Loyalists vs Plastic Fans

21 August 2024

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It seems like just five minutes ago that Manchester City secured another Premier League title, with Arsenal just missing out once again. But now it’s August and the Premier League is already back in full swing.

While sports fans tuned into the Euros and the Olympics over the summer break, Premier League Clubs weren’t resting on their laurels. In the money-led era of domestic football, they were touring the world on lucrative pre-season ventures, critical to their overall marketing and growth strategies.

In fact, on the final day of last season, Tottenham and Newcastle actually flew to the other side of the world for a marketing-led friendly in Melbourne, part of a ‘post-season’ tour, played in front of 78,000.

Marketing in football is serious business , as Jamie Williams, managing partner of independent creative agency isobel, explains.

In an era when many UK industries face challenging times, our domestic football league sits pretty on top of world football. The Premier League is the world’s most watched domestic league , the world’s wealthiest, and now home to six of the top 10 world’s richest football clubs.

These club’s commercial successes lie in the balance of speaking to two audiences – lifelong, predominately local passionate fans, and then a much wider global audience, which comes without inherited club loyalties or bias.

This therefore, requires a combination of both targeted and mass marketing.

Football clubs have long benefited from a passionate and loyal consumer following, probably more so than any other industry. But they also now realise that to truly grow their brands, they need to reach new consumers.

As the saying goes ‘a brand is not just made by the people who buy it, but also by the people who know about it’. And like any other brand that seeks global iconic status, football clubs need to grow their reach, awareness, popularity and consideration – on a mass scale.

Global TV audiences and associated revenues have been the key to this growth historically, coupled with tactical post and pre-season tours across Asia, Australia, and USA. Signing (or producing) world megastars like Cristiano Ronaldo or Harry Kane is pretty handy for global fame too.

Football fans vs. football tourists

With TV rights broadly set and with new Financial Fair Play regulations in place , football clubs can’t overspend like they once did, so income and profit are more important than ever. This change has put the focus on match day income as the long-term revenue driving focus – especially for clubs who have invested hundreds of millions in new state-of-the-art stadiums, designed to maximise spend per visit.

And this is where the real marketing tension lies, with two very different sets of supporters in mind.

On one side, clubs have to commit to their lifelong season-ticket purchasing fans, who generate the atmosphere, who live and breathe the club, and who ultimately make the club what it is. Clubs need to be careful they don’t overcharge for season tickets, to maintain their invaluable local grassroots support.

But these lifelong fans are not the big profit making match day spenders.

And on the other side, there is football tourism. Or ‘plastic fans’, as they have perhaps unfairly been labelled.

These fair weather fans come from afar, on tailor-made trips to see a Premier League game. Tickets probably seem cheap for what is essentially a one-off experience, with fans arriving at 9am for a 3pm kick off, spending hours in the club megastore, taking a stadium tour, eating, drinking, and – ultimately – spending a shed load of money.

Commercially, these fans are every club’s dream.

Mass marketing on a global scale

Having recently built a huge new money-making stadium, Tottenham Hotspur know a thing or two about match day revenue potential, and reportedly now make close to £6m per game.

Despite the criticism around ‘day-trippers’, ‘casual fans’, ‘half and half scarfs’ and so-called ‘glory hunters’, the maximising of revenue per stadium visit is crucial for Tottenham’s future business plans, as it is for most football clubs across the league.

This demand is driven by clubs becoming globally famous and desired brands among a wider mass audience.

In a recent article on the demise of mass marketing, in favour of data-led targeted marketing, John Hegarty stated: “The plentiful supply of customer data compels marketers to focus on selling to customers, ignoring all the other people whose casual knowledge of a brand adds to its credibility and prestige.”

Football clubs have become some of the biggest and most prestigious brands in the world, through both targeted and mass marketing. Commercially successful clubs have an enviable combination of consumers, with ultra-loyal and consistent local fan bases sharing stands with new ‘plastic fans’, who have deep pockets and an appetite for a one-off piece of the action.

It’s not an easy marketing balance to strike for clubs, but with restrictive financial regulations now in place, it’s a vital one for ambitious football clubs to get right.

And ultimately, the clubs that do, will be the clubs that see future success on the pitch.