Increasing the Popularity of Major League Baseball among Children and Teens in Wichita, Kansas
(Instructor Name)
Summary
Wichita, Kansas has a minor league baseball team, the Wichita Wingnuts which plays in the AA League. The Commissioner of Major League Baseball would like to increase popularity of the game among children and young adults through a marketing program. The nearest MLB team is the Kansas Royals based in Kansas City. In addition, Oklahoma City in Oklahoma is looking to host a Major League Baseball team as well, and currently has a minor league baseball team, the Redhawks, which is the AAA affiliate of the LA Dodgers.
Given the proximity and presence of all these baseball teams, the need to grow Wichita’s interest in MLB is strong. With a population of over 600,000, the city is a significant target audience. To encourage the sport, kids and teenagers need to be targeted to show interest and get involved with baseball. Using online and offline events in collaboration, such as visits to the Kansas City Royals stadium, events around friendly exhibition matches between the local teams and the Royals, etc. the visibility and awareness of baseball among school kids and teenagers in Wichita can be increased.
Introduction
Wichita, Kansas is the biggest city in the State of Kansas, with a combined population of 673,000 across Wichita-Winfield area. It is also the heart of the small aviation aircraft industry, with Beechcraft, Cessna and Stearman Aircraft based there, and Learjet, Airbus, and Spirit AeroSystems having design and manufacturing facilities in Wichita, earning it the title of “Air Capital of the World” (City of Wichita, 2014). It also has a large student population as the Wichita State University (the third largest in Kansas) and a host of other universities are located here.
In sports, the city supports a NBA team, besides several professional, semi-professional and university teams. Wichita has a minor league baseball team, the Wichita Wingnuts which plays in the AA league (Wichita Wingnuts, 2014a). The nearest Major League Baseball team is the Kansas Royals team, located in Kansas City, Missouri (MLB, 2014) which made it to the World Series in 2014. Oklahoma City to the south of Wichita has a minor league AAA championship team, the Redhawks, affiliated to the LA Dodgers (MiLB website, 2014). The Commissioner of Major League Baseball is interested in developing more interested in baseball in Wichita. To do so, the target audience chosen has been the student population of the city.
SWOT Analysis
The advantages of generating baseball interest in the city are numerous. The city has a large population of students who can travel either to Kansas City or Oklahoma City to support their teams and watch the games during the season. Developing the city as follower can also lead to a major league baseball team being franchised there in the future. To evaluate the choice of city, a SWOT analysis can be done on the city.
Strengths:
- The city has a large population, and is the biggest in Kansas State.
- The city hosts a large aeronautical industry and therefore has a commercial base which can support the sports teams based here.
- The city has a large student population due to the numerous universities such as Wichita State University, Newman University and Friends University, all of which have active sports programs in different leagues.
- The city has been the home of professional baseball teams such as the Aeros and Wranglers, before the Wingnuts.
- Wingnuts won the AA championship Series in 2014, as well as the South Division title.
Weaknesses:
- The Wingnuts had a 2014 season attendance average of little over 3,000 per game, 7th in the AA League (Wichita Wingnuts, 2014b).
- The city has multiple sports teams including basketball, ice hockey and soccer.
Opportunities:
- Corporate sponsors like Cessna and Beechcraft can support and sponsor visiting teams from Kansas City or Oklahoma to play with the local college teams or the Wingnuts in exhibition games.
- The student population would be interested in meeting and interacting with a Major League Baseball team like the Royals who qualified for the World Series.
- Exhibition games would bring in additional revenue both to the local stadium as well as the teams in the off-season/ practice season.
Threats:
- Wichita being the home of multiple sports teams may decide to focus on its NBA and ice hockey teams which are already in the major leagues.
- A poor performance by Kansas City Royals would lead to a drop in interest among college students in baseball.
Product focus
The focus for the marketing program is centered on schoolchildren, in order to popularize the MLB program around Wichita. An extension of this target audience is college students who are also interested in sports and would have younger siblings whom they can influence. The product in this case consists of:
- Tickets to MLB games,
- MLB Merchandise and
- Fan Experiences like meeting the players, visiting the stadium, etc.
Since the target audience is school children, in order to appeal to these groups, the key people that can help the marketing effort inside MLB include the players, stadium management, team managements and the team sponsors. The external audiences involved in the marketing effort would include university managements, school managements and the local corporate sponsors. The last segment will support the marketing effort in return for sponsorship and visibility among the local community. The role of each internal and external member driving the marketing effort can be understood from the marketing program outlined in the next section.
Marketing Program
In order to popularize Major League Baseball in Wichita, a number of online and offline activities will have to be carried out. These include:
Offline Events and Activities
- Hosting exhibition games: the Wingnuts have had a good season in 2014, and arranging friendly games between the Kansas City Royals and the Wingnuts will bring attention to the Major League Baseball games. The Royals can also play against the University teams of Wichita State, Newman and Friends. Corporate sponsors from Wichita could help sponsor these events, even support entire schools attending the games by buying up seats.
- Organizing tours: To popularize the game in Wichita, MLB can organize baseball stadium tours to Kansas City for school children, and let them visit the Kauffman Stadium, home to the Kansas City Royals team. Local companies like Beechcraft could sponsor these events.
- Tours of schools by individual players: players from the Royals or other teams could visit schools in Wichita to promote Baseball among students there, during the off-season. Having sports celebrities in their schools is a big attraction for school kids, and would drive their interest in the sport. These could be sponsored by local companies as well.
Online Activities
- Targeting schoolchildren through online games and apps: with school kids increasing using phones, and 42 per cent of middle school kids using smartphones (eMarketer, 2014), the potential to use mobile marketing to target this segment is high. By creating apps and games specifically targeted at attracting kids to baseball, like MLB.com At Bat which is ranked among the top baseball apps (Herrick, 2014), it is possible to attract kids to the game. Other games like Flick (Google Play Store, 2014) can also help drive interest in the game.
- Fan clubs: Creating online fan clubs where students can interact with their favorite players will give them a talking point and drive interest. These could be supported by offline activities like contests to meet their favorite player etc.
- Contests: these will drive awareness among school kids as contests are the best way to attract their attention. Prizes can be tickets to MLB games at Kansas City, opportunities to meet players, free merchandise, etc.
Resources and Budgets
Driving all this marketing activity at the local level in Wichita will require funding. The key source of funding will be corporate sponsors based in Wichita, such as Cessna, Beechcraft and Learjet. The biggest cost of activities will be the games and events that need to be done at the ground level, followed by the media campaign necessary to communicate these activities to the target audience.
The funds will have to be spent on the following activities in the given proportions:
- Online marketing: According to Gartner (2014), 25 per cent of marketing budgets are dedicated to driving digital and social media marketing across products, indicating the importance of the medium.
- Events: these will consume over 40 per cent of the budget, as the cost of getting the teams to play, cost of the stadium, etc. can be significant. However, this will be partly subsidized by the corporate sponsorships of the events.
- Media & PR budgets: These will take up 30 per cent of the budget, with print ads, news features, PR articles and television spots featuring coverage of the activities. Local news channels, kids’ channels and sports channels will have to be covered.
- Contests: These will take up the remaining 5 per cent of the budget, as the prizes will represent a very small portion of the total marketing budget.
Conclusion
Driving interest in MLD among school children in Wichita will require a structured approach. Due to the advantage of being located close to Oklahoma City and Kansas City as well as having a minor league baseball team of its own, Wichita will be easy to target for the game. Driving awareness among school children will require a concerted effort across online and offline media, supported by local corporate sponsorships and the participation of the universities. With a combined effort across all these fronts, response to MLB can be generated.
References
Gartner (2014) Gartner Survey Reveals Digital Marketing Budgets Will Increase by 8 Percent in 2015, Gartner online, retrieved from http://www.gartner.com/newsroom/id/2895817
Google Play Store (2014) Flick Home Run, retrieved from https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.infinitypocket.flickhomerun&hl=en
Herrick, J (29 March 2014) Best Android apps for the 2014 Major League Baseball season, Talk Android, retrieved from http://www.talkandroid.com/guides/beginner/best-android-apps-for-the-2014-major-league-baseball-season/
MiLB website (2014) Oklahoma City Redhawks, retrieved from http://www.milb.com/index.jsp?sid=t238
MLB (2014) Kansas City Royals, retrieved from http://kansascity.royals.mlb.com/index.jsp?c_id=kc
eMarketer (2014) Smartphones in the Hands of the Youngest Demographic, retrieved from http://www.emarketer.com/Article/Smartphones-Hands-of-Youngest-Demographic/1009915#sthash.u7s7FtM7.dpuf
Wichita Wingnuts (2014a) Wichita Wingnuts, retrieved from http://www.wichitawingnuts.com/
Wichita Wingnuts (2014b) AA Regular Season 2014 Attendance, retrieved from http://amerwichita.bbstats.pointstreak.com/attendance.html?leagueid=193&seasonid=27548
