Post Olympics opportunity

[PhilJ]

Just started to get an excellent new magazine, Outdoor Fitness.
In this month's edition is an article by Daley Thompson , not one for shying away from controversy over the years but he makes an excellent point:
"I hope we have enough coaches in place and enough commitment from the government, schools and parents so that when, say, Beth Tewddle wins a medal and a mass of kids all want to follow their hero and take up gymnastics, we're ready and able to nuture that desire"....
So admittedly 'O' is not an Olympic sport but after the Olympics there "should" be people champing at the bit to try a new sport. Is BO/clubs ready for the onslaught of eager newcomers in Aug/Sept? What is BO's marketing strategy to ensure we blitch the population with exciting intitatives that parents and children cannot ignore? Looking at the BO events diary for Aug/Sept etc looks like any other year, no special post Olympics events. The post Olympics will be a once in a lifetime opportunity for us to champion our sport against all the other mainstream and Olympic sports. If we do nothing could we even see a decline in 'O' numbers as local members/occassional orienteers decide that they like the look of badminton/beach volleyball/archery etc and try those sports instead.

Now is the time (well actually probably last year) that plans should be formulated to maximise the Olympics legacy else we may well find ourselves an even more minority sport than we are now.

[RJ]

Yes, PhilJ we should keep our eyes on the Olympic legacy, but it is a mistake to think that July and August this year will give us, orienteering, the boost we need. Trying the sport at an event in August is only the start. Every club needs a whole series of events in the following months so that once tried, folk can keep going.

The strategy is to have a weekly informal event structure within every club so that people who read your weekly press reports can come along, take up the sport and then join the club.

Yes the Olympic legacy will help, and the various government initiatives also help, but each club needs to have that informal event structure in place to offer orienteering to whoever wants to have a go. Many clubs are already on the ball. Just remember to start printing more maps!!

[SeanC]

I don't think we can expect BO to do a big marketing blitz on our behalf after the olympics. They don't really have the resources.

However there was a long discussion in the October development committee on how BO can help support publicity in clubs. You can check the October minutes but I've pasted the relevant section below as they are hard to find on the BO website.

................... from the dev committee minutes...............................


Marketing and Publicity in Orienteering

The committee had a wide ranging discussion regarding marketing and publicity in Orienteering..

The following points were discussed

1) Challenges of promoting orienteering. The committee discussed the challenges of marking the sport. Currently we deliver a product that meets the needs of a small, defined group – i.e. existing orienteers - and we market our product primarily to this group. Orienteering is challenged in either evolving the sport to attract new different participants or marketing to the smaller sector of people who may be interested.

2) Defining the market. Orienteering often promotes itself as “The sport for all.” This is a great facet of the sport, however, it also creates a marketing challenge. To get the greatest impact the mar keting has to be focused at a target audience. The end product (event; community orienteering etc.) then has to be tailored to this audience. It was suggested that the same event could promote itself with different marketing for different groups. However this was recognised as a challenging position. By picking a single target audience, the product and marketing then has to alter to appeal to that audience, and this may be detrimental in its appeal to other groups. The committee noted the success of some clubs in supporting a particular market (e.g. South London Orienteers have a high proportion of M/W21s and are delivering events and activities to meet their needs). The committee noted that the family market is a strong area for orienteering to target. There was recognition that new markets could be evolved, particularly in the 35 plus age group. The committee further discussed the methods of marketing, commenting that certain mediums can be used to target certain groups (for example social media for 16 -35 age group)

As part of the discussion above, it was noted that the current set of British Orienteering promotional materials has a focus on children, families and elite action. This makes marketing to older age groups more challenging, yet this group provides the majority of volunteer time within the sport and should not be neglected. It would be prudent to source photographs and create promotional material focussed on the older age groups to complement the existing flyers.

3) Publicity Budgets. An example was discussed where a club had offered to set aside a part of their budget specifically for publicity. This was regarding as good practice; however, this is not currently common amongst clubs, where publicity is often a low priority, and funded only through event or activity budgets.

4) Sponsorship. Clubs should look to support any sponsorship offer that is made. Clubs should also consider what they are giving back to the sponsor in terms of coverage.

5) Engagement of Youth Groups. The committee had experience where direct marketing to youth groups (Scouts; Duke of Edinburgh etc) had been successful. The committee asked if something could be organised at a national level. EN detailed that for real impact the local organisation of these relationships is better than a national campaign.
Understanding of current practise. The committee asked if work can be carried out on what publicity is working and what isn’t working for an edition of Focus. The committee also asked to see if an audit could be carried out on current practice.

6) Training of Publicity officers. The committee expressed a desire for publicity officers to be offered training to help them with their role, in line with that available for mappers and volunteer event officials.

7) Paid Publicity officers. Due to the high value attached to publicity, and the limited expertise amongst orienteers, the committee suggested that clubs should investigate the opportunities of paying individuals to develop and deliver publicity to groups both within and external to the sport.

Action EN and the committee to find examples of publicity working and not working for an edition of Focus. EN to investigate the options for a wider audit on the current marketing and promotion of orienteering.

Action EN and CP – consider producing promotional materials targeted at older age groups.

Action EN to investigate the development of a support programme and learning packages for club publicity officers.

Action EN to organise further examples of marketing and publicity best practice to go online.

[Gross]

If orienteering gets more than 2 longterm recruits due to the English 2012 Olympics I will vote for the Union in the Independace referendum

[Kitch]

See you.
in 2014.
Pal.

[andypat]

You gotta be in the country to vote mind Gross!

[AndyO]

Interesting notes from the Development Committee, SeanC

My own view is that having the marketing focus on family groups and elite competitors is fairly broad as it includes all ages and abilities, while showcasing the elite "high end" of the sport. No disrespect to those of us who are older, but I really don't see the likelihood of attracting large numbers of newbies from the 40+ group who have never done orienteering before, and I see no advantage in diluting the attention on the younger group who will be the future of the sport.

A couple of thoughts came to mind while reflecting on the statement in the minute extract that

Currently we deliver a product that meets the needs of a small, defined group – i.e. existing orienteers - and we market our product primarily to this group. Orienteering is challenged in either evolving the sport to attract new different participants or marketing to the smaller sector of people who may be interested.

I was browsing through Runners World at the time, and the Race finder section at the back has details of races all over the country, with a symbol guide to race type (road/rural/urban/trail/flat/hills). How about approaching RW to propose adding another symbol for "off trail" and a compass symbol for Orienteering? If they agree, race organisers have immediate access to a much larger market, through main newsagents country-wide (and online). The symbols used will cover urban, forest or park races, without using unnecessary and obscure jargon like the "level" of an event, but Clubs would need to be prepared to welcome more newcomers and give advice and assistance, though. The other, in some ways more radical thought, is to reduce the time an event takes by dramatically shortening the interval between starters in each block to say 15 secs. This would help generate a "race" atmosphere, create opportunities for head to head racing, and give athletes a chance to meet their competitors after the race to compare routes, instead of finding that everyone has pi$$ed off by the time you finish! We would have to keep the time spacing for championship races, but for club races, why not try something different?

[roadrunner]

Good idea, AndyO, though I think that the Runners World website would be of more value than the printed magazine. But perhaps we could take a leaf out of their book in providing a friendly search capability. For example, using their web site, I could search for a race that is:

10k distance
In the future (the ability to see past events is also useful when the date of the next one hasn't been announced, or if I want to see what people thought of it in the past)
Within 30 miles of my home
On-road
Undulating (as opposed to flat or hilly)

For each matching event, I get the name, date, link if there's online entry through RW, and a link to a page of basic information, which has links to the event's web site, forum discussions, and ratings of past events. And it all looks very neat.

By contrast, the only filters I can use on the BO list are:

Distance from specified postcode
Association
Club
Level
Competition (i.e. certain leagues or cups, from a drop-down list)
Dates
Suitability for newcomers, children, etc, presence of traders/caterers, dogs allowed/forbidden, and a few other options

The only event types I can search for, so it seems, are MTBO and Night Events, and the brightly coloured tabs against each event I think are rather distracting. So if all I'm interested in is daytime events, for example, I don't think I can exclude the night ones, and if all I want is urban events then I just have to scan the whole list.

Do people really want to search for events on the basis of whether or not there are traders there more often that they want to search by event type (which I'm sure used to be possible)? How many people want to see only events where dogs aren't allowed?!

[Paul Frost]

...No disrespect to those of us who are older, but I really don't see the likelihood of attracting large numbers of newbies from the 40+ group who have never done orienteering before, and I see no advantage in diluting the attention on the younger group who will be the future of the sport.

This is exactly the age group that EckO has seen growth in. Don't forget that this is commonly the age group with children, and you need to attract the parents before the children, as they need transport to get there!

[andy]

and you need to attract the parents before the children, as they need transport to get there!

Doesn't always work that way round.. it can definitely work the other way

[Paul Frost]

I agree, but was I highlighting not to ignore the 40 somethings. Mum & Dad are more likely to taxi the kids around if they are also interested in the sport. They are also able to take on volunteer roles like planning, coaching & organising, which children can't do. So they can be more valuable as a new recruit.

Looking around many of the running, adventure race type events it seems to me that the 40 somethings form a large part of the entry, so they may be the most susceptible group to good marketing.

[Clive Coles]

40+ group who have never done orienteering before

Quite agree Paul ~ that's in fact how I, and my (then) teenage son, came into the sport. And 25+ years later we are still involved with the sport.

Our club is heavily reliant on families and a dwindling group of oldies (like me) to put on events. That's the group where we find our event organisers, planners and controllers.

It would be nice to think that more unencumbered 20 somethings could be attracted to step in and commit to running things. But life is more frantic and interesting for this younger age groups. When we get them they are great to have around and they more than play their part. But they move on as interests and commitments change.

In my experience it's the young families that have sustained the club based sport. If you look at the list of champions over the years it is clear that behind many of them there is an O committed parent (or two).

You should not therefore dismiss the 40+ group who have never done orienteering before. If they are not competitive runners by that age it is unlikely they will aspire to becoming a champion in their own right. But, does that matter ? Podiums aren't everything. Once hooked, they may well develop into a club stalwart who is prepared to help their club run the sport we all enjoy.

We need to embrace all age groups and I agree the post olympics period provides a opportunity for all activity sports.

[SeanC]

You might find it interesting to look at the newcomers to our club that have gone on to become regular orienteers ie going to >15 events a year and/or volunteering to organise/plan/other committee role:

W21 - Also does running and other adventure type sports.
W35 - Had no sport but was a keen runner in the past.
2X W10 - children of above
M60 - Used to be a runner but was finding road running too tough on the joints.
M55 - Also a member of a running club and keen cricketer in the summer.
M50 - also does caving - not many caves locally.
M45 - Joined after giving up serious windsurfing.
W40 - wife of the M45.
2 X W10 - children of above
M35 - used to do orienteering at School but also does running.
W35 - wife of M35
M10 X2 - children of above.

Of course these newcomers are influenced by our marketing (and often lack of it) and our product however I think maybe if clubs are targetting groups it might be better to avoid the "you can walk if you want" and sell it as a physically tough adventure. All these people are fit, active types. Maybe this is more important than focusing on age alone?

I do agree marketing is quite easy to runners, particularly with Runners World events listing (it's free and easy). But I don't think most of our events are a suitable product for runners. I assume they will want to run and the learning navigation bit is secondary. Long Orange is probably too hard, Long White (5-10K) but with some taped routes through some rough stuff might be better? Offering white or yellow to runners - I think they finish and think "is that it?". All newcomers want it to be friendly as well so compressing start times seems good.

Interesting that once you start thinking about marketing it leads onto changes in events and for runners/fit newcomers there are better formats than classic colour coded eg. trail challenges, mass start scores with lots of easy controls and targetted event names (eg Surrey Hills race). Even better is taking the orienteering to the running clubs and organising a street O from their clubhouse - they love that. Maybe only a few runners will cross-over to mainstream/classic orienteering and you have to find a way of getting them into classic O (coaching, club nights?), but there are masses of runners (at least round our way) and we only need a few new regulars to make a big difference to our club.

[andypat]

But I don't think most of our events are a suitable product for runners. I assume they will want to run and the learning navigation bit is secondary. Long Orange is probably too hard, Long White (5-10K) but with some taped routes through some rough stuff might be better? Offering white or yellow to runners - I think they finish and think "is that it?".

Interested to hear your opinion on that - I've been harping on about this too, but experienced orienteers often seem blind to the possibility that normal adults might not be able to manage "orange"! Some good ideas there.

[Kitch]

it might be better to avoid the "you can walk if you want" and sell it as a physically tough adventure.

indeed
people who can't be bothered to run probably can't be bothered to walk either, in fact can't be bothered getting off their backsides.
Its a running sport, tell it like it is, don't apologise.