Case Studies, Sports Jun 09, 2020

Customer Stories - ECB

Challenge

Engage cricket lovers and general sports fans to help launch England’s new domestic and international season fixtures, including The Hundred!

Solution

ECAL was quick to build a large community of passionate cricket fans, and drive immediate response around ticket release dates for The Hundred, driving high demand for early ticket sales.

1. Introduction

England & Wales Cricket Board (ECB) is the governing body of cricket in England and Wales.

The Hundred is a new professional franchise tournament run by the ECB, scheduled to start in July 2020. It plays a new 100-ball game format, in a round-robin tournament with eight city-based franchise teams. Each franchise will field a men’s and women’s team. 

2. Objectives

  1. Launch England’s new season cricket fixtures using ECAL, to connect and engage cricket lovers, general sports fans and social groups.
  2. Use ECAL to schedule the competition and team fixtures directly into the calendar of users.
  3. Leverage the connected calendar audience to deliver important ticket release details for The Hundred, to drive early sales and stimulate demand.

3. Strategy

A. Create

  • Multiple ECAL button displays were created for all cricket competitions, incl. The Hundred, International Men’s / Women’s, County Championship, Vitality Blast, and Royal London Cup.
  • These buttons were integrated into the ECB website and a link on their mobile app. 

B. Connect

  • ECB executed an integrated launch campaign around the release of The Hundred fixtures, to drive strong user adoption.
  • Promotion included web ad (home page), site article, social campaign and email. 

C. Activate

  • With a large, connected audience, ECB can then deliver important ticket release dates directly to an engaged audience, to stimulate sales and interest.

ECB Activation

4. Results (at end of Feb)

Timeline

  • 15 Nov: ECAL Launch
  • 26 Nov (7am): The Hundred Fixture Release

International user subscriptions

ECB user subscriptions

With very strong local adoption

ECB user subscriptions

Timeline

  • 12 Feb (10am): Priority Ticket Window Open
  • Next: 17 July (6:30pm): First Game

Definitive response to ticket release

 

Drives significant purchase intent

Testimonials

"We could not be happier with the ECAL product. ECAL makes it easy to implement and even easier for our fans to download our calendars where they want them most!”

Matt Rochinski

Vice President of Digital Media @ Hornets Sports & Entertainment

"The ECAL platform ensures that fans can easily find out where to tune in and watch Formula E live in their territory, providing us with the ability to deliver targeted messages to users, based on location and behaviour. ECAL is our highest performing digital marketing channel, contributing approximately one-third of new user data acquired. The team at ECAL are a great bunch and I would have no hesitation in recommending them."

Tecwyn Davies

Senior Digital Project Manager @ Formula E

“We welcome around 750,000 visits to our Bins, waste and recycling section on our website annually. Implementing ECAL’s ‘Sync to Calendar’ service, has not only significantly reduced the average website visit, but residents can now receive dynamic bin collection reminders in-calendar. When collection days change, as do the entries and reminders in our users calendar. We are proud to be the first council in the UK to provide this innovative service for our residents and are thrilled to see this as just the start of a great journey and synergy with ECAL”.

Tariq Gangari

Senior UI Designer

Fixture release day is a key moment in the Premier League’s calendar. It signals the start of our new season and provides an opportunity for us to onboard new fans. ECAL’s platform provides a powerful communication channel for us to deliver against our key objectives – driving tune-in and referrals for our clubs and broadcast licensees.”

Chris Archer

Head of Digital Operations

“Fixture release day is a highly anticipated event in the EFL calendar. ECAL's excellent support, from technical to strategic, allowed us to focus on maximising reach and delivering a timely and engaged service to our fanbase.”

Matt Hudspeth-Lamb

Senior Data, Research and Insight Manager

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