Welcome to My Sandbox

Welcome to Field of Play - my pet project designed to start conversations on the marketing of sports.  It is my contention that as a rule, the sports industry is by and large full of lazy marketers.  Lazy, not in the sense that they don't work hard.  They do.  Any one who has worked in sports for any length of time has certainly logged their share of hours.  The lazy aspect comes in the form of an overall failure to think outside of ticket programs (how many ways can you bundle games, seats and concessions), advertising campaigns (what picture and slogan will be used for the billboard this year) and in venue promotions.

There are some amazing things being done in marketing these days.  With the explosion of technology and social media, the opportunities to reach people in new and interesting ways are endless.  So why, generally speaking, do we as sports marketers always find ourselves following instead of leading?  Lack of resources has been the typical response to this question and while this may be true in many instances, shouldn't that fact alone drive more innovation?  Hierarchy and stringent rules, especially in the college ranks, is also an easy excuse but that doesn't reconcile with the fact that some of the most explosive marketing ideas around today have come out of these environments.

Which brings me back to my premise that we are lazy.  It is the intent of this site to ask some questions, raise some issues and have a whole lot of dialogue about how we who are in the business of marketing sports, can become better sports marketers.  It is my hope that the few who drop by and engage will be interested in challenging and not defending the status quo.  We may end up in the exact same place but I don't think so.

So here we go.  First question.  Why on earth would you start a new sports blog?  There are hundreds of thousands already and many of them focus on the sports marketing angle.  That is an easy one - you guessed it - I am lazy.  It is much easier to ask a question than answer it....let the conversation begin.