The Rally Monkey. BIRFing. Tanking. Selling to non-fans.
These were just a few of the topics discussed at the 15th version of the Sport Marketing Association conference in Boston, hosted (in part) by the Boston Red Sox.
If you aren’t familiar with SMA, it’s an annual gathering of sport marketing faculty and a few curious industry practitioners who convene in order to review the latest research by some of the world’s most intellectually curious sports marketing researchers.
It’s a grab-bag of concepts, discoveries and interaction between the folks who live the business and the university professors who study the business.
The two of us attend each year, usually to present our own research, but more often than not to get our collective fingers on the pulse of the “Academy” and thus see how the findings of the past year actually sit with the folks who are making decisions for the Celtics, Cowboys, Cavaliers or Canucks.
In the case of the Los Angeles Angels’ nearly forgotten Rally Monkey, Brendan Dwyer from VCU, a noted researcher in the area of fantasy sports, and Mark Slavich from Grand View University, looked at team superstitions and determined that teams can generate new revenue from long-held fan superstitions. The reason? Superstitions give the team supporter a sense of control over the outcome of the game. Objects associated with the superstition or ritual (think Seattle’s 12th man fan avidity) often become must-have merchandising purchases for long-suffering fans.
When the Rally Monkey worked his mojo for the Angels (first in 2000 and then again, most famously, during the 2002 World Series), it wasn’t long before fans wanted some of that same comfort for use in the stands. And right now on Amazon, you can buy an Angels-identified Rally Monkey bobblehead for just $24.
The Rally Monkey became a beloved (and revenue-generating) icon for the Angels.getty images
Want something completely different? And, to be honest, surprising?
Swinburne University’s Heath McDonald presented work he did with Dan Funk from Temple that made a case suggesting the non-fan (a term they defined) of a professional sport club could be a source of knowledge and even revenue for clubs.
Wonder how that works? Well, in reviewing a large sample survey of non-fans avoiding the Australian Football League, McDonald and Funk reported non-fans clustered into five segments including the unreachable (“Haters”), the “Dabblers” and “Informed Rejecters.” What was interesting to them was seeing that these subsets could provide key information on barriers clubs need to overcome for developing new fans.
Want another topic we saw?
How about BIRFing. That’s social psychology speak for Basking in Reflected Failure, which is a corollary to a famous Robert Cialdini research paper called “Basking in Reflected Glory” that recognized when teams did well, fans (and bandwagon jumpers) often used the pronoun “we.” As in, “We won. We rule. We are the Champions (to give rock band Queen a shout-out).”
The opposite fan behavior (called CORFing for “cutting off reflected failure”) identified that when teams lost, fans cut their losses, bandwagons emptied and the dejected announced, “They suck. They always screw up. They lost.”
But BIRFing (research generated by UNC’s Jon Jensen and scholars from Indiana, Louisville and LSU) used a 10-year study to look at teams such as the Cubs and Red Sox that held onto their fans through years of heartbreak. It was fascinating material and suggested sustained losing may still have a silver lining (our words, not theirs).
Importantly, the Jensen research emphasized that team marketing managers can succeed in a context filled with on-the-field challenges and failures.
The next SMA presentation we want to feature was one that involved “tanking.”
We all know what tanking is. The Browns have been perfecting that concept throughout the 2017 NFL season. The old L.A. Clippers were masters at this.
But how does it affect fans of teams that make the unofficial decision to tank? How do fans respond when it becomes clear their favorite team is playing for a first-round draft pick and not for them (in that current season)? Can bad teams afford to inform their faithful backers, “we are losing a lot right now for you … in order to give you a better team years from now”?
Finally, but not least among many impressive papers was this: Although Rio 2016 is in the past, research done around the Games is still emerging.
In a very engaging session, Andrea Geurin of New York University and some of her colleagues presented preliminary findings about the International Olympic Committee’s Rule 40 — the rule scaled back from the 2016 Games — and how it influenced athletes’ use of social media. Their analysis, based on a content analysis of Instagram visual (photos/videos) and written (captions) content made by U.S. Olympians in a six-week period around the Games, found evidence that athletes were able to showcase their personal sponsors with use of the images (not written words) in line with Rule 40.
To us, that suggested Rule 40 has been effective in supporting athletes and allowing the IOC to protect its sponsors’ rights.
In addition to research presentations discussed above, SMA also included roundtables, breakout sessions and practitioner keynote talks, not to mention a significant amount of networking. We understand most industry professionals who read SportsBusiness Journal are not going to go mining for gold at an academic conference, but we do think there are nuggets out there waiting to be found.
Particularly when the Rally Monkey can’t stop a team from tanking … which leads to BIRFing and a lot of social media frustration. But that’s OK because the Haters, Dabblers and Informed Rejecters really don’t care.
Rick Burton (rhburton@syr.edu) is the David Falk Professor of Sport Management at Syracuse University. Norm O’Reilly (oreillyn@ohio.edu) is the Richard P. & Joan S. Fox Professor and Sports Admin Department Chair at Ohio University. Their new book, “20 Secrets to Success for NCAA Student Athletes Who Won’t Go Pro,” was published recently by Ohio University Press.
