Tech Meets Fandom: Evolving Sports Apps – Jon Wolf , MLSE

This transcript has been transcribed by Riverside.fm, no edits (please excuse any errors)

Sean (00:02.006)
Very happy to welcome Jon Wolf. He's the manager of product design at Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment. Jon, welcome to the podcast.

Jon (00:09.767)
Thanks, Jon. Thanks for having me. Excited to be here and geek out with you for the next hour.

Sean (00:14.366)
No, no problems at all. Always happy to get my geek on. I always ask people how they got their start in the world of sports. What about yourself? How did you get your start in the world of sports?

Jon (00:26.103)
Yeah, so it was definitely, it was a long road. I was preparing to answer this question and I was doing some math and I've been a designer for 15 years. Always had a passion for design. I always had a passion for sports. And just really luckily about four or five years ago, I got the opportunity to kind of blend the two together. And I don't think that was ever really something I set out to do. It kind of just organically happened.

I think at the end of the day, I just continued to put my best foot forward, work really hard, build fantastic networks and relationships and show up to work every day doing what I love. you know, when you do that in any industry, eventually opportunities kind of, you know, come just combined naturally. So, you know, having worked in various different industries, the sports industry kind of, like I said, as I mentioned, came up about four or five years ago. you know, it was being from Toronto, born and bred, raised,

Growing up watching the Leafs, Raptors, it was somewhat of a unbelievable opportunity and I had to almost take a step back and couldn't believe, I guess, that it was actually real opportunity for me. And so yeah, just, would say it was just kind of came by organically and I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity and seized it.

Sean (01:46.562)
I mean, that design to develop a space and like I told you before we started, was a Coder developer before Sports Geek. You do have the ability to sort of jump to different industries because when I was a Coder, they're all ones and zeros, they're all use cases, all about the data flow. And then from a design point of view, it's how do you onboard users and it's slightly different for the web and different for mobile.

So did you have sort of that background of being able to change to different industries and sort of see how those customers acted differently and then did you have to learn something new coming in as a, know, how sports fans are different to, you know, if you're doing an app for a bank or you're doing an app for, you know, for another consumer product, sports, was there some learning curve on what sports fans want?

Jon (02:34.473)
Yeah, that's absolutely a fantastic question. You know, I think it's funny that you mentioned banking because I feel like any designer to write a passage up to work for a bank, right? There's always work there. know, it's, it's, wouldn't say it's most exciting work, but it's definitely, definitely important work to do. But yeah, in the sense of sports, you don't realize, you know how cyclical it is, but when you're sitting on this side of it, and you realize that like,

There is a game on Sunday as we're recording this and we got to be ready. Like there's no pushing it out by a day, there's no pushing it by an hour. The puck's dropping at 7 PM Sunday. So you better be ready, you better have staff prepared and everything tested as much as possible. So I think that was probably the biggest learning curve, which makes it both exciting and terrifying at the same time. I think also like there is really no off season, we call it off season, but like, you know, as soon as, you know, call it end of April, May,

Sean (03:22.273)
Yeah.

Jon (03:31.115)
June kind of rolls around, you're already getting ready for the next season about what you're going to do and with how you want to improve what you've worked on this year.

Sean (03:38.742)
I mean, that peaks and troughs thing is around the schedule of games is something that is very unique to sport. Like you said, you know, spoken to people who work in the stadium side and the event side, it's like, if the network's not working, as people are about to walk in the venue, you have to be a problem solver and fix it. And you have that same pressure, you know, it's not like, we'll just delay the launch of the app a week. It's like, no, no, the season's going to start at that point.

Sean (04:05.44)
So it does create that pressure and a little bit different from other industries.

Jon (04:11.575)
Absolutely. Yeah. And tickets, right? Like our tickets are in the app and everything's digital now. So you're going to have 20 ,000 people that are going be very happy. They can't get to their seats and they're going to, they better not miss puck drop, right? Or tip off or whatever you want to call it. So absolutely. Technology has kind of become that. And, know, every once in a while, you know, you'll hear people just talking about having their old tickets back. Right. But, and I this is what's here to stay. And the goal is just to make it as easy as possible for anyone, to get in and out. that should, that should never be a friction point, right? Like getting into the arena.

Sean (04:41.772)
So Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment is an absolute beast of a sports and entertainment business. Just for people who don't know, what is the remit of your role in the different teams and venues that effectively you service?

Jon (04:56.001)
Yeah, wow. How much time do we have? Absolutely incredible company, what they've accomplished. So Maple Leaf Sports Entertainment owns the Toronto Maple Leafs and Toronto Raptors, Toronto FC, Toronto Argonauts, Scotiabank Arena. They also own a venue called Budweiser Stage, a venue called History. They own BMO Field where the Argos and TFC play. And there's actually, there's more as well. But, you know, that's majority of the sports.

in Toronto. The news just kind of came out actually, I believe yesterday. I'm sure you heard it where Rogers is going to acquire Bell's rights and become majority shareholder of Maple Leaf Sports Entertainment. you know, it's a massive landscape shift in Canadian sports and definitely excited to see what that means, right? Because they outright own the Blue Jays right now. So that being said, getting back to your question.

My role currently is to service the five ops or five, four team ops and the Scotiabank arena app. I manage a cross -functional team of project managers, program managers, designers, UX researchers, product analysts. And on any given day I'm reporting to or working with 20 different people from different business units, from FMB to retail, to ticketing, to global partnerships. And what's so interesting and amazing about this role, is sitting in the middle of all of these business units.

Everyone has a use for mobile, right? Whether it's a new way to be in touch with a fan or offer a promotion or create some sort of utility that they haven't had before inside the app. So the app can be different things to different people and that's something that we're really striving for. So yeah, to answer your question, it's definitely do a lot more than just building the apps, but effectively at the end of the day, definitely setting the strategy and vision.

Creating engagement and then they try to create value for fans in the app and catering it to their needs and what they need when they want it.

Sean (07:01.57)
I mean, one of the things I sort of picked out there when you're talking about is the the utility of the app. I mean, I think I think in those early days of the sports fans app, was the sports teams apps that were sort of built as a as a destination. It's like, this is where you need to go to consume our content and that kind of thing. And it'd be but the stickiness really came when when the app started to have utility had had a reason for you to open it every day, whether you were going to the stadium and integrating the ticketing.

Also all that home experience. How much is I guess that utility focus something that you're you know Focusing on but is paramount in in the apps that you're designing

Jon (07:41.163)
Yeah, that's a really good question. I think people use the app for different reasons and we're really trying to take that to heart when we're designing. Having fans around the world, global fans, they don't really need to see tickets. If they ever get to go to a game ever once in their life, that's a one -time thing. So how do we make it so that they find value in the app and they're not just sifting through a bunch of promotions they can't use?

There's nothing more frustrating and seeing something that you're you geolocated locked out of entering. So how do we create those seamless frictionless? Journeys for fans no matter where they are in the world. What doesn't even really knowing what they're missing or what they're not right? Like I think at the end of the day when you can just have again a seamless experience. Fans don't know what they don't know and sometimes that's the best that's the best way to keep it right? So as far as like what type of utilities fans are looking for is you know, I think

There's so many content aggregators out there. It's hard to compete with, you know, op -ed pieces or editorial pieces and hot takes. And we definitely shy away from those. We try to bring more of like the player side because we have that capability, right? Like the things that fans really want to know about their players to make them feel like even if they're a thousand miles away, that they, this is their team and that they can understand and get the information that they want or they can't, that they can't find anyone else anywhere else.

Sean (09:06.25)
And is that a little bit of an extension of what, you know, your, digital teams are doing on social as a, you know, there's the teaser stuff, but then there's a little bit full, a fuller and richer content in the app that sort of starts bringing more of those return visits.

Jon (09:21.867)
Yeah, that's a, yeah, again, that's a great quick question. So that's exactly what we're trying to do this year is really doubling down on content. We have an awesome partner called WSC who we've been working with for quite some time. And they actually just won best use of AI this past year at sports business journal tech awards and how we are looking to leverage their content and our apps and how fans can see more of what they want to see just by watching things that they're already interested in and serving that stuff, right?

It's important for fans to get what they want when they want. I think that's, know, content is always a good thing to have. Fans always want more and more and more. And, you know, as you mentioned, evergreen content is the best, but, you know, seasons go by quickly and, you know, who really wants to watch a losing season or a playoff loss, right? So always looking for what's new and what's next.

Sean (10:17.772)
So on the what's new and what's next, one of the trends in both league and team apps is, you know, sort of following the leader of the IG story, the TikTokification, the verticalization of video. That's something that you've, you know, you've looked to roll out. that, has that been something that one powered by, you know, tools like WSC to be able to get you that content quicker, but is that, you seen a good uptick on, you know, more consumption, more thumbs swiping? You know, in delivering that method.

Jon (10:50.935)
Absolutely, think it's something that you never you don't really get to control or you know even strategize for is again It happened organically, you know It started with was it Instagram and then ticked off came along and that's how fans are consuming content So it only makes sense to to use the engagement method, right? So we were very fortunate to write at the beginning of playoffs last year for the Leafs and

April, we rolled out our first variation and instance of WSC and we were able to get, you know, the Instagram style stories of the playoff game highlights and we saw amazing uptake and, and there were, the fans just grasped it. There was no, you know, extra marketing push or even instructions how to use it. It was just a very natural organic flow and it was really neat to see that happen. So we're definitely doubling down on that and looking to expand it to other teams and

You know, I think it's definitely here to stay. What better way than to have your entire screen filled with amazing content and not have to your phone sideways, right? It's such a simple, silly thing to have to turn your phone sideways, but it is a friction point, right? So let fans consume content how they're consuming it and their favorite sports apps.

Sean (12:06.306)
And it also removes the, guess, the choke hold that the algorithms have on deciding, you know, if I'm following the Raptors and I'm following the Leafs, like Instagram and TikTok are deciding if I'm going to see that, see that content. So you can sort of say, well, you know, there's no algorithms here. This is the content you want. And, you know, that's why the fans are leaning into that piece.

Jon (12:30.839)
I actually didn't even think about that. That's a, that's a really good point. you know, not getting served, irrelevant ads. And look, I don't think ads are bad as long as ads are relevant to you and what you're interested in. I, know, I've actually found a few really cool products before that I would never have found otherwise. So I think as long as like that's the angle, the advertising, again, it's not, it's not, here to stay, right? It's not going away. Maybe the way things are served will change, but you're right. That's not serving me something completely irrelevant.

And, one of the best use cases are implementations I've seen is the Buffalo Bills app. I'm not sure if you've seen it. They have something called Bills Bits and it's a navigational element on their main main now footer and you hit it and it's literally just tick tock the entire thing. There's no instructions or anything and I was kind of blown away and I it and I was like, this makes total sense, but I had not thought of it right. And it's like sometimes the solutions are just so simple and yeah, they've they've seen as far as I know, crazy, crazy usage from that and that's what fans want.

Sean (13:29.942)
I mean, I use the phrase, steal with pride. If you see someone else doing something cool, how can you build it into what you do? Do you find yourself downloading far too many other team apps or league apps and swiping and testing and looking for different things that you can use?

Jon (13:41.277

Yeah, you know it. the one thing I do love about sports is it's a sense of community because, you know, it's funny. I can actually pick up the phone or jump on LinkedIn and reach out to kind of any other team. And, most of the time they're very willing to speak with you, right? you know, the New York Islanders reached out to us before they built their app and said, Hey, like, we really love what you did. And we were so happy to speak with them.

Like it's, it's neat to have recognition by your peers because a New York, you know, and your God under fans probably not going to be a trauma, a bully fan. Right. and that's okay. And so it allows for the kind of that cross collaboration and like, Hey, did this work for you? This didn't work for us. Well, why, and you know, certain things work in different leagues that they don't work in other leagues. And, and it's a really, really neat part of the, or the industry that, know, you're not going to that at a bank. You're not picking up the bank and say, Hey, RBC, what are you doing? No. at least, at least not in my experience.

Sean (14:37.783)
Yeah. No, that's the thing. You're not, I mean, yes, there is a certain outreach for new fans, but you're right. Someone who is an Islanders fan isn't going to come across. there is, you're talking to your own fans, especially in the app space. You talked a little bit about before around advertising and partner integration that that's becoming more and more important as a deliverable for your commercial team, in your sponsorship team.

How do you both tackle that and sort of and manage that and integrate that into what you're offering and trying to keep that balance. Like you said, you don't want someone opening up your app and it be full of ads and full of promotions. do you balance that?

Jon (15:20.341)
Yeah, it's a really fine line, isn't it? Because you put too much out there and it really drives people away. You don't do enough and you're not making enough money to make ends meet, right? So again, it's a really, really fine line. I think at end of the day, the goal should always be to advertise and market in a situation that makes the most sense, right?

So retail stuff, do I get 10 % off retail stuff at Maple Leafs, real sports? Then it makes sense to promote the credit card that allows us to do that, right? So it's like nice to know, it's a value add, everybody wins. But you're right, it is a constant battle of, what's new? What are fans interacting with? What do they wanna see? Are they local? Are they not local? Can they see this partnership opportunity? I mean, I think just the other day, or…

The Oreo announcement was, announced where Oreo is as sponsored our helmets and have milk on our Jersey. So I can't wait to see the activations like that come through this year, right? The Milton cookies, it's going be really neat to see. but yeah, it's always a fine line, right? So, and I don't think it's ever really done. I think you're just always kind, kind of trying to, do your checks and balances and make sure you're, you're servicing is all three sides ideally, right? If you can, at the end of the day.

Sean (16:45.778)
Yeah, most definitely. And it is a matter of also trying to understand where the commercial team and the partner is coming from and try to make sure they're not trying to fit a square peg in a round hole to say, hey, what do you guys want? Because this type of activation or promotion or this works better in the app for that outcome. Are you sort of providing that, I guess, consultative approach back to the commercial team to sort of make sure you're getting the best fit?

Jon (17:14.155)
Yeah, that's some like this is exactly what we do. We sit down with our global partnerships team and we'll bring ideas to them first and we'll say, Hey, like, what do you think of this? Does this make sense? Because we would have already vetted that my main goal is always fan value, fan engagement growth, right? How can I benefit the fan? Cause at end of the day, that's what for me, it matters the most. If our monthly active users is going down or not growing, then we're not doing something right. I can't necessarily get the fans in the door past the ticketing purchases.

But I can make sure they had a great experience and they're coming back. So what are the opportunities to do that? What are the offers we can, we can help with? How does GP kind of fit into that? And we'll sit down and we'll strategize on some of the ideas that we'll bring to the table and, and they'll say, Hey, like, this is a great idea. We have a partner that'd be really interested in this and we'll, we'll come right out of the gate, ready to go as opposed to just, you know, trying a few different things and seeing what doesn't, what doesn't work. We'll already know.

And so I'm very excited about that partnership. you know, I've only been, I've only been running this team for about two, three years now. So we're still, and having just gotten the new apps out last year, we're still really doubling down and learning what the synergies are and the best way to do certain things are. But that's, you know, I think I like to call the track factor, right? When you can win for the business, win for the fan. It's, it's really important. And it's the ultimate outcome when, when all three went.

Sean (18:38.69)
Most definitely. One of the things in apps is, we sort of spoke about utility and ticketing is the obvious one, having the digital ticket in the app. Are there any other things that you've been putting into your apps that are in that in -stadium engagement, getting people to use the app when they're in the arena?

Jon (19:00.159)
Yeah. So we're going, undergoing a massive renovation, actually a three year renovation right now. really, really exciting. And so that, creates both excitement and frustration because certain gates will be closed. And so how do we help the way finding, how do we help fans just get to their seat? Right. Like, it's not a task can be daunting sometimes, especially in the middle of a Toronto winter when it's really, really cold outside.

So this year we're doubling down on things like we have something called a live activity for your ticket. So on your lock screen of your phone, it will show you for the Leafs and the Raptors, it will show you your seat location and row and whatnot. And how many times, you know, yourself when you go to a game, even though you sat in your seat for, you know, half a game already, you go to the washroom, go get a drink and come back and you're always double, triple checking, but you're having to open and look at your ticket. And so like just those little things where it's like,

It may not seem like the most useful thing, but when you're actually at the stadium, it helps a lot. really does. You know, another thing, another thing is just, you know, understanding, what food is where, at what level, what promotions are on your level, you know, how can we segment the app to deliver a better experience for those who are actually in the arena? we've doubled down this year and, and I've built a new section of the app that we're calling game day.

And it's meant for both in, in, in, in venue and out of venue hands. And we're really, really excited to see, how it improves, how it was last year. We went from more 11. It was a bit of a static, a static page last year, and we're really doubling down the dynamicism of it to see, to get you what you want, depending on where you're.

Sean (20:39.392)
I mean, it's really good to hear those, you know, really functional, really strong use cases, but they're not like, they're not winning awards. not big shiny objects of, how are you rolling out the newest implementation or this new tech and, we've got to have this new shiny bell in our app. How do you balance, you know, high value, you know, high impact, but not high PR value, I guess, pieces like the one you just described to.

hey, there's all this new tech that we want, you we want the latest shiny thing in the app. How do you balance those type of, I guess, incoming features?

Jon (21:18.007)
Yeah. So obviously there's a lot of different considerations that go into it, ultimately at end of the day, we have incredible management here that help us, you know, set our North stars. And I think at the end of the day, what we really have tried to focus on this past couple of years is we want to have one big idea a season, ideally per quarter. But if we can, if we can do one really big thing per year and then get all the other little things right, right. It's 1 % better each day.

It actually is a massive impact and then end user experience. so, the amount of, first of all, the season goes by very quickly, like way quicker than you think. Right. So I think just being kind to ourselves, but you know, think just interrupt design and iterative iterative upgrades. It's really nice to just constantly see progress instead of just, you know, one big feature and nothing else. So, we're always working towards something big, but we're always, you know, constantly releasing small updates as we go, which ultimately make big impacts.

Sean (22:19.094)
I mean, one of those is, you know, we've seen some apps playing around with the AR, XR, augmented reality, that kind of piece. Is that something you've played in and found, I guess, a functional use for that tech?

Jon (22:33.003)
Yeah, definitely. We have stuff like that. think what we actually doubled down on last year, our incredible team, which is called the arcade or fan experience team. They built something that is more so projection based, I would say. So I'm not sure if you saw it, but it's called DJ dual or rink racer. And what they decided to do was during intermissions.

Everyone knows when they used to go to a baseball game that they'd have like the screen meter and it's like 100 level cheer against 300 level and whoever screamed the loudest, they would win. Well, they actually made it real and they made it real with your cell phone being the center of the, of the device feedback. And so, during the first intermission, a few times last year, we'd have Carlton, the bear superimposed on the ice and all the lights turn out and they'd have 100 level versus 300 level.

And when you join the game, you know, scan a QR code you would tap, each level would tap on their phone and whoever cohesively tapped together the most, the bear would skate faster on the ice. And so, you know, I know you're talking about like AR XR, but I think like that's a really nice like in between engagement type where there's still, you know, feedback with like in your hand, but you're seeing something visually projected on the ice. And it was really, really cool to see them come up with something like that.

You know, I definitely felt very gyps growing up knowing that I always remember the day when I found that it wasn't real. didn't matter how, yeah, how much I yelled. now for, you know, our kids and the new generations to be like, no, like it actually matters. Like I actually can, can affect the outcome of that. think it's just so neat. It's a cool use of tech.

Sean (24:15.744)
Yeah, it is one of those myths that gets dispelled pretty quickly when you're in work in sports and you find out that noise -o -meter is just a video that they play every week. But still people cheer. But I do really love that gaming element and sort of getting people involved. Again, having a reason for people to engage, you know. And then you've also got that data piece of knowing people are leaning in stadium.

Sean (24:44.45)
One of the things I did spot n your LinkedIn is you recommended a book hooked by Nia. I hope I'm getting someone and how to build habit forming products. What are some of the things that you've applied from that book to put more habit forming pieces in your apps?

Jon (25:03.125)
Yeah, so at the end of the day, it's about, you know, there's a lot of psychology that goes into this stuff. And the, know you've probably heard the word gamification over and over again, it's kind of gone away now, but it actually is a huge part of our day to day. Look at Duolingo. Look what they've done just by the daily reminders, right? Don't lose your streak. So, that stuff's always in the back of my mind. Absolutely. But I'm not trying to get anyone hooked on the app.

For any other reason than they're just a loyal fan and they just want they just know where to go for the content. I feel like we have some sort of like a moral compass for this type of stuff in this industry. And I think it's important to make sure that, you know, while they find things useful, that they're still easy to break away and get back to reality and enjoy the game, right? Like the last thing we want is for the fans to be stuck on their phone when there's a live game happening. Right.

So again, that's, know, certain what certain points are we engaging with the fans and when are we not created something called Team Drop where it's a chat and fans win prizes and it's only before a game. We really don't do much during the game on purpose. know, Rink Racer runs during the intermission. So yeah, there was a lot of amazing information in that book and it's scary when you read a little bit of how they're able to do it and you look at Instagram and TikTok and like how many times have you, you you sit down for five minutes and before you know it's been 45 minutes, say, what did I just do with that time? Right?

So the population is becoming more apparent to that and I think it's a good thing. But at the same time, it was definitely a very fantastic read to understand the amount of research that they put into this stuff. But again, I think we have a moral obligation to do the right thing, right? On our end.

Sean (26:56.962)
And I think sports apps in particular aren't in that duolingo, candy crush, trying to pull you back in every day, of, here's another shiny loot box to bring you back in, which can be very habit forming. But we're always working with either the digital teams or the marketing teams to have that cadence of, we want the fan has a routine that from on game day, whether they're going to the stadium or not.

Sean (27:26.306)
It's like, can your app and your content engage in those points? So whether it's I'm hopping on the train and I've got this 15 minute or 30 minute and that's when I engage with the app or as I walk in. And so it's sort of trying to get those key moments in that journey that you want the app to be part of. Is that sort of the habit forming that you want, which is a healthy one and part of their usual fan journey?

Jon (27:50.305)
Yeah, that's exactly it. and, and that's exactly what we're doing this redoing this section called game day, right? Cause we realize that game star, like the game journey actually begins from the moment you buy the tickets, right? Like you're, you're already thinking about the day, what time are you going to get up? When are you going to leave? When are you going to meet your friend? Where are you going to go for dinner? What time do have to leave out? What's the weather like? Like it's literally checklists of things just to get to the game. Nevermind once you're there. So any way that we can help, with that, is a massive win for us, right?

Like we should remove those friction points and surface content or relevant information when needed. And again, it's not just about just going to the game because it's not, you know, there's only 20 ,000 seats on any given night, but millions of fans around the world. So again, how do we, how does the app adapt for those fans in those moments? And again, it's high performing, right? Like that's, that is why we launched a team chat for all of our sports teams because fans do want to chat.

It doesn't matter if they're not here or not.that loyal fans always want to talk with other fans. you know, there's even been romances in some of the chats, right? And it's just so neat to see these people who have all the shared interests and camaraderie and cheer for the same thing to kind of get together on a nightly basis and just really enjoy a sport.

Sean (29:07.474)
Well, we're recording this. We're effectively in the almost pre -season for the NBA and NHL. And your team's obviously putting in a lot of work to get that new build or that new launch of extra features. And there is a bit of a sigh of relief. When you hit launch and it goes live and you go, know, terrific. But then, there's a lot of heavy lifting to tell the fans and market to them to say, hey, we've got this new feature. Here's what game day looks like.

Sean (29:35.894)
Here's how to get around the stadium because of renovations. How do you work with your teams from a marketing and getting that message out to say, because your app's been around for years and years, you've got to either tell people to download it or, hey guys, it's not the app that you haven't used for two years, come back and check us out. What's that marketing piece look like to start pulling fans back in?

Jon (29:59.339)
Yeah. So I think that's obviously always evolving with technology and whatnot. You know, this year, ticket master tickets will only be available in the app. So, right. There's a whole marketing push just for that. And that's, although that's not a primary, like a singular primary use, it is a massive use for the app for anyone who goes, right? So like, it's almost, a natural progression on that side or a natural thing that happens because they're going to need it. So just by that one thing alone, the app will go up.

On the other side, know, last year we wrote a whole campaign called the New Season New App. This is the first time we redesign our apps in a few years. And it was really neat. We had, you know, some of the star players. I wrote a player script and we had some of the star players read it and they posted on social media with, you know, links back to the app and we were able to track success metrics and KPIs that way.

And it's pretty surreal to see, you know, come up with an idea and like see a star you idolize and, and I've been watching read something that you came up with off the top of your mind and then have it be live, right? For other people to see. then nevermind that it's the feedback that you get, right? And unfortunately you always get more negative feedback and positive feedback on the internet. I'm sure, I'm sure you hear all about that. but yeah, it's, it's, it's always obviously evolving.

And I think at end of the day, we're always looking for those, those massive, key moments, through the fan season. Last year we had All -Star, right? So was big opportunity for us here in Toronto and I think it would have been over 20 years since I'd have been here. we look at the key moments on the calendar. What are the big games? What are the big rivalry games? What are the theme nights? And we try to weave in a story on the app side as well.

Sean (32:15.446)
They might not be as a big of Leafs fan as an Aveds fan or a big Raptors fan. Has that onboarding piece been something you really focus on to make sure that that experience is easier and better for them and they get that sort of ticket onboarding experience?

Jon (32:30.987)
Yeah, absolutely. Because again, like I said before, they don't know what they don't know. So if they don't know that they can get this really cool feature of like the live activities for their tickets on the home screen or even just the score, right? The live score on the home screen. Then that's a that's a massive, massive miss for us. And typically, you know, you want to go with, you know, the less the most frictionless features that people will find the most value in and then naturally they will find the other maybe more complicated features.

So, you know, the, know, called the low hanging fruit or whatnot, but yeah, it's, it's definitely, a priority of ours to get just those simple things. and I don't want to, I don't want to use terms from the book hooked, but yeah, right. Like how do you hook them to say like, Hey, like this is actually really valuable. and I, I find this a value add to my, to my game day experience. yeah.

Sean (33:23.97)
Yeah, most definitely. I I think the digital ticketing is, know, particularly a gateway to say, hey, here's all the other things that we're offering. I wanted to get your take on the explosion that is AI. I mean, it's obviously very much disrupting the world of content and writing, but it's also something that is available as a tool for coders from a debugging point of view. You can also tackle it from a design point of view.

Is it something that you're starting to play with and sort of exploring how it can be used both for yourself, but then also inside your team.

Jon (33:58.743)
Absolutely. think if you don't use it, then you're going to fall behind very quickly. It's obviously here to stay. It's definitely far from perfect. We've it a few times over the past couple of years. As mentioned, WSC, one of our partners, has maximized it to its potential and we're harnessing that. I think there's a lot of fantastic use cases like game recaps or game previews where…

It can very easily pull historic matchups versus two teams, what to watch for, how the night had gone the previous night. But it's just not where it needs to be right now. I think we'll probably, you know, it seems like there's a new chat GBT version every month now. So I would imagine by the end of this year, it'll be in a really, really good spot. know, fans, fans want to consume content, however they prefer, right? It should be up to them what media they choose. So.

They want to read about a game preview or watch it. We should have both those things on it. And I'm really excited as a fan to see that as well, because, maybe you have bad reception and you're on the trainer on the subway and you just want to read. But I think again, there's tons of use cases and specifically sports and you know, I think sports is also very happy to embrace technology. NBA is on a fantastic job at that. They're constantly pushing that. Same with the NFL. And so, yeah, I think there's going to be tons more use cases that kind of rear their head and this year alone.

Sean (35:27.936)
Yeah, I mean, I, you know, initially I was looking at it from that content point of view, but yeah, more recently I've sort of been sucked back into the world of coding because now you can literally, you know, go to something like Claude and say, please redesign this page. Here's a screenshot. How else could it be done? And it can write the code, but also start doing some design.

So, you know, I think there is a future where you're, you know I remember doing pair programming with another programmer and we would sort of work on each other's code, like that can be an AI code assistant or an AI designer that can give you six more iterations of what that screen might look like that you might not have thought of. So it is going to be interesting to see how it helps and potentially quickens development or also the development of these AI chatbots, like

If you want to have a fan, you know, if you want to be talking with a fan while you're watching a Raptors game, we might be at a point where it's a bot that gets developed and it's just talking to the fan and it produces that stickiness and that on the couch experience. So there's so much in that space.

Jon (36:39.383)
What about if I wanted a broadcasters voice, a certain broadcasters voice like Snoop Dogg or whoever I wanted to be running the broadcast? That stuff's all gonna be, obviously broadcast rights aside, right? Like that's TBD, but that stuff is already technically possible. It's just about getting alignment on it. So obviously the future is personalization, another word that I'm not a huge fan to use, but that's where we're going and it's exciting and the fans deserve it, right?

Jon (37:09.215)
I think at end of the day. you should have the experience that you want. And yeah, AI will definitely take us there, it's gonna, still a lot of room to go, but I think it's definitely here to stay.

Sean (37:21.088)
Yeah, and it is going to be, again, following what other apps and how they're better in integration of the AI. And that's where I think it will be. It'll be integrated. Like you said, we're already using a lot of tools that are using AI slash machine learning that are in that same space like WSC that is picking the best highlight because of this and cutting it this way. I think that's where that integration piece will where most of the AI will be used.

Sean (37:48.93)
But yeah, being able to use it as a co -pilot, is obviously Microsoft's version. like, I think, you know, being able to have that, that assistant, I have been asking guests recently about their tech stack and some of the tools that they, they use on a regular basis. What are some of the tools that are in your toolkit or your team's toolkit that, that are helping you do what you do.

Jon (38:08.545)
I'll be honest, Figma, do screens, prototypes, we do presentation decks. We live in there that you can literally get a design to be so realistic by mirroring it on your phone that we've had people say like, this isn't live. They think it's real app. having grown up in this industry, going from Photoshop to Sketch to where we are now, it's absolutely incredible.

I hate to say it, but like designers have this power to make thoughts and ideas be real, right? Like, things you can interact with. And it's such an amazing thing to, to have an idea and to test it right away and be able to launch it and get feedback. we're at this amazing place and time right now where it's just, it's so easy to get that data and get feedback and make the right, make an informed data driven decision. Right. So, Figma is definitely day in, day out, across the whole team. Yeah, that's I'd answer that.

Sean (39:10.69)
I mean, it does feel like all the tools that are available are sort of aligned with that Mark Zuckerberg phrase of, make things fast, break things and get that learning. Is it something that you sort of align with to say, hey, we want to test this. What is the minimum viable product look like? How can we get it in? And then, it is something that we want to do and it can expand.

Jon (39:35.223)
Absolutely. Yeah, we have a pretty good segmentation done over here and we're always, always trying to figure out what's working and what's not. And what may work for someone may not work for another someone else. And I think that's what's probably the most difficult thing about having the four different team apps. Cause we purposely designed and launched all four apps last year as very similar styles and layouts, but we know that they will eventually change based on usage patterns and

It's up to us keep, keep ahead of those curves. because what may work for the Argos app may not work for the Raptors app just by way of the fans and demographics and their age and whatnot. So, it's really neat, but also like a very big, big thing that we have to keep our eye on.

Sean (40:22.348)
Do you, from an architecture point of view, try to keep all of those apps pretty modular? So if you're gonna run something on the Argos and it works well, then it is easy to pick up and transform and take across to the Leafs? Is that something that's both an advantage but also constricts you a little bit because you're like, wanna keep everything, have some transportability?

Jon (40:43.007)
Yeah. And I mean, like, I think, I think, first of all, you need to, you need to always be testing, right? You always need to see, well, is this going to work? Like if it works here, does it work there? and by keeping it modular, does allow you to test those things. and I think, you know, again, we owe it to the fans to see how they respond to it at end of the day, but we are very fortunate in that sense that we have the four teams to, try different things with, right. And see what works.

So WSC was a perfect example, it was a massive hit for the Leafs and so we're going to roll it out with the Raptors, right? And so things like that, but how we start and what we start on and that changes as the seasons go on, that's for sure.

Sean (41:27.81)
We sort of spoke about it before, whether you're a coder designer, there is a lot of similarities in different industries, but sport has its differences. Like you do get pretty unvarnished feedback on social media from sports fans that you wouldn't do at a bank, because no one has so much passion as they do as a sports fan. If you've got any advice for someone that wants to work in the world of sports that has tech and design skills like yourself.

Jon (41:55.915)
Yeah, it's, it's not the easiest industry to obviously break into. But I think at the end of the day, if you show your passion and I think at the end of the day, if you can go above and beyond your expectations, which, know, is definitely easier said than done, right? It is a lot easier said than done. But if you can do more than what's required of you and show that you're thinking about outside the box, bringing different initiatives that someone else hadn't thought of.

You know, I will shout out a team member right now. Danine steven Otto on our team. used to, was in ticketing for nine years and she expressed a desire to get into design and we made that opportunity happen for her. And she is absolutely crushing it on our team and becoming an insanely valuable member, with what she's done. And so there are those opportunities there, right?

Here's an example of someone from ticketing and, and made this happen. with the opportunity. But, you know, those are few and far between, right? But all you can do is put yourself in that position. So however, if you really want to work for a sports team, do whatever you have to do to get in and just kind of go from there.

Sean (43:11.37)
I I think it is a growing, I guess, segment of sport. lot of that app development, web design development has been either outsourced or managed centrally. And there's been more teams going, we want more control. We want to tell our story. We want to do our own app, which is a big endeavor. It's not an easy thing to say, hey, we want to do our own app. it is a particular set of skills. That's not just, hey, know sports. You've got to know how to design.

Sean (43:40.162)
You've got to know how to code and deploy and all of those things. So, yeah, I think there is opportunities there, but like you said before, those deadlines, they don't move. And so being able to manage which features going in, which feature is good enough to go in and hitting those deadlines, that's the pressure that sport has that I don't think other corporates or other industries necessarily have.

Jon (44:09.399)
But you've never felt so alive. That's what I'll say.

Sean (44:11.778)
No, exactly. Yeah, there's I mean, you get those peaks and valleys of, you know, 15 ,000 people, 20 ,000 people going into the stadium that are all using your app in that three hour period. You know, you don't you don't get that in, you know, other industries, if you're building an app for a supermarket or, you know, in finance, you don't get those peaks and troughs, but also that, that euphoria, like you said, of a win and boom, everyone's coming in and consuming your content or, you know,

Sean (44:39.562)
tapping their phone furiously to watch the rink racer, those kind of things are definitely the rewarding parts of sports.

Jon (44:48.983)
Yeah, you know, when you see someone using it and they're like, this is really cool. You're like, that you're like, really? I spent all the time on this other feature and that was like a, just a low level effort feature, but that's what they really enjoy. Like, you you don't get to choose, right? It's up to them, but you know, I will say this last year on my birthday, we were launching the Raptors Apple 5 a Like, you know, that was just the day of our happened. And the lease was also a 5 a launch time.

Sean (45:07.585)
Yep.

Jon (45:13.909)
You know, they're very good to us here, but you know, that's part of what is required in this industry. And so if you're not prepared to do that and probably won't get too far. but again, it's, because you have a passion for it, right.

Sean (45:26.21)
Most definitely. I mean, as we're discussing it, there's currently a content trend where admins and digital folk are going up to players and showing and getting them assigned old Facebook photos. Right? It's currently everywhere. Everyone's doing is a current trend. But I think the one for the developers is go up to a developer and say, here's your app from five years ago.

Sean (45:55.218)
And you would get the same reaction or, you know, here's what the app looked like in 2015. It's like, my goodness, we've come such a long way. like, think it's, I think you would get the same, you know, reaction from developers and designers goes, that's right. That's what our app, the app looked like five, six years, cause they've changed so much in the past, you know, 10 years, let alone five. What's that?

Jon (46:08.791)
And that's not even that long ago, Sean. Right? That's not even that long. It's not even that long ago, which is so incredible. Like five years ago. And it's so, so outdated already. Right. It's, you know, I've been doing this since 2008 to think about back then, but we had it. It's, it's laughable. So, you know, who knows where we'll even just be in five years.

Sean (46:29.502)
Is there any tech on the horizon, whether it be driven by new smartphones that is already on your radar to go, we've got to figure out how to use that piece of tech.

Jon (46:43.083)
You know, the whole like Apple headset was really neat. Obviously like just, you're not going to see people walking around wearing it. Although some people did. there's the XR AR glasses and super imposing stats of a game you're watching. You know, there's it being on your coffee table and projected up all that stuff's on the horizon. Absolutely. It's just like, what's going to be the most adaptable. still, I don't, I don't see a cell phone being the main item in the future, do think classes will probably eventually take over, right?

Like, I don't know how far that is. it's just too kind of too cumbersome to have to carry this thing around in your pocket. And wouldn't you just like to look at something and then be able to, you know, think about what, it is you want it to say. So I'm not trying to get too far in the future here, but, I can definitely see that the input, the input of the search will change.

Sean (47:35.296)
And is it, I mean, it's a little bit that sports isn't on the leading edge of a lot of those texts. It's a little bit of where does this, where did the streamers go? Where do other tech, whether other industries go to sort of break new ground to make that either that tech or that product more useful, more people using it. And then you go, okay, the ground has been broken. We can figure out what, how we might use that, that, whether that platform or that new tech stack for sports.

Jon (48:02.453)
Yeah, absolutely. I think again, being who we are, we definitely invest in that type of stuff, right? We want to know, we want to try to push those boundaries of what's going to be usable. But at end of the day, it's about market adoption, right? So cell phones is where whatever one's using right now. So we're definitely mostly focused on that, but we definitely have a division called SportsX that focuses on that type of stuff.

Sean (48:28.802)
Yeah, I mean, I look back at for a while there, Facebook was pushing 360 degree video and you you'd hold your phone up and look all around and it had a little bit of cool factor but then and then people were doing 360 whole streams. It's like it didn't have the length of people going in there watching the stream for forever. So it didn't quite catch on. So sometimes, you know, if you're too far on that, you know, bleeding edge, you're putting too much effort into something that's not really gonna not really gonna take.

Jon (48:55.969)
Yeah, absolutely.

Sean (48:57.91)
So John, I wanna get to the Sports Geek closing five. Do you remember the first sports event you ever attended?

Jon (49:05.473)
Yeah, Toronto Blue Jays. Definitely was yelling as loud as I could thinking that I was making an impact with that noise level meter in the outfield there. So exciting, so exciting.

Sean (49:16.386)
Terrific. I've been, yeah. Yeah. I've been to a Blue Jays game. It's a, it's a good place to watch a game. You would have obviously been to a lot of sports events. and as much as the app development scene has grown in the past 20 years, so has the food scene in at sports. Do you have a, do you have a favorite food memory or a go -to food?

Jon (49:36.533)
Yeah, you know, I never got to actually try this, but I always wanted to try something called the Rothless Burger. I don't know if you'd ever heard of it from Pittsburgh Steelers. They used to have a quarterback named Ben Rothless Burger and they got an idea to make a burger in the stadium that was a patty with sausages and cheese and fried eggs. It's just the most absurd thing you probably have ever heard. And I always, I always got a good kick out of that. Never got to try it.

Sean (50:05.538)
That would definitely be a mouthful. Managing multiple teams across multiple properties, app deploys at 5 a What's the first app you open in the morning?

Jon (50:15.009)
Yeah.

Jon (50:19.067)
It's got to be the score. I love my aggregate news from all over. I like the opinion pieces, like to know what's going on in the sports world. Fantastically well -designed app out of Canada.

Sean (50:34.332)
And is there someone that you follow it might be someone you follow on a social or it might be an author That the podcast listeners should give a follow on why?

Jon (50:45.291)
You know, I just found this gentleman this past year and his name's Alex Coppola. I'm not sure if you heard of him. He's a incredible, lot of presidents on, LinkedIn with partner sponsorships and engagement tactics and whatnot. And, I've, I really like how he, you know, he basically services things that, other teams are doing. All right. And so it's become like a really great resource for us to see how other teams are executing certain partnerships and marketing and marketing.

campaigns.

Sean (51:16.482)
Terrific. And then lastly, you can answer this from a personal point of view and you can put on a team hat or two on. But what social media platform is your MVP?

Jon (51:28.855)
For connecting with people, definitely LinkedIn. And then for just Ruckus and News, X, absolutely. Two very different breeds of people on there, but both definitely valuable.

Sean (51:45.986)
Terrific. And John, if people are listening to this episode and want to reach out and know more, or at least say thank you for taking the time, what is the best way for them to do so?

Jon (51:56.437)
You can definitely find me on LinkedIn at John Wolf. And there's definitely a few of us out there with that name, but I'm the one that works at MLSE. yeah, definitely appreciate this. Sean, really thank you for taking the time and speaking with me.

Sean (52:10.775)
Not a problem. I really appreciate it and talk to you soon.

Jon (52:14.39)
Absolutely.