Abraham Madkour Recaps the Launch Party
Sports Business Journal Executive Editor and Publisher Abraham Madkour attended the We’re Live! Inside the BIG Business of Sports Media launch party and shared this recap in his Sunday Forum column.
Good morning. I’ll see many of you at Leaders Week London, as more than 2,800 from across the global sports industry gather at Stamford Bridge. If you haven’t registered yet, there’s still time to join what will be a great week of content, speakers, networking, private forums and dinners — secure your pass here.
The message from Val Ackerman to the audience of Game Changers
Bold-face names hit Michael’s in New York to celebrate John Kosner and Ed Desser’s book launch
How teams are thinking about loyalty programs, ticket prices and inventory
Investors weigh women’s pro volleyball landscape
This Week’s Forum: The benefits of teams bringing content production in-house
I will share more thoughts from this week’s Game Changers in an upcoming Forum. But a major highlight was SBJ announcing the new Val Ackerman Legacy of Leadership Award, which will be presented annually at the conference. This award will recognize a woman whose career represents the highest standard of leadership, as well as vision, integrity and a commitment to advancing opportunities for women. Ackerman received two standing ovations from a full ballroom on Thursday, and her remarks and takeaways were the talk of the conference.
→ Thursday night I attended a book signing for longtime SBJ contributors John Kosner and Ed Desser, who co-wrote “We’re Live: Inside the Big Business of Sports Media.” The room was packed with bold-face names, especially from their days of working together at the NBA. There was Commissioner Adam Silver; the late David Stern’s son, Eric Stern; Stern’s longtime executive assistant, Linda Tosi; and Bill Koenig, Joel Litvin, Val Ackerman, Gregg Winik, Matt Winick, Brian McIntyre, Dan Mannix, Rob DiGisi, Tom Carelli, David Denenberg, Chad Evans, Steve Hellmuth, Neil McDonald and others, who posed for pictures from their NBA days. Others spotted: Mark Lazarus, Jon Miller, David Levy, Marv Albert, Joe Cohen, Joe Leccese, Brad Ruskin, Barry Blyn, David Proper, Cathy Flowers Yancy, Ed Erhardt, Ted Shaker. Apologies to those I missed!
Desser and Kosner shared a few thoughts on writing the book. Desser said, “The idea for the book came from loving to write our SBJ columns but always having trouble keeping them short enough. Not so with a book, I incorrectly thought. The entire process took three years. As we wrote, new industry developments (e.g., development of Amazon Sports) constantly challenged us to include more. We had an outline, and each of us took the lead on particular topics we knew best. John focused on digital. I focused on valuations, contracts and dealmaking. Each chapter got bounced back and forth for multiple rounds of improvements. After two years we had a manuscript. Little did we know it would take another year to edit, have reviewed by editors, reviews by colleagues, creation of art and all of the layout and proofing.”
Kosner added, “I loved IMG founder Mark McCormack’s book, ‘What They Don’t Teach You at Harvard Business School.’ In plain English, and with plenty of anecdotes, Mark explained how he built a terrific business. I dreamed about writing a similar book someday. So, in fall of ’23, when Ed suggested we write one together about the sports media business, I was in! Halfway through, when we weren’t making progress, I actually asked Ed if we should put the project on hold. Shortly afterwards, I was on a family trip in Mexico and Ed began bombing me with chapter drafts. I knew then we’d have a book!”
→ At a meeting in New York this week, someone asked my thoughts about their possible investment in a professional women’s volleyball team. My advice is that while I’m bullish on the sport and its prospects, I’d hold until there is one fully unified, aligned league. Right now, there are two main rival leagues in LOVB and Major League Volleyball, and while both have selling points, there are too many uncertainties to invest in one or the other. I’d wait on the sidelines until there is one league, which would have significantly more appeal to fans, sponsors and media partners.
→ Cleaning out my notebook from what I heard at AXS DRIVE:
• Loyalty programs can be an effective tool for teams, rewarding highly engaged fans, testing new programs and even gauging fan behavior. The New York Mets’ loyalty program launched two years ago and has 200,000 enrolled members. The team said 85% of its season-ticket holders use it frequently, with the Mets able to glean helpful data on concessions and retail sales, and they have learned how to offer better items and incentives to generate a higher redemption rate. To that point, they have seen steady growth in redemptions, most of which are on food and beverage and tickets. But it was interesting to hear the Mets be very clear-eyed in that it’s too early to determine if they are getting fans to incrementally more games, or getting them to spend more based on the offerings. The bottom line: Yes, the Mets have valuable information on specific buying habits, but understanding if they influenced key behaviors (ticket purchases, additional concessions, etc.) will require more time. I found this a valuable takeaway as teams consider loyalty programs across sports.
• Ask fans for their thoughts and you’ll get them — they are eager to volunteer their opinions. So many team decisions are made behind closed doors, but if you open up the process and ask the fans, you’ll get a lot of smart feedback and valuable data in the process. Here are a few examples. First, New York Islanders President Kelly Cheeseman said the well-publicized effort by the Isles to allow fans to submit designs for the team’s third jersey resulted in an astonishing 81,000 submissions, and 25,000 in the first 24 hours. Cheeseman admitted the most fascinating component was the data behind the effort — seeing a real-time graph of how fans were picking logos, colors, which generation of Islanders logos they wanted, which design they wanted. They added that into the fans’ persona stack that helps inform the team’s strategy going forward, especially on future jersey design. Chicago Bears SVP/Strategy and Analytics Corey Ruff said the Bears did a stadium survey and the response rate was nearly 75% — which is just unheard of in other industries. Finally, a team leader pulled me aside to say they have a group of 10,000 fans they keep on a digital panel for quick turnaround feedback and often get up to 50% response rates in fewer than two days. Fans are active and eager to let you know how they feel, so utilize that.
• I was a bit surprised about the lukewarm acceptance of facial recognition’s use for ballpark/facility entry. Every time the topic came up, there wasn’t consistent or universal adoption. Many openly said the technology alienates part of their fan base, so they are making it optional and building it into incentive programs. But the technology works, and the fans who do use it love it and keep coming back.
• Attendees buzzed about Buffalo Bills CSO Kate Hussmann’s presentation around the opening of Highmark Stadium, coming just a week after the team’s home opener. The thorough presentation touched on the team’s facility history, the story of getting to the new stadium and the symbolic and significant touchpoints. Also noted was the financial gain from moving into the new facility, with the Bills posting $264 million in PSL revenue, far exceeding the original projection of $125 million. Meanwhile, ticketing revenue is up 30%, even though the Bills have the smallest capacity in the NFL, and suite revenue is up 48%, despite reducing inventory to 79 suites. Finally, year-to-date sponsorship revenue is up 30%, with the Bills moving up from 28th in sponsorship revenue to 19th. So, very impressive financial metrics that mean the Bills are in a different grouping of NFL teams when it comes to revenue. Hussmann also discussed the challenges after the team’s first open scrimmage led to social feedback about some limited obstructed seats and sightlines. Her advice: Overprepare for immediate, viral feedback. All in all, an impressive, comprehensive presentation by Hussmann.
→ From the notebook:
I am struck by how many team and facility leaders stress to me that if they could improve areas of their facility, it would be around sound and lighting, especially sound quality ... There was an emphasis on creating more and enhanced standing-room-only options ... Teams discussed monetizing experiences as add-ons to the ticket price, which could be pregame sideline access, pictures on the field, a pregame tailgate or other elements. For years, those were complimentary, so there is a fine line between giving them away and adding real value to the experiences and charging for them ... Ticketing leaders discussed which revenue/sales metric they are focused on. Some agreed that it used to be overall revenue or price per ticket. Now, some emphasize revenue per seat more than average ticket price, focusing on how they are maximizing all the seats in the building ... Customer lifetime value was a frequent topic, as in understanding a consumer’s total spend across an organization — from merchandise, food, parking and other elements. AI is helping teams understand that much better. One team exec discussed a fan who had spent thousands of dollars on merchandise in less than a year but had never been to a game, so trying to engage with that fan in other areas is a focal point. There were other, “softer” areas around fan connections to keep them engaged for life, such as finding those ambassadors and mining that relationship. Some elements, like these, are harder to measure than others.
→ Overheard at AXS DRIVE:
• “Name an AI owner. We surveyed 50 teams, and 80% didn’t have an owner of their AI strategy. So, name an AI owner.” —StellarAlgo SVP Lee Schmold’s advice to teams
• “Yes, I did. I asked Claude if it was sure.” —a team person relaying what a staffer said when asked, time and again, if the staffer had validated the AI data
→ Reader feedback:
• As you noted, we lost two great ones (in George Gillett and Ernie Accorsi). George was everything you said: brilliant, affable, and really fun to be with. His contributions to the modern ski business were significant and he was so customer-centric! He invented the nametag featuring your hometown and your first name. He wore his proudly: “George - Racine, WI”
• Ernie was one of the most straightforward and honest guys ever. He was a perfect match for Wellington Mara. Two guys with enormous integrity. Ernie knew a lot about Super Bowls. He won one Super Bowl and built the roster for two more. That’s an accomplishment. He should be in the Hall of Fame.
→ If you missed Morning Buzzcast, check out this week’s episodes here.
See our early access stories of the week below, and this week’s Forum, where I look at an important trend — the benefits of teams bringing content production in-house.
