BleedGopher
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per the Wall Street Journal:
Now, though, schools have more data than ever on their fans and especially their student fans. That new information has them rewriting their old theories. Their most startling finding challenges the one thing they thought they knew about today’s 18-to-22-year-olds: It turns out that students may not want to be on their phones all game long.
The most recent support for this surprising result comes from a new survey by the National Association of Collegiate Marketing Administrators and Oregon’s sports marketing center. It asked almost 24,000 students across the country to rank the factors that influenced their decision to attend games. By far the most important was a student’s interest in that sport. By far the least important was a stadium’s cellular reception or wireless capability.
The epidemic of student absences has troubled school administrators because of its potential implications for the future of college football and fundraising. Before last season, average student attendance at college-football games was down 7.1% since 2009, according to a Wall Street Journal study of stadium turnstile records.
Schools that had been slow to recognize the sea change were suddenly scrambling to respond. They overhauled their student-ticket packages. They started selling alcohol in on-campus stadiums. They shelled out millions of dollars to solve the technological puzzle of packing 100,000 people into a confined space and praying their smartphones still work.
They also decided they didn’t know enough about their fans. Schools have since embarked on a sweeping effort to collect more information about the people who come to football games—and that is shaping the way they overhaul the experience.
“We have had access to data,” Boston College athletic director Brad Bates said. “I think in the last five to 10 years we’ve taken it much more seriously.
One of the shocking things that schools have learned is that football fans, including students, currently care more about clean restrooms than fast Internet. In the recently released Oregon study, which surveyed students across all five power conferences, fans ranked cellular connectivity last on their wish list.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/what-do-college-football-fans-today-want-1437080251
Go Gophers!!
Now, though, schools have more data than ever on their fans and especially their student fans. That new information has them rewriting their old theories. Their most startling finding challenges the one thing they thought they knew about today’s 18-to-22-year-olds: It turns out that students may not want to be on their phones all game long.
The most recent support for this surprising result comes from a new survey by the National Association of Collegiate Marketing Administrators and Oregon’s sports marketing center. It asked almost 24,000 students across the country to rank the factors that influenced their decision to attend games. By far the most important was a student’s interest in that sport. By far the least important was a stadium’s cellular reception or wireless capability.
The epidemic of student absences has troubled school administrators because of its potential implications for the future of college football and fundraising. Before last season, average student attendance at college-football games was down 7.1% since 2009, according to a Wall Street Journal study of stadium turnstile records.
Schools that had been slow to recognize the sea change were suddenly scrambling to respond. They overhauled their student-ticket packages. They started selling alcohol in on-campus stadiums. They shelled out millions of dollars to solve the technological puzzle of packing 100,000 people into a confined space and praying their smartphones still work.
They also decided they didn’t know enough about their fans. Schools have since embarked on a sweeping effort to collect more information about the people who come to football games—and that is shaping the way they overhaul the experience.
“We have had access to data,” Boston College athletic director Brad Bates said. “I think in the last five to 10 years we’ve taken it much more seriously.
One of the shocking things that schools have learned is that football fans, including students, currently care more about clean restrooms than fast Internet. In the recently released Oregon study, which surveyed students across all five power conferences, fans ranked cellular connectivity last on their wish list.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/what-do-college-football-fans-today-want-1437080251
Go Gophers!!
