The Virtual Terrace • Re: Catalan Dragons v Widnes Vikings

I actually think the 'Different League' campaign is a good one. I also liked the NRL's "Make History" campaign but I think the NRL has things a little easier, particularly as far as digital is concerned. Because every game is televised, it has so much more content to work with. The RFL tries, but with just 2-3 games being properly filmed each week, it's much harder. Last year, Rangi Chase's flick-pass should have gone viral, and had the game been televised by Sky from all of the different angles, it would have. Instead, all we had was one fairly poor quality angle from the TV gantry - and the opportunity was lost.

On the wider joined-up marketing, the difficulty is that the clubs know their markets better than the RFL, and they have their own business priorities (quite understandibly). Leeds, for example, are clearly looking to attract more premium audiences - they're increasing the number of seating tickets in prime areas to do that and, with limited capacity next season, they have no need or interest in handing out cheap tickets. Other clubs may have different priorities.

What I'd like the RFL to do is almost set an ABM strategy for it's commercial side. Say to the clubs "in three years time, we want to attract these sponsors to the Super League" and then KPI the clubs on growing their reach to and engagement of the audience groups that those sponsors aim for. We have affluent areas of North Yorkshire and Cheshire on our doorstep, yet we struggle to engage those audiences. Similarly the RFL needs to set hard and ambitious KPIs on audience volume and on commercial revenue at club level.

This is where franchising should have been a good opportunity for the RFL to set the agenda. Unfortunately, it used the wrong KPIs and they were easily fudged. The attendances KPI really should have been a "ticket revenue" KPI, to mitigate against clubs fudging it with cheap tickets.

Again, this isn't about neglecting the audiences or sponsors that we have (and whilst Kingstone Press is hardly a blue-chip brand, it is clearly a very engaged and enthusiastic sponsor and that is something we want to keep), it's simply about growing our appeal.