United City FC President, Eric M. Gottschalk, spoke at this week’s SportsPro Singapore event alongside industry veterans Mike Kerr, APAC Managing Director Bein Sports, Dat Pham, Sports Director VSDTC /K+ and Host Elliot Renton on “A New Era for D2C.” The discussion centered around the transformative potential of Direct-to-Consumer (D2C) strategies for sports fan engagement and loyalty in the APAC region.
During the discussion, Eric presented the state of Philippines football and UCFC’s innovative technology strategies to build a fan community and to unlock new revenue potentials:
UCFC responded strongly to the impact of the pandemic on sports and the absences of traditional matchday revenues in the Philippines football (ticketing, sponsorship, hospitality, merchandise), through the launch of its own blockchain powered fan app (developed by Blocksport).
Eric emphasized, “Football Clubs these days must evolve into technology companies within the media & entertainment space, allowing them to capture and most importantly owning critical audience data to be able to directly engage with its fans. We are moving away from transactional relationships (trying to sell fans a jersey) and instead working on building fan communities through fan chats, news portals, gamification, loyalty programs and access to exclusive contend for the most loyal fans.
Therefore, our approach is not “selling” football in the Philippines – we connect with our audiences and engage in direct communication and exchanges with them.”
The Philippines football league has recently expanded to 15 first division teams and efforts are made to assure the sustainability the league which should start with further endorsing technology and the ownership of critical audience data.
Stay tuned for more updates on how United City FC is pioneering fan engagement and leading the way in SEA in D2C strategies!
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