Sean Callanan chats with Colin Kelly from the Los Angeles Football Club about digital and building a fan base that now fills the Banc of California Stadium.
On this podcast you'll learn about:
- Colin Kelly on his journey into digital and sports business industry
- What it was like working in digital during the early sports web space
- The challenges of building a fan base
- How do they integrate fan opinion and stories into their digital efforts
- How they leverage social ad platforms
- What is the 3252 Supporters' Group and how it all started
Listen to Colin Kelly on Sports Geek
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Our fave quote from Colin Kelly interview
This has become our mantra that we're now putting it on merch – Street by street. Block by block. One by one. If we can make that one fan, he tells his friend and tell to another one. It became a very grassroots thing.
Colin Kelly on the early days of building the LAFC community
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About Colin Kelly
Colin Kelly has over 14 years of experience in connecting with sports executives, producers, content providers and developers. He has been able to deliver influential messages for well-known names in sports.
Colin's career in sports started through an internship where producing blog content, photos, videos, fan commentary and web development for the University website. After his stint at the Uni, he moved in to a role at National Hockey League working on content, covering live games and being the ‘go-to' problem solver for the teams in the league.
He took a break from the league scene for a while and worked on news and commentary at the CBS Local in New York and founded his own digital newsletter UpStrt. In 2015, he joined the New York City Football Club and managed their digital platforms, pages, applications and website content. Today, Colin continues to do his passion for digital as the Vice President of Digital for the Los Angeles Football Club.
Resources from the podcast
- Connect with Colin Kelly on Twitter @colintkelly, Instagram and LinkedIn
- Follow LAFC on Twitter @LAFC, Facebook, Instagram, Youtube and LinkedIn
- Some related articles you might want to read:
- Some Sports Geek episodes you might be interested in:
- Bryan Srabian on digital the San Francisco Giants way
- Al Guido from San Francisco 49ers on stadiums, fan and digital
- Scott Kegley from Minnesota Vikings on digital, media and innovation
- New York sports digital scene with Jayne Bussman-Wise
- Follow and support Gravitas on the OPL season of the League of Legends. Visit Gravitas.gg now
- Need help with your team or athlete's digital? Go to Sports Geek Social Media Athlete Training
- Learn more about Sports Geek's Digital to Dollars process
- Loved this podcast episode? Leave us a review on Apple Podcasts
- Join Sports Geek Nation to connect with sports business executives across the world
- Already a member of Sports Geek Nation? Check out the AMA with Simon Murphy full transcript on the Members Area
- See the highlights from Simon Murphy on building a smartwatch app that eases referee administration
Highlights from podcast with Colin Kelly
3:21 How Colin Kelly got into the sports business industry
6:09 Transitioning from journalism to a league role at the National Hockey League
6:56 What digital was like in the early sports web space at NHL
11:58 How his digital role at the New York City Football Club opened new opportunities at the Los Angeles Football Club
14:19 What are the challenges in building a fan base for LAFC
18:00 The impact of moving to the Banc of California Stadium for the team
19:31 How does the digital team work with other departments to fill in the stadium seats
21:06 Getting full fan support from The 3252 Club
24:35 Colin on how they are producing high quality content
28:01 Finding conversion success in LAFC Facebook and Instagram
35:47 How do they keep fans engaged to their digital content
39:47 LAFC’s partnership with Youtube TV
40:44 Getting inspiration from the community
41:16 Sports Geek Closing Five
50:46 Sean gives an overview on a quick #SportsGeekTrip and presentation at the NSF
55:36 Gravitas partnership with Pickstar. Read full details here
56:30 Join Sean and the Gravitas team on March 5th at GG EZ Bar in Melbourne for the Esports for Brands event. Learn how your brand can connect with esports and gaming audiences. Go to sgesports.com/esports-for-brands
Some tweets you may have missed:
Best of luck in Season Two
#LAFC is soccer and more… It's a celebration of Los Angeles.
Season Two starts on Sunday.
🎟 https://t.co/ilcCU9jAch pic.twitter.com/A00nJ0ftLl
— LAFC (@LAFC) February 26, 2019
The awesome 3252 Black Army
March 3.
Be here: https://t.co/g2VSSy2fIi pic.twitter.com/SKVETws2eR
— LAFC (@LAFC) February 21, 2019
A peek into LAFC's partnership with YoutubeTV
A sneak peek at Media Day 👀#LAFC pic.twitter.com/RwzCDdOcaV
— LAFC (@LAFC) February 12, 2019
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Join the SG Esports event
Learn how your brand can connect with esports and gaming audiences
We are hosting brands and savvy marketers at an event on Tuesday March 5 to explain esports and the opportunities, more info on the event here
If you are interested in esports please come along or if you know someone who may benefit please invite them.
See you at SEAT in Salt Lake City
Join us at SEAT Conference in Salt Lake City Utah on July 14-15 2023. Many of our podcast guests are SEAT attendees.
SEAT is the conference where sports technology executives unite to discuss and solve the tech problems the sports industry is facing. Collaboration across multiple tracks of technology, digital and data has helped the sports industry deliver improvements across stadium access, wi-fi, security, fan engagement, social media, digital content, ticketing and sponsorship revenue. Sean Callanan, Sports Geek
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