Mobile Marketing Role Model - Chicago Blackhawks

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Though I’m a diehard Chicago Bears fan, I’m also a Chicago Blackhawks fan. Fills in the gap between the Super Bowl and Hall of Fame Weekend with something other than baseball. So as I’m watching one of the Blackhawks’ games, they flash a bottom screen banner about joining the team’s text message list with the chance to win tickets to the playoffs, with winners alerted 24 hours in advance of each game. I’m so going to join that list!

Once I was on the list, I started receiving updates on scores, upcoming game broadcasts, and more… all stuff that would be of interest to fans who follow the team. No flashy mobile app, though there is one for Android and Blackberry. (What no iPhone? Big mistake.) No email (thank God!). No massive interruption or investment of my day. That works for me.

As I’ve discussed on our PWPMobile.com website, text message mobile marketing is a great way for sports teams to keep in touch with fans or a team’s players. Let’s look at some of the things that make the Chicago Blackhawks program a role model and what you can integrate into your own mobile marketing efforts:

Incentive – What Blackhawks fan wouldn’t want to go and see history being made live at a Stanley Cup playoff game? Offering a desirable incentive for joining a mobile text list is a good way to build a list of engaged followers.
Combined with Traditional Marketing – Mobile marketing, as powerful as it is, cannot stand alone. It must be combined with more traditional marketing channels such as television, print advertising, signs, billboards, direct mail, websites, social media, public relations, and promotional products. The Blackhawks used television and website (and I’m sure more than I’m unaware of) to promote it. You must get people to opt in to your program. And if they don’t know your program exists, they can’t participate. When you do get them to opt in, you’ll know that you have a quality list of truly interested people. This is marketing gold!
Not Device/App Dependent – While they do offer team mobile apps for either the Android or Blackberry platforms, offering a device independent text message program helps expand reach. Apps are amazing, but they do require additional steps to download, as well as either a capable web browser or mobile platform, which may discourage some users.

Hope that gets the ball (or puck as the case may be) going for you to think about how you can use this for your own marketing. We’d love to have you on our mobile text message team, too! We send out alerts about once a week unless there’s something really special going on. To join our list:

Text ALERTME DEMO to 41513

Have you seen any other cool uses of mobile marketing in the sports arena? Share them with us in Comments.

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