ECAL, the world’s leading calendar marketing solution, is proud to announce its partnership with Dream11.
ECAL’s ‘Sync to Calendar’ feature provides India’s biggest Fantasy Sports platform with the world’s best digital calendar service. For ECAL, this is yet another significant partnership with a major fantasy sports franchise.
With Dream11’s enormous popularity estimated at over 100 million users, this partnership takes the ECAL service to a significant new audience in sports-mad India.
The online fantasy sports platform includes cricket, football, basketball, kabaddi, hockey, volleyball, handball and baseball.
Registered users create a virtual team of real-life players and earn points based on their performance and compete with other sports fans!
ECAL’s ‘Sync to Calendar’ feature provides users with timely reminders via the calendar of upcoming contests, complete with entry deadline information and direct access to enter, tips and stats, earn referral points and lots more.
Dream11 users can ‘sync’ individual matches, team schedules and entire competition schedules to calendar via the IOS and Android app, ensuring they won’t miss a moment (deadline!) of fantasy action.
The NBL Cup tips off on February 20 with a four-week basketball extravaganza in Melbourne! All 9 NBL teams, 36 games, 1 winner!
In what will be one of the biggest basketball events ever staged in Australia, the NBL Cup will feature 18 double headers at John Cain Arena and the State Basketball Centre.
The 36 games will count towards the 2020-21 Hungry Jack’s NBL Season and, in a first for the league, will also decide the winner of the inaugural NBL Cup with total prize money of $300,000 up for grabs. All games will be broadcast live on SBS, ESPN and Sky Sport (NZ).
Ticket prices start at just $17 with a blockbuster double header featuring Melbourne United v Perth Wildcats and Cairns Taipans v The Hawks to open the NBL Cup at John Cain Arena on Sat 20 Feb.
Don’t miss a moment of the action, sync your team(s) fixture to calendar here to receive timely reminders, broadcast information and direct access to purchase tickets, watch live and shop the NBL store.
Celtic fans, it’s here! Your digital 2020/21 Celtic FC fixtures are ready to sync to calendar.
Never miss a moment of hoops action this season, sync every Scottish Premiership, European Fixtures and League Cup clash to your calendar, thanks to ECAL.
ECAL’s ‘Sync to Calendar’ feature provides fans of the Scottish Football powerhouse with the world’s best digital calendar service. Match details are updated dynamically throughout the season, complete with direct access to the Match Centre, betting odds with principal partner Dafabet CelticTV, Latest News, Social Media and lots more.
The addition of ECAL’s Sync to Calendar button coincides with Celtic’s newly designed website, enabling fans to engage with their team like never before.
Support Celtic FC throughout the 2020/21 Season and beyond with ECAL. Sync the Celtic fixture to your calendar now.
The AFL has released its ‘rolling fixture’ for the 2021 Toyota AFL Premiership Season. 2021 sees footy return to Victoria, NSW, ACT and Tasmania after a Covid-19 affected 2020 season.
The league has locked in the opening six rounds, starting with the traditional Richmond v Carlton blockbuster at the MCG on Thursday, March 18. Match-ups for Rounds 7 to 23 have been determined, but don’t yet have specific dates or timeslots.
For AFL Club ECAL subscribers, fixtures automatically hit the calendar, and will continue to be updated as the rolling fixture continues to evolve throughout the season. The days of the member fridge magnet fixture are gone, the calendar is where all the action is!
Timely reminders, TV broadcast information, official game hashtags and direct access to Club Memberships, Tickets, Online Shops, Video and Latest News just a click away.
It’s going to be big! Don’t miss it when footy returns, sync the full AFL Fixture to your calendar here or from your teams fixture page.
The NBL, Australia and New Zealand’s pre-eminent professional men’s basketball league is back for 2020/21, the League releasing the first part of it’s rolling schedule.
A total of 39 games will be played over the first 37 days of the season in front of fans across Australia.
With fixtures increasingly subject to change, sporting leagues across the globe are implementing rolling fixtures. ECAL’s dynamic calendar solution provides the NBL and its fans certainty when it comes to the season schedule.
Fans of the nine-team competition are treated to a live and dynamic feed of game details, delivered straight to their digital calendar of choice.
Basketball lovers will never miss a moment with match entries automatically updated with TV broadcast information, official game hashtags and direct access to Buy Memberships, Online Shop and more, just a click away.
The 2020-21 Hungry Jack’s NBL Season tips off on January 10 with the Throwdown between Melbourne United and South East Melbourne Phoenix headlining a nine game opening round.
Follow your team throughout the 20/21 Season and join thousands of basketball fans who rely on ECAL to stay up-to-date and connected to the NBL via their calendar!
The Stable
October 7th, 2020
Australians have been waiting for spring with anticipation unrivalled for decades. We’re all longing to burst out of the box. Even Aussie sport had to hibernate throughout winter due to the restrictions that Covid placed on everyone’s lives. So this year’s spring racing and sporting calendar promises to be quite a gala.
While it is synonymous with the Spring Racing Carnival, this year, spring is loaded with NRL and AFL Finals, NBA Playoffs, a new NFL season, the MLB World Series, French Open Tennis, Masters Golf – and the State of Origin Game 1 the day after the Melbourne Cup in November.
To help racing and sports fans navigate a hectic calendar, TAB is inviting Aussies to Make a Date with Play. The M&C Saatchi campaign aims to excite Australian sports fans and connect them fully through technology and new product offerings, so they never miss a moment.
At the heart of the campaign is TAB’s spring calendar creator, a utility that syncs user’s calendars to any racing and sport event, linking them to venues and set reminders. There’s also a new way to connect with friends and family through the TAB Locker Room, a social utility using Twilio that allows users to stream in virtual rooms with each other, watch live racing as well as live content normally found in a TAB venue.
Setting the spring excitement in motion is a film by Revolver Will/O’Rourke’s Matt Devine, in which classic flip-down stadium seats come to life across the country like giant keyboards to Beethoven’s 5th Symphony, inviting Aussies to grab a seat wherever they are. The “seat theme” continues with TAB Hot Seats in social channels, a weekly show that dives into the sporting calendar co-hosted by comedian, Sam Simmons, and Fox Sports presenter and sporting enthusiast, Andrew Barnett. Hot Seats brings entertainment, banter, history and information to sports hungry sports fans in a fresh new way for TAB.
“We’ve had a lot of fun building a campaign for what is to be an epic Spring, one that helps get bums on seats via tech as much as it celebrates pulling up a pew in film and content. The Calendar Creator is going to sort out a few headaches as racing and sport collide like never before. We’re proud of that, it’s the kind of UX that truly adds value to sports nuts,” stated Cam Blackley, chief creative officer, M&C Saatchi.
Luke Waldren, executive general manager marketing, customer & product, TAB, added, “Regardless of whether fans can attend racing and sporting events this Spring, we want to make sure we continue to bring Australians together in whatever way we can and ensure they enjoy every moment. That may be at the track or stadium, visiting their local TAB (in States where that’s possible) or on the couch watching live vision and chatting to their mates in the TAB Locker Room. This will be a spring like no other and we can’t wait to see it all unfold.”
The hero film is supported by product films promoting Venue Mode and Live Vision and activity around TAB venues throughout spring.
Article first published on The Stable, 7th October 2020
ECAL, the world’s leading calendar marketing solution, is proud to announce its partnership with the Delhi Capitals. ECAL’s ‘Sync to Calendar’ feature providing DC fans across the globe with the world’s best digital calendar service.
For ECAL, this is yet another significant partnership with a major global sporting franchise. With an enormous audience, particularly within the Indian subcontinent, this partnership takes the ECAL service to millions of new users.
CEO and Founder Patrick Barrett is thrilled with the partnership.
“The IPL is the most popular domestic T20 competition in the world. Over 200 million people tuned in to the opening match of the competition. The 2019 tournament saw a 12% increase in viewership with a whopping 462 million viewers watching on the Star Network over the 8 weeks of the competition.
It’s great to have the Capitals onboard, delivering dynamic match content into the calendars of fans, complete with handy reminders, broadcast information, and direct access to the Match Centre, Shop, DC TV Latest News, Social Media and lots more.
We hope this is the first step in becoming a must have feature for not only Indian sporting teams, but across multiple industries, given the great versatility of our software”.
Delhi Capitals fans, it’s here! The 20/21 IPL season is underway, and to make sure you don’t miss a minute of the action, sync the Capitals fixture to your calendar now.
English Rugby Union side Harlequin’s has launched its new digital calendar offering for fans across the globe.
The Gallagher Cup, England’s premier Rugby Union competition is officially releasing its 20/21 season fixtures on Tuesday.
Fans connecting their calendar ahead of time using ECAL, will be the first to receive the new season Quins fixtures straight to their personal calendar of choice.
Calendars will be kept up-to-date delivering every Harlequins match into the calendar, including Gallagher Cup and Champions Cup. If match times change, so will your calendar. How good is that!
Fans can also get ready for the upcoming Women’s and Academy seasons.
ECAL is proud to be the official calendar provider of one of England’s oldest and most famous Rugby teams.
Harlequins fans, get prepared and sync here!
AZ Alkmaar fans, it’s here! The 2020/21 Eredivsie season is underway, and to make sure you don’t miss a minute of the action, sync the official AZ schedule to your calendar, thanks to ECAL.
ECAL’s ‘Sync to Calendar’ feature provides fans of the Dutch professional club with the world’s best digital calendar service. Match details are updated dynamically throughout the season, complete with direct access to the Match Centre, Latest News, Social Media and lots more.
The teams promotional campaign ‘always up to date with all competitions’ campaign engaged fans across social platforms Twitter and Facebook, and across the AZ website with splash page, feature news story and ‘Sync to Calendar’ banner on the Fixtures & Results page.
Support AZ Almkmaar throughout the 2020/21 Season and beyond with ECAL. Sync the AZ fixture to your calendar now.
By BULLPEN
Calendar communications and marketing platform ECAL has had a fresh injection of capital and has signposted their intention to maintain their global ambitions with key senior appointments.
The company’s technology has been widely used by hundreds of clients in major sporting leagues and federations. Key to their solution is the ability to deliver hyper personalised content to users, such as localised broadcasting information for games and events, across each region in dozens of languages.
To get an insight into where the company is at right now we spoke to their CEO Patrick Barrett.
Well done on the very recent injection of capital into ECAL, how will it be used?
Patrick Barrett: “Thank you, it’s been a good time in the works and really nice to see it come to fruition as part of an add on to the business sale.
“So the business sale was obviously much more comprehensive than that. But certainly having a million dollars in the bank to fuel growth is excellent.
“That money will be deployed in investing in the sales success side of the business. We’re at a point where we have our product at a terrific stage with wonderful technical leadership from our CTO and have previously invested in the product team so we’re really happy with our technology. It’s now time to fuel growth and invest in the sales and success side. We’ve made a few key appointments and we’ll make more, we’ve recruited a chief revenue officer to help that department in Alex Peebles.
“We’re largely investing in people but also in marketing, advertising and PR capitalise on the success we’re having and the areas of opportunity that is presented to our business right now.”
The appointment of Alex is noteworthy, he’s come from Perform and DAZN into an emerging tech company and that indicates to me that you’re targeting Asia, what is he going to drive in the region?
PB: “Market entry into Southeast Asia from our base in Singapore is really important to us because I feel that Asian sports are at the beginning of their digital marketing, CRM journey.
“So our products are an easy solution to understand, it engages with the digital audience incredibly well and it actively drives sales and engagement. So we were looking to capitalise on early interest in the region particularly in sports, ticketing, media and entertainment type organisations. So having Alex based in Singapore from where he can build out a team and unlock that potentials is certainly a high priority.
“Also, his remit is to oversee a lot of the major global deals as well. So it’s not just a Asian focus, there’s a lot of growth throughout the business in the UK, right across Europe is in incredible demand. We’ve grown quite considerably over the last 24 months.”
What emerging verticals can you apply your solutions to? Things like finance, billing, perhaps digital events.
PB: “We’ve seen a number of opportunities that have arisen through COVID. Certainly major sports are at the big end of town, so major leagues and federations continue to invest in digital communications but they’re also investing into esports tournaments. I don’t see that disappearing, they’re going to be running those in parallel with traditional live events.
“We’ve seen conferences quickly go digital, like digital series and virtual conferences. That’s an area of which we have a good client base and growing. We also see the media landscape changing as well where I think our solution can play a great role in acquiring customers and converting to pay subscriptions, but also reducing churn. That’s the biggest obstacle for a lot of these streaming companies particularly in the sports arena.
“Aside from sports, entertainment, media and ticketing you’re right that payments and finance is a big focus for us. We’re creating some pretty innovative products in the payment space to be able to process real-time instant payments from the calendar off the back of specific offers presented to users, and allowing them to transact quickly. Then in the traditional banking and finance space our solution is used to deliver payment reminders to customers which works very well to increase on time payments by up to 12 per cent over more legacy-based solutions like SMS.”
The opportunity to partner up and integrate with other companies to mutually grow across in your targeted verticals is an interesting opportunity going forward as well.
PB: “That’s a great point, from the very beginning of COVID we’ve seen a number of significant partnerships and integrations fast-tracked for us and we still see that continuing. Stack Sports, for one, is a wonderful partner of ours in which our technology is integrated right across their platform. But we collaborate on opportunities all the time. We’ve also recently announced a partnership with PayDock, a payments orchestration platform, which again gives us amazing access to another channel of business, but also helps us build out our product set to enable these smart payment features I was talking about before.”
Why is calendar management. digital communications to push the calendars preferable over direct messaging, emails, even a chatbot. Why is this solution a far more salient one for clients and clubs?
PB: “I don’t think it’s an either/or type decision, it is the fact that there’s a large audience there that manage their life via their digital calendar. Our research suggests that over 70 per cent of adults aged between 18 and 65 rely on their digital calendar to manage their life. There’s an incredibly valuable audience there that prefer to manage important life events within their calendar.
“That type of dependency on the calendar translates very well across many territories. This includes traditional western economies and countries like Australia, US and UK and throughout Europe, but also in emerging markets throughout Asia and India. There’s a growing sophistication of smart phones in some of these emerging markets and the calendar is increasingly used as a management tool.”
Validating in sports and expanding to other verticals, why has that been a purposeful strategy to grow the company?
PB: “You’ve got to remember that calendar marketing or calendar communications is an entirely new segment of marketing. It’s been important to invest the time and resources to build that segment and certainly sports was a very obvious place to start. It’s a very straight forward and compelling use case.
“You have highly passionate fans that want to know when the two teams are playing next, fundamentally. So we’ve built up a strong reputation in that sector but it leads to all sorts of other opportunities in and around that sector, the media and programming space dovetails into the ticketing space, and so on. All these opportunities have come from our success in sports and as a business we’re really interested in moving ECAL up the value chain of business – sports has led to media, has led to ticketing has led to more corporate functions like conferencing, and then even further up the value chain our solution is being used by banks and financial institutions.
“I think it would have been tricky to go to a bank straight off but certainly once the use cases start to pile up then it became easier to make that foray into a sector like banking.”
What potential headwinds that you may face in the short to mid-term, you certainly have to be mindful of utilising your capital effectively? I know that Asia is a huge market and opportunity in itself, you’ve got a global focus but any potential headwinds to battle?
PB: “I don’t think anyone can predict with a degree of certainty what’s going to happen. So we’ll invest smartly and we’ll invest in people and invest in real market opportunities where we know there is growth.
“I think sports and live events, the longer the pandemic goes on will come under greater pressure. So we certainly work hand in hand with our clients to offer any assistance that they need to get through the trough. Having a great relationship with your clients is where it starts.
“COVID is going to present a number of hurdles for the next 12 months and beyond but out of that comes opportunities and we’ll adapt to those to best position our product.”
Article first published on the Bullpen website, Wednesday 9 September 2020
