Plymouth Albion is a successful first division rugby football club based in Plymouth with a small management team and limited marketing budget. The city of Plymouth ranks as the 21 largest Cities in the UK with a population of 240,000 once a strong naval base the economy has been in decline for many years. The club needed additional revenues to allow for essential investment in its ground and facilities in a tough commercial market.
The challenge for Beechwood was to assist the club in generating much needed additional revenue. At the same time the club needed to communicate more effectively with the supporters with a limited budget. Until Beechwood became involved the club had NO website and communication was pretty much restricted to in-game promotions, sporadic mail shots and word of mouth.
The solution was to launch a website and to use the site to keep supporters up-to-date with the team and games but also to give the club a way of effectively communicating its message on an ongoing basis and sell a range of club related products and facilities.
The website was designed in 2004 and recently revamped in 2008. Throughout the process the website was designed to encourage supporters to keep in touch by visiting the website.
Club league results, news, and information on the team were the first priority with commercial revenue generation close behind.
Match Hospitality
Facilities
Ticket sales
Merchandise
Advertising revenue
The simple aim was to get the information in front of potential supporters and business in an efficient ongoing cost effective way at minimal cost to the club.
The new site was a big success and enabled the club to get its commercial assets on Google page 1 rankings. In particular, the promotion of the club as a venue for; weddings, parties, and conferences proved to be very effective with hundreds of enquiries going through the website.
A web shop was introduced which has generated substantial revenue for the club selling match tickets, merchandise, and match day hospitality.
The ability to sell tickets through the online shop saved the club money by eliminating the need for a costly and unnecessary ticketing system.
The e-mail system on the site provided regular supporters with updates aimed at increasing communication and the sale of tickets and merchandise. The e-mail subscribe proved very popular with thousands of supporters subscribing to the e-mail news letter.
Automated results
League fixture admin
CMS system
Online store
Flash photo galleries
E-brochures
E-mail management system
Dynamic forms