You can't sell Orienteering

[SeanC]

Actually no.

Mike Shires on the UK publicity Facebook page reports that 150 * newcomers came to the TVOC Hill End local event on Saturday following some very effective marketing.

* I think it was 90 or so IND's listed, but many competed in 2's or 3's.

[Sunlit Forres]

Can you imagine how many more are going to start coming when these people start bringing their friends? Some comments on Facebook from the newbies say it all. Nopesport readers, ask yourself when did you last post a nice comment on a club's Facebook page after an event you'd enjoyed.

"Ann Palmer Had a brilliant time, thanks for organising such a great event"
"Nik Windle Thanks for putting on this excellent event - Ben's training session beforehand was a really useful bonus"
"Anna West Thanks we had a great time!"
"Leah Glen Day. The Day family had a great time at our first orienteering event. We will be back and will attempt a harder course next time!"
"Diane Gibbs. We had a great time. Thanks for organising."
"Lucy Khan Go Arty we had fun! thanks"
"Peter Cox DipWcf Enjoyed my first time, see you next time."

Passion + talent + vision = the fastest-growing sport in Oxford.

The extra levy coming in to BO as a result of Mike's efforts is probably enough to employ someone to do professional PR like this for any club willing to give it a try. Imagine if that extra levy was replicated right across the country!

[SeanC]

Over on the Publicity Facebook page (location https://www.facebook.com/groups/orienteeringpublicity/ in case you want to sign up) Mike gives a breakdown of what work he did for the 150 newcomers. Probably it is unrealistic to expect all clubs to do all the things he did, but hey this is just a mindset. I'm sure he spent much less time on publicity than the mapper did making the map for example.

Club treasurers, please not he had a decent publicity budget, I think over £300 for 3 events.

He did quite a lot of different things, but almost half were from Facebook advertising, though whether that works in other areas I guess you can't be sure.

Paying people to do publicity. I think it might work to pay a marketing expert to come up with a plan and offer online support, and let the club do the time consuming legwork - handling out fliers at ParkRun, posts on Facebook etc. The marketing expert would need to know or learn quickly about orienteering though.

Why isn't British Orienteering offering this kind of thing as a service to clubs? I think it could work well. The marketing expert needn't live local to the club. But I'm not optimistic about BOF, even though there is a full time marketing manager. I've been told that SportEngland are not keen on funding this kind of publicity as sports all tend to target the same sorts of people, rather than the difficult to reach groups.

One possibility might be the semi-pro orienteer looking for an orienteering related income, or someone looking for part time work in orienteering. Rather than the well known routes such as mapping and coaching, someone could start their own 'orienteering marketing' business, working with clubs to develop marketing plans, and doing the online stuff such as Facebook (which was the most successful technique Mike Shires used).

[daffdy]

I think it might work to pay a marketing expert to come up with a plan and offer online support, and let the club do the time consuming legwork - handling out fliers at ParkRun, posts on Facebook etc. The marketing expert would need to know or learn quickly about orienteering though.

Why isn't British Orienteering offering this kind of thing as a service to clubs? I think it could work well.

That's actually very similar to what British Orienteering did at the Club and Association Conference this year, in that various plan-like ideas were shared by a marketing expert and there's a website full of online support.

[SeanC]

I'm thinking of something for specific clubs rather than a broadcast to all, or something only accessible at a conference *. Say a marketing expect working with a club to develop marketing plan(s) for specific events, then actively helping the club implement the plan. For example the marketing person might produce a Facebook advertisement, and work out the demographic and geographical parameters needed to make it work, then leave the club to do the admin on Facebook and pay the bills, but answer questions and do any coaching needed for the volunteers.

Another example might be fliers, the marketing person might produce the fliers to hand out at ParkRun, but the club volunteers hand out the fliers. The marketing person might again offer coaching (eg advice on making sure the fliers get picked up by the runners) and the club and marketing expert work together.

Perhaps the word I missed in the previous post is coaching. There is a lot of publicity help out there (if you know where to find it), but applying it to an individual club can be tricky unless you have a background in marketing and/or are resilient and determined, and prepared for hard work that doesn't pay off initially. However I do think that many clubs would be willing to pay something for marketing support.

Am I wrong to assume this level of support wouldn't be available via BOF?

* Is this on the BOF website in the "marketing support" section?

[Sunlit Forres]

Mike Shires' figures stated that for a £350 outlay to promote the 4-event Oxford Parks series, the likely additional income from entry fees is £1,800.

If that can be replicated at even a quarter of UK clubs, it would still pay for an army of marketing gurus, and could easily result in local events drawing 300+ attendances regularly.

I am yet to be convinced that this is actually something the orienteering community really wants.

[graeme]

* Is this on the BOF website in the "marketing support" section?

it hasn't been, er, publicised very well, but I think it's this page...
http://www.britishorienteering.org.uk/p ... erating_pr

[DaveK]

Some very good 'stuff' there. Thoughtful and comprehensive.