“Sharing” my Phoenix Suns experience
I went to the Suns/Magic game on Friday with my 8-year old nephew. We weren’t in the door 30 seconds when a Suns representative came up to us, asking if she could take our photo for for the Suns website, and telling us we could go there to see it. Sure, I replied, thinking my nephew would get a kick out of seeing his photo on the Suns site even though in reality it was likely just a revenue stream: We would see the photo and would want to order it on a t-shirt or something. As a side note, I later found out it was actually a free download but I never found it. The girl handed me a card with a code to view the photo and instructions on how to log on: 1. Visit SUNS.com 2. Click the “My Suns Game Day” Button 3. Enter you Passcode & CLICK “Submit” 4. Download your free photo and share your Suns Experience Well, I would have loved to click on the “My Suns Game Day” button when I tried, but I couldn't find the damn thing. After about a minute of searching I just gave up. Here are the lessons to be learned here if your a marketer. First, the Suns get points on wanting to give me something for free. They lose, however, from making the process frustrating. While they’ll see my visit in their monthly site reports and say, “Hooray! We have lots of visitors,” they will have no idea why I was there or what I was looking for. If they only would have had a unique URL and landing page that got me exactly what I wanted, the experience would have been a lot better for me - and completely trackable and measurable for them. At least then they could determine the success of the program and whether of not they should spend capital to continue it. This is basic Interactive marketing 101 - and I can’t believe that companies still don't do these basics.
8 comments so far
Roger Hurni says:
As a follow up. I did finally find the button. And guess what. The free picture isn't free at all. The amount of personal information they want from me to download it is ridiculous. Take note Suns. Don't tell me something is free and expect me to give your my life story for it.
PhoenixSunsGirl says:
Hi there, I'm the Director of Digital Media & Research at the Phoenix Suns and I'm glad you've called this to my attention. I've sparked an internal discussion to evaluate the entire process. In the interim, you can pick up your photos. The link is housed at the bottom of the suns.com home page (230 x 102 button ad) that says "MY SUNS GAME DAY PHOTO PICKUP".
Please DM me on Twitter if you have any other questions or comments.
Thanks for your Suns support and feedback. GO Suns!
@PhoenixSunsGirl
Drew says:
Really appreciate the feedback, I coordinate the Suns Fan Photo program and we have already discussed making adjustments to make the photos easier to pick up. Wanted to point out a couple of things:
As you can imagine, there are hundreds, maybe thousands of things that demand publication on a professional sports team's website. Stats, scores, stories, photos, player content, ticket sales, marketing messages, the list goes on and on. It is virtually impossible to fulfill the expectations of every fan, but suns.com has been recoginzed as one of the top team websites because we are able to combine content, entertainment value and even a few sales/marketing messages. In my opinion, we have the best web staff in professional sports because they are able to blend so many things without sacrificing content. Inevitably, this means that sometimes, things can be lost with so much information in such a limited amount of space.
As for the MY SUNS GAMEDAY PHOTO button, its on the bottom left corner of the suns.com homepage. You're right, not the most obvious location, but we already had so much other existing content, we did the best we could. Based on yoru comments and a few other fans that share your opinion, we're going to create a dedicated URL as well as reprint the locator cards to feature the dedicated URL, so frustrated Suns fans looking for their photos, well, they can thank you!
Finally, I'm glad you appreciate the program, our commitment is that attending a Suns game should be an experience and many fans would like to have a memory of that experience, so this program is totally free to the fan and I'm happy to hear you were approached as soon as you entered the building. I'd be happy help you retrieve your photo for your nephew, just let me know the locator information on your card and I'll track it down.
Appreciate your feedback and GO SUNS!
Roger Hurni says:
Glad to see that the SUNS are on top of responding to social media. Great job. Everyone makes a misstep but there are many companies that can learn from the SUNS on how they handled this one.
Brian Renner says:
While you've got the attention of the Suns staff now's the perfect time to unleash your strategy about bringing Tom Chambers, Dan Majerle, KJ and Charles Barkley back from retirement for the 2010 season!
Just kidding, great example of how companies are supposed to embrace social media and customer feedback...and so quickly too!
Alisha says:
Greeting. We bear the world and we make it... There was never a great man who had not a great mother - it is hardly an exaggeration.
I am from Faso and learning to write in English, give please true I wrote the following sentence: "Send your friends a free flying flea electronic greeting card."
Best regards :), Alisha.
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Candace Westwood says:
Interesting dialogue! I think all phoenix ad agencies should take note of the lesson learned here.