people’s information. there is no.”
Not all fans are using Thunder’s mobile app, but all ticket holders will have a unique QR code attached to their seat at Paycom Center. According to Loft, Thunder scans an average of more than 2,000 games in 18,200-seat venues, half of which are by individuals new to the database.
“The adoption rate is better than we expected,” he said. “If we can get 40,000 (new entries) during the season of people coming into the game, that’s a big deal for us and it gives us the opportunity to market our product to them. I think things like merch and a basketball campus will be a big plus.”
In Paycom Center, mobile ordering functionality is implemented through Savor for general concessions and Levy for fine dining in suites and clubs, in partnership with technology vendor Shift4. So far, according to Loft, it’s been of minimal use to fans ordering food and drink on their mobile phones for pickup at the concession stand where express lines are lined up. In that respect, digital sign programs are consistent with the general low adoption of mobile ordering at sports venues. (Fans can also use the Thunder app for mobile ordering.)
One of Digital Seat’s university clients, Baylor University, is in its second year using the technology at its football, basketball, baseball and softball venues.
For the Big 12 School and Baylor Bear Sports Properties, the rearfield entity that holds the multimedia rights, the QR code is primarily used as a tool to drive sponsor exposure on game days. said Matt Iazzetti, general manager of Waco’s Baylor Bear Sports Properties. ,Texas.
At McLain Stadium, Baylor’s football facility, the use of digital signs allowed the school to streamline game presentation scripts and post codes over and over on video boards as reminders to encourage fan interaction. can be used.
“Last season we did a QSR promotion for football, where we focused on ‘section battles.’ The sections we won had a code scan rate of 70%,” says Iazetti. “It’s hard to get 70% of the people in the section to do something, but in this case, providing a good offer and an interactive way for people to participate during the game works. bottom.”
Baylor Bear Sports Properties are in the early stages of analyzing fan data collected through digital sheets. For now, the focus is on promoting sponsorships in the sports sector, including soccer’s eight partners.
“We are just starting to tap into the potential for fans to interact and enhance their experience,” he said. “The goal is to keep upgrading it and cleaning up the game scripts, so that there’s nothing to disrupt breaks or hype fans up when they need to be emotional.”
Loft started his sports business in 1988 with the Philadelphia 76ers. I remember using old Dun & Bradstreet cards printed on a dot matrix machine. With Digital Seat, he fast-forwards to 2023, and the data goes straight into his CRM system at Thunder, where sales campaigns are set up and team officials can reach out to prospects the next morning.
“We always like to be in front of things when we can,” says Loft. “We’re enjoying this platform and the deep data it gives us, and we know we can identify people’s preferences by seat. We can start looking at those trends. It’s not just data. , is the reaction to the data, and that is the key.”
