This transcript has been lightly edited by AI
Sean: So what strategies have you found work well to get data from Facebook and Twitter into your database? Are there specific campaigns or tools you've used to get more of that data into your system?
Aaron: We've tried a few things with our marketing automation tool. We've done something with Twitter where we know who our followers are and we're able to direct message the followers with a strong call to action. The key is it needs to be a very strong call to action, because you're messaging to them where they're not expecting it. People don't want to be messaged unless they really know you and have that relationship with you.
What we did is we delivered a strong call to action through a direct message for a sweepstakes. We found about 10% responded to that direct message and we were able to capture that data. There are tools out there – we've worked with Woobox for Facebook, and there are plenty of others similar to that. These tools integrate with Facebook, which is all about delivering quality so fans are willing to share their information with you.
It's making sure you don't betray that fan trust. A lot of fans and consumers on Facebook see the “publish my information” option, but people are starting to back away from those. So it comes back to delivering content and delivering quality content.
It's not only for your website, but for your social media, email campaigns, and contests. You have to deliver something quality that your fans like, then they'll be willing to share information. They'll be willing to pay for tickets as long as you're delivering a plan that fits their needs.
Sean: I definitely think there is pushback from fans. They're not as open as they were a couple of years ago giving over their data. I don't know if that's because the NSA's reading everyone's emails or we've just had new privacy laws in Australia. Fans are more wary so you really have to raise the bar as a sports team when running a competition from a fan experience point of view.
Then you've got to deliver high quality email newsletters and information to the fans. Otherwise, they're not going to open those emails.
Aaron: You pointed out the privacy laws that you just had in Australia. That's something talked about a lot in the States. We as marketers have to be cognizant of these privacy laws. A lot of trust is put into the marketer's hands to self-govern, so we need to make sure we don't violate the consumer's trust, because the more we violate that trust the harder it will be to do these things in the future.
Our goal is to deliver relevant and timely content. We're not just delivering the same content to everybody. With understanding more about the consumer we're able to deliver relevant and timely content, but we need to make sure we understand the privacy laws in our jurisdictions and don't violate customer privacy.
Sean: The laws only came out recently in Australia and there are people spooked, but if you stick with not violating trust, and ask permission for what you want to do, and the fan has agreed, then you'll be fine. But you really can't violate that trust, because you'll lose fans quickly.
