Hawthorn Football Club

Are you ready to THROW OUT your Financial Software?

Starting out in the 1870s with a sprinkling of members, Melbourne-based Hawthorn Football Club (HFC) has worked hard at steadily building its membership to the point it currently has a record number of 33,319 supporters paying an annual membership to support their team. With this base providing a strong foundation, the club is in the enviable position of being debt-free, investing in equity for the future with $1 million profits.  Not bad considering it was facing a merger and debts of $4 million almost a decade ago.  That was after a miserable season coming second last in the premiership, resulting in members leaving the club in droves.

So how did this club turn itself around?  Smart business decision-making on the part of the senior executive, diligent goal setting and keeping all eyes on the task at hand – building up the Club and bringing back its members - are the answers.  

And then there’s the fact that in 1999 the Club decided to invest in an advanced technology platform to assist it to achieve its challenging business and marketing goals. Up to this point the club had relied on two incumbent state-of-the-ark database systems for its administration, management and marketing and it felt these systems were no longer supporting it to achieve its goals. The lack of integration between the two, the fact both were clumsy and difficult to use as well as the stress of having a paper-based membership history to work with meant the club’s marketing and membership team was finding it increasingly difficult to access the information it required to grow its membership and sponsorship streams.

More than just membership

Rather than follow the lead of fellow sports clubs and invest in a task-specific off-the-shelf membership software package, the HFC chose to go many steps further by investing in Pivotal’s Customer Relationship Management (CRM) solution.

“We wanted a solution that had the flexibility and potential to grow with our club, that could integrate into and bring together all our management, administration, marketing and sales data as well as our event management and membership information” says John Nugent, General Manager, Finance and Operations. 

“A simple off-the-shelf package simply was not sophisticated enough for our needs and would not have supported us to achieve what we have, using Pivotal.  We needed a complete view of our business and activities – across the board - not just in membership”. 

“To build the club back up we needed to refine our marketing strategies and precisely identify and select different types of target audiences and communicate with these groups in appropriate and compelling ways.  We needed the power of Pivotal to enable us to do this”.
 
“We were impressed by the flexibility Pivotal offered, the fact it would grow with us and we could add functionality as we needed it.  Also, we did not need to implement the whole of Pivotal up-front – it allowed for incremental deployment and for us to tailor the solution to fit our own business and environment – we did not have to conform to its parameters”.

The bird’s-eye view is empowering

With Pivotal on board the Club is now accorded a full and complete view of its members, supporters and corporate sponsors as the solution houses all its records and activities for financials, memberships, event management, marketing and sales, including seat reservations at games – which can be done in a multi channel environment, using mail, phone or the Internet. 

Armed with this depth and breadth of information the Club can easily interrogate its data and identify specific target audiences based on particular buying preferences and trends regarding attendance at games and events, both at-home and away.   With this intelligence the HFC has been able to fine-tune its product offerings, developing programmes, activities and events that appeal to the full range of members’ passion and interest in the game and the HFC premiere team.  It has reached the point where it now has over 20 different membership packages – offering an array of value-added benefits and enabling the club to introduce new initiatives with complex components. 

From a sponsorship viewpoint Pivotal has been equally valuable in enabling the HFC to easily and precisely match its different types of sponsors with tailored sponsorship benefits.  Furthermore with the range of information it now has at its fingertips the club can more precisely develop sponsorship packages that offer attractive propositions to new corporates wishing to support the club in this manner.

Reporting Made Easy

Having the ability to integrate Pivotal into its financial system was critically important and management enthuses over the ease with which reporting and invoicing is now conducted.

“With Pivotal the whole process is streamlined and we are reassured that our invoicing procedures and communications are completely up to date and accurate.  At the end of the financial year we have results at our fingertips instantly – it used to take days and many ‘people hours’ to prepare statements and reports.  Now with a click of the mouse we have it all there.  It couldn’t be more efficient, accurate or easier”, says Ewart.

Tracking members, turning lapsed members into active supporters

A key concern for the HFC was to ensure its customer records were a true and complete reflection of membership activity over the years.   Given the enormity of inputting all paper-based records into the system in-house, the HFC has used a third party data inputting and mailing house to work through these records, inputting customer histories as well as managing the date entry of current records.  The warehouse uses Pivotal’s satellite system to ensure its remote data entry is reliable and wholly accurate.  Included within this process is the inputting of lapsed member details – so that the HFC can re-connect with these members and work at re-inspiring their enthusiasm and loyalty for the club, converting them into active members.

“With our paper-based system it was a long and laborious task to go through the records and track members. With that data now inputted into Pivotal it is incredibly easy to see just where people are, what they are signed up for and who has fallen through the cracks”, explains Marlene Kornides, Marketing Director.   “Just by following up our lapsed supporters and understanding their reasons for not renewing we have been able to put new plans into action, respond to their issues and bring them back on the books as faithful supports”.

“Additionally, signing back up members for the next year is now a breeze as we can easily view just what each member has signed up for over their history of membership and the benefits they received over time, with a report available that predicts the type of membership and associated benefits the member may want for the following season, based on their combined history over the years.  We could not have done this with our old systems operating,” says Wajda.

Value-added benefits for members

As well as using Pivotal for its proactive sales and marketing, management and administration functions, the HFC also uses Pivotal to create a range of benefits for its members.  This includes the HFC Business Directory that it provides to all members of the database, detailing businesses and corporates who are loyal HFC supporters and members. The aim of the directory is to encourage HFC businesses to build a business community around their primary football loyalty.

“It is important to us that we give back to our members and this is one way we can use the data to ensure all our members benefit.  Our Business Community is really important to us and we nurture its development, supporting the network whenever possible”, explains Wajda.

Forever evolving, moving with the times and business

In the true sense of CRM the HFC is finding its strategy is forever evolving as the club discovers new ways of accessing and viewing its customer data and acting on this new-found intelligence

The HFC has incrementally deployed the technology adding functionality as it has needed to and has plans in the pipeline for further developments, including adding in its merchandising data to alongside its membership data.

“With a technology platform like this in place you find you don’t outgrow it, rather your business and the platform grow together and you add features as you see the need, making sure you keep in pace with one another.  The potential with Pivotal is endless – we can make it be whatever we want it to be – and that has been a revelation as it was certainly not the case with our old system.  We look forward these days, not back, thanks to Pivotal”, concludes Jamie Haebich, IT Manager.

Specific ROI realised as a result of investing in Pivotal:

• Monthly reporting – historically it took days to prepare the monthly and annual figures, now it takes a matter of a few short hours to run the reports and see where the club is at.
• The full transparency of data and of business processes has led to improved quality and mining of data which, in turn, has resulted in more targeted and planned execution of marketing and sales activity.
• Improved effectiveness of marketing efforts through efficient allocation and management of resources.
• Increased efficiency through the centralisation of the databases and elimination of duplicate record keeping and data entry.