The Canadians Social Media Marketing Strategy 2 0 1 2 / 2 0 1 3 By Jeremy Dyson, Claire Elizabeth, Marc Thornton, Candice Vallantin

Vancouver Canadians 1 Social Media Marketing Strategy

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

The are a short season A minor league team based in Vancouver, . Their home base has been at Stadium, named after the famous restaurateur and baseball fan, located on Ontario St and 30th Avenue since 1978. Being a new affiliate of the as of the 2011 season, the Vancouver Canadians have quite the reputation to live up to – with a season that consists of only 76 games, it is difficult to find the right way in which to represent the “C’s” to their current, and desired demographics in the social media world. With few threats and competitors in the industry, there is much room for growth and improvements over the course of their season. With that, we present our Social Media Campaign for the Vancouver Canadian’s 2013 season. Thus far, the social media team working with the Vancouver Canadian’s is doing an excellent job – since beginning to prepare our plan in late April of 2012 there has been a massive change in terms of their social media activities. Although their work across their selected platforms is consistent in terms of voice and delivery, they are in need of determining their brand and presenting that message across the internet in a manner that strikes their target market and catches their attention in the appropriate way. It is apparent, and important, for the driving forces behind this campaign to have a good grasp as to what kind of traffic they are expecting, and would like to see, based on their efforts over the course of the season. It has been noted that one of the major faults that their current social media campaign features is a lack of an outlet for which user generated content may be submitted, and driving forces which encourage guests at their games to participate in the “show” that is a sporting event such as theirs. In order to build the bond and create a sense of community at Canadians games, we propose a full list of activities, featuring sponsorships and recognition events, through which we hope to generate an interest in the members of our demographic in the Vancouver area.

With proper planning and implementation of our proposed plan, we guarantee that the Vancouver Canadians 2013 season will be unlike any other.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Vancouver Canadians 3 Social Media Marketing Strategy

1. COMPANY INTRODUCTION

The city of Vancouver has long been in active in supporting its community sports teams with a history of championship teams in the NHL, CFL and NBA as well as many successful teams in the minor leagues, one of them being the Vancouver Canadians Baseball franchise. As the only Canadian franchise out of eight teams in the North West Baseball league, the Vancouver Canadians have dedicated following in the greater Vancouver area for both sports enthusiast and experiential guests. Playing from at Scotia Bank field, the Vancouver Canadians maintain the second highest attendance and capacity of the NWL. The team has gone through many incarnations in its history dating back to the 1920’s and the formation Western International League. During the 1990’s, the Canadians were a triple-A team and in 1999 won the championship pennant before being bought and moved to Sacramento, California. In 2011, the Canadians became the Short Season A affiliate of the Toronto Blue Jays. The team had previously been associated with the Oakland A’s major league franchise from 2000 to 2010. In that year, the Canadians defeated the Tri- City Devils to win the North West League Championship. Founded in 2011, The Vancouver Canadians Baseball Foundation scholarship program was developed to create an athletic foundation for under-privileged children in the Greater Vancouver area to build confidence and valuable skills that would otherwise be out of reach. The goal of the foundation is assist 100 kids during the 2012 season in paying for baseball enrolment and equipment so that they can develop teamwork, social and athletic skills that were otherwise financially unreachable. Attendees are engaged with both the team and the stadium in many ways. The stadium regularly has interesting events and giveaways at the games that include interactive contests, first 500-1000 giveaways and weekend fireworks. A Vancouver Canadians Baseball game is not just a game but an entire experience designed to engage guests from any background.

II. ANALYSIS AND EVALUATION

Situational Analysis

2.1 Organization background The Vancouver Canadians are a short season A team based in Vancouver British Columbia. They are known among their fans as “The C’s”. The C’s are currently the only Canadian minor league team to be affiliated with (MLB) as they have been a farm team for the Toronto Blue Jays since 2011, before which they were affiliated with the .

The 2012 season for the starts in June (after Major League Trades have been made). The Canadians will play a total of 76 regular season games between June 15th and September 1st. 38 of which are at home, and 38 away. The Canadians play against 7 other teams;

2.2 SWOT Analysis

Strengths Weaknesses • Only Canadian minor league baseball team to be • Ample summer outdoor event opportunities exist affiliated with the MLB within the Metro Vancouver area such as the • Affiliated with the Toronto Blue Jays PNE/Playland, outdoor concerts, outdoor theatre • Nat Bailey stadium has the second highest seating events, festivals and other sporting events capacity in their league  Low Mainstream media exposure • Nat Bailey stadium has the second highest  Cluttered website/hard to navigate attendance in the league • Won 2011 league championship

Opportunities Threats • Dedicated sport enthusiast fan base in Vancouver • Competition with summer other summer • Five months until NHL season begins activities such as beer league sports, camping, • Market Gap in competitive sports. vacationing. • Competition with BC Lions and Vancouver WhiteCaps.

2.3 Products The Vancouver Canadian’s baseball club provides primarily an experiential product for fans to enjoy. They do sell food & beverages, merchandise, and premium value-added options such as Corporate boxes and the Bar-be-que pit. The also club leverages it’s sponsorships to create additional opportunities for their fans ($1 A&W floats for charity, B.C. Hydro Powersmart Nooners). The organization focuses on exceptional customer service which is displayed from the time fans are greeted at the entry gates to staff thanking them for their attendance as they exit the stadium.

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2.4 Financial background The team is privately owned by the Vancouver Professional Baseball Partnership, and financial records are not published.

Social Media Audit

The Vancouver Canadians already have a relatively strong online presence. They can be found on all the major social media channels including Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and even Pinterest. Their online voice, if personified, is masculine, friendly, casual and humble and largely consistent across platforms. However the team has not utilized customizable features to create consistent online branding from one platform to the next. While it is clear that the team management has dedicated some resources toward social media marketing, it doesn’t seem as though they are working towards clear short and long-term objectives. The Canadians definitely have a social media presence, but this presence needs to be curated to speak more directly to identifiable target markets.

EXTERNAL DATA

The Vancouver Canadians have no obvious competitors. They are the only minor league baseball team located in Vancouver, B.C. and the only single A team in Western Canada.

On a sunny summer day in Vancouver, the Canadians’ have many competitors as far as activities go. One could see one of their games or go to Playland, go for a bike ride, to a restaurant, a bar or any other number of activities. However, these “competitors” are also in very different markets so it wouldn’t be helpful to compare the Canadians to any of these potential “competitors” to evaluate the success of their social media marketing strategies.

Considering this, we’ve decided the best competitor to compare the C’s to would be the . While the population in each city is much different and baseball culture in Canada and the United States is dissimilar, both teams are in the same class and the average attendance for each team’s home game is actually quite close: there were an average of 4,613 people at a Spokane Indians’ game in 2010 compared to 4,068 for Vancouver Canadians that same year. As a result, we’ve chosen to compare the Vancouver Canadians’ social media metrics to those of the Spokane Indians to help us evaluate their online marketing goals and potential opportunities the Canadians could leverage online.

FACEBOOK

The Vancouver Canadians have fairly regular Facebook posts and have a high level of interactivity (one post promoting 30 days until opening night had 60 likes!). The page

administrator responds quickly and courteously to comments. The team’s about page focuses heavily on family activities. Comparatively, the Spokane Indians have 2,000 more “likes”, but the team’s page is also one year older. The Vancouver Canadians have a decent level of “talking about this” posts compared to the Spokane Indians. This means the Canadians must post quality content that speaks relatively well to their audiences. In terms of look and feel, the Vancouver Canadians have customized their page to reflect their brand.

TEAM LIKES TALKING WERE HERE DATE ABOUT THIS JOINED Vancouver 3,298 125 339 Dec. 31, 2010 Canadians Spokane 5,450 146 N/A Jan. 23, 2009 Indians

TWITTER

The Vancouver Canadians have a very active Twitter page. They are highly interactive and respond quickly to other Twitter users, ReTweet regularly when another user mentions them in a Tweet and they use this platform as a means to communicate special events and campaigns they’re running on other platforms like Facebook or on their website The team worked with a local blogger to host the first #CanadiansTweetup on April 28, 2012 to view their affiliate team, The Toronto Bluejays at a bar. About 100 people showed up. Their page has been customized to feature a background photo of NatBailey Stadium during the fire works. The Slocane Indians by comparison, are much less active on Twitter. They sometimes don’t Tweet for a few days at a time, they rarely address other Twitter users directly and have far fewer follower. As with Facebook, their page is also customized to reflect their brand.

TEAM JOINED TWEETS FOLLOWERS FOLLOWING @vancanadians Feb 16, 2009 4654 4394 225 @spokaneindians Jan. 8, 2010 1,098 1,934 304

YOUTUBE

The Vancouver Canadians are very active on YouTube. Their page has 31 uploaded videos with a total of 56,078 views, even though their videos tend to have low production value. Their most successful video by far, with 40,884 views, was a tickets promo, which had the Canadians’ team players parody the movie Major League. The Spokane Indians by comparison have only posted two videos with a total of only 279 views, despite their relatively higher production value.

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When one searchers in YouTube for videos related to “Vancouver Canadians Baseball”, 246 results appear, compared to 136 for results for searchers related to “Spokane Indians Baseball”, suggesting that the former is more successful in reaching out to their fans and engaging them in creating online content.

TEAM TEAM VIDEOS TOTAL VIEWS SEARCH RESULTS @Canadiansbaseball 31 56,078 246 @Spokanindiansbball 2 279 136

PINTEREST

Both teams have recently created Pinterest boards, but both teams have very different Pinterest strategies. While the Spokane Indians page focuses very clearly on the team (board subjects include Spokane Indians Players, Indian All-Time greats, Indians Fans, Indians in the Community etc.), the Canadians’ page seems to focus more on baseball culture in general. The Canadians’ boards subjects include baseball reads, baseball foodies, baseball: it’s a lifestyle, Vancouver love, Around the Nat, and baseball necessities. It’s perhaps too early to say which strategy is more effective.

TEAM BOARDS PINS LIKES FOLLOWERS FOLLOWING Canadians 12 83 0 11 14 Indians 11 79 1 25 5

IMPLICATIONS? (of social media audit)

III. RECOMMENDATIONS

1) Goals

The Vancouver Canadians are a baseball team, but one doesn’t have to be a sports fan to enjoy the experience of attending one of their games. A Canadians’ game offers people the opportunity to drink with their friends in a public space, time to enjoy the sunshine and the great outdoors, an excuse to eat two-foot long hot dogs and even a great view from which to watch fireworks—all for an affordable price. With those selling points in mind, our goals are the following:

a) To attract an audience that is not interested in the Vancouver Canadians because they are a sports team, but because their games offer a novel outdoor experience that is unlike anything in this city in the summer time. b) To create brand awareness and loyalty amongst young post-secondary students. c) To transform passive observers into active participants by motivating social media use amongst our target demographic during games.

d) To create a unique experience that converts first-timers into repeat visitors. e) To keep our online audience engaged during the off-season.

2) Objectives

a) Short-term (over the course of the 2012 season) i) To acquire 500 Facebook likes amongst 19-24 year olds in the Greater Vancouver Area (our target demographic) by the end of the July. ii) To generate the creation of homemade signs by fans. iii) To set up a live Twitter feed on the field screen and increase the use of in- game tweeting by 10 per cent.

b) Long-term i) To increase the appearance of fan-created signs by 30 per cent from the beginning to the end of the 2013 season. ii) To increase Facebook likes by 2,000 amongst 19-24 year olds in the Greater Vancouver Area (our target demographic) by the end of the 2013 season. iii) To increase the Vancouver Canadians’ Twitter mentions by 50 per cent compared to last season and to double their Twitter following. iv) To maintain 50 per cent of the Vancouver Canadians’ website visits during the off-season by promoting the work of the Vancouver Canadians’ Foundation.

3) Target Market

According to Metro Vancouver statistics, there were over 270,000 post-secondary students enrolled in the major institutions (universities and colleges) in 2011. Statistics Canada lists about 220,000 persons between 19-24 living in the Greater Vancouver Regional District, so 200,000 is a more suitable estimate of target market size.

Canada is already the 2nd highest country in terms of smart phone penetration (45%) [footnote link to Comscore page 39], and post-secondary students are one of the highest user-groups within the whole. StatsCan data showed that in 2009 internet usage by the under 34 demographic in Canada reached 82.9%, ensuring that it would be almost impossible for any of the target to be unreachable online by 2012. Furthermore, time spent on social networking websites is higher amongst the 18-24 demographic than any other group in Canada [footnote to Comscore doc page 16].

Typical post-secondary schedules run from September to May including examination periods, meaning that during the Canadian’s season (June - September) the target market is likely not attending classes and generally will be working conventional part-full time jobs during this break period. This creates higher seasonal discretionary spending opportunities and more free time to explore leisure pursuits.

Post-secondary students within Canada report that 50% spend monthly on movies while only 6% spend monthly on professional sporting events. The fact that 7% spend monthly

Vancouver Canadians 9 Social Media Marketing Strategy on live theatre/ballet/opera shows that capture the will to experience a live, authentic event experience is more than possible with this group [BC Headset P.7 ].

With the average monthly spending habits on professional sporting events in the $30 range for this target group (out of approximately $50 monthly total spend on entertainment as a whole [BC Headset p.15]), there may not appear to be a huge amount of huge opportunity for conversion - however this is a highly impressionable demographic who’s habits formed during these years may set the tone for consumption habits for years to come. Members of this demographic do not necessarily have to be baseball fans or fans of sports in general. They are simply searching for an experience, one which the Vancouver Canadians are guaranteed to provide over the season.

That being said, competition comes from several sources outside of sporting events. The challenge will be to market Canadians games to the point that our target market will choose to attend our sporting events instead of spending money on events like concerts, movies, night clubs, theme parks or evenings at the theatre, ballet or opera.

4) Positioning

The Vancouver Canadian’s baseball games will be positioned as a unique experience that is unlike anything else offered in Vancouver in the summer months. It will be framed as a novel experience that isn’t exclusively enjoyed by sports fans, but any group of friends, especially young students who are looking for a public place to enjoy the sunshine, drinks, fireworks and comically huge snacks like two-foot long hotdogs. Young people need to feel like they are on the cusp on the next big thing so that they can be the first to share their unique find online. The Vancouver Canadians will be just that.

5) Strategy

The Vancouver Canadians social media strategy will be implemented via four campaigns. Each campaign will use multiple mediums—including social networking, blog content, user-generated content and offline integration—to promote a different kind of experience one can have at a Canadians game.

The Canadians’ Biggest Fan campaign will encourage sports fans to share enthusiasm for their team and the sport by bringing creative signs or wearing exuberant costumes during games. This will simultaneously encourage sports fans to give in to their tribal tendencies during games while also giving non-sports fans more of a spectacle and experience to enjoy when they attend a game.

The Tweet Your Neighbour campaign will encourage people to share their attendance at a game and answer a question about their seat neighbour on Twitter to get a chance to win seats for future nooner games.

The Most Meagre Meal contest will encourage people to post their stories of their most creative low budget dining experience (aka eating like a student) to the Canadians’

Facebook page for a chance to win tickets to one of their 11 season games featuring fireworks.

Finally, The Two-Footer Club will encourage people to post videos of themselves or their friends eating one of the stadium’s epic two-foot long hotdogs. Anyone who posts a YouTube video on Facebook eating a two-footer gets “Two-Footer Club” swag and tickets to one of the Canadians’ nooner games. All contest entrants get a chance to join the Canadians’ team players for an end of season BBQ.

The following tactics will describe how each campaign will leverage social networking, user generated content and an online blog to achieve our goals.

6) Tactics

a) The Canadians’ Biggest Fan—Fans must create and attend a game with their most interesting sign in any format and take a photo of it at the game to post to a “Canadians’ Biggest Fan” photo album on the Canadian’s Facebook page. The contest will be introduced on the Canadians’ blog and shared via Twitter and Facebook. The winners will be decided by whoever gets the most likes on Facebook. The winning slogan or sign will be transformed into future Vancouver Canadians’ swag and to creators will win tickets to future games.

i) Networking Strategy: Facebook posts and Tweets (with a branded hashtag) will be posted online with links to the original blog post explaining the contest details. After the first entries are submitted, all future Facebook posts and Tweets regarding the contest will repost the best of these photo entries as a way to challenge future attendees to come up with even more clever slogans and signs.

ii) User-Generated Content: Because the winners of the contest will be chosen by popular vote via Facebook likes, Canadians’ Biggest Fan contest participants will be encouraged to share links to their sign’s photo on the Canadians’ Facebook page. This will drive traffic to the Canadians’ Facebook page and expose people to photos of enthusiastic baseball fans having a great time. This will hopefully encourage people who have attended previous games to become more active fans and entice people who have never been to a game to attend one with their friends.

iii) Blog Strategy: The contest details, rules and regulations will all be posted on the Canadians’ blog and photo highlights of the week’s top contenders will be posted at least once a week as a way to encourage people to participate. The contest winner will be congratulated on the Canadian’s blog.

iv) Integration strategy: The winning slogans may be incorporated into future Vancouver Canadians’ swag, at the club’s discretion.

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b) Most Meagre Meal contest— A Facebook-based contest where users enter examples of their “Most Meagre Meal” to win a game-night package, including entry for two, food and drinks, and a “Student Survival Kit” of gift certificates and swag from Canadian’s sponsors (ex. A&W gift cert, Safeway gift cert etc). This is a promotion that can be run during different periods throughout the summer, possibly one giveaway every two weeks or even once a month as this contest requires time for entrants to write and post their experiences. As with all contests, a social media moderator will be required to ensure all posts are tastefully written.

i) Social Media Strategy: Acting on the concept that one can be very well fed at a Canadian’s game, this contest draws on segments of our target market who are willing to compete to see who has eaten the most creative “student-style” meal written in the form of a brief Facebook post.

ii) User Generated Content: All posts will be checked on a regular basis to screen for inappropriate content. The nature of this content will hopefully lead to sharing, since everyone loves to re-live their student days with tales of creative eating on the cheap. There is much room for content fraud and it is at the discretion of the social media moderator to decide a winner. The ideal winner is someone who shares a great story that is accessible to the current generation of post-secondary students (ex. “When Subway has a stupid deal I raid the recycling bin at my frat and eat $3 subs for the next 10 days”).

iii) Blog Strategy: The contest details and clear guidelines will be posted on the blog to initiate the launch of the campaign. The blog may also highlight the week’s most entertaining posts. Finally, at the winner’s discretion, their original post and a photo of the winner will be posted on our blog.

iv) Integration Strategy: The winners may be featured on the big screen during the game. c. Tweet Your Neighbour - During each nooner, fans will tweet from their mobile phones their seat number to @Vancanadians, and include an interesting fact about their nighbour or the answer to a specific question. This could include humourous ideas around best excuse for missing class/work to attend a C’s nooner (ex. I’ve come down with a mild case of Dengue fever that I’ll get over by Monday). This tactic also builds on the community/neighbourliness aspect of a Canadian’s game – meeting those around you and having fun together.

Some of these tweets will be posted on the stadium screen between innings and a random winning tweeter will be announced during the seventh inning stretch and receive a private table for four in the BBQ pit at a future game, complete with light

refreshments. Additionally the winner will receive a Canadian’s novelty “doctor’s note” to present to their professor/boss in the hopes of getting cleared to attend another nooner. This contest is designed to build upon the Vancouver Canadians experience by encouraging repeat visits.

i. Social Media Strategy: The contest will be promoted mainly on Twitter with a branded hashtag (#noonerexcuse), before and during games.

ii. User-generated content: The real value of this contest comes from the user- generated promotion that is generated from it. If 1000 people participated in the contest at each home game with an average of 50 followers each, this generates into a reach of 50,000 people per game. This amounts to nearly two million user- generated impressions over the course of the season, all for the price of one table and a couple hot dogs, and a piece of paper.

iii. Blog Strategy: Contest winners will be congratulated on the Canadian’s blog and with their permission a photo may also be added alongside. Blog mentions of the contest will be posted the day of games to remind people planning on attending the game to participate.

iv. Integration: The contest will be announced over the loudspeaker before the game and in between innings and tweets will be streamed live on the stadium screen as a means to encourage participation. d. The Two-Footer Club—Nat Bailey Stadium is the only place in Vancouver where one can buy a two-foot long hot dog. To spread the word of this unique offering, Canadians’ fans will be encouraged to join the “Two-Footer Club”. Anyone who uploads a video of themselves eating a famous two-foot-long hotdog all on their own will automatically join club. All members are entered into a draw to win a pair of game tickets for the BBQ pit for an end-of-the-season game.

i. User Generated Content: In order to qualify for the Two Footer Club, participants must create a YouTube video and post it on the Vancouver Canadians’ Facebook page.

ii. Social Media Strategy: The Canadians can create a special YouTube playlist to collect all of these videos in one place. A Facebook album with screen shots of all new entrants with one of the infamous two-foot-long hotdogs will be created. Shout-outs to new club members will be given on Twitter.

iii. Blog Strategy: A weekly round-up of new Club members can be posted once a week with links to their videos. The Two Footer Club will also be announced on the blog and all contest details will live here as well.

iv: Integration: With club member’s permission, their photos and perhaps part of their videos could be screened live between game innings.

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OFFLINE INTEGRATION

The club uses radio, television and print to communicate their current messaging to the marketplace. To enhance the efficacy of the social media marketing strategy, a slight increase in prominence of the team’s existing social media platforms (Facebook, Twitter) would likely provide much support. The recommendation would be to capitalize on the existing ad spend in these mediums but to gently raise awareness of the social media channel addresses/pages.

OFFLINE ADVERTISING

Due to the high transit usage amongst the target demographic, we would expect great value from transit station advertising of the key tactical social media campaigns. By capturing the attention of the smart-phone wielding target demographic at a moment when they might share this information amongst their networks could prove valuable to this program. The point of such as campaign is to gently register within the target demographic and allow social media sharing to do the rest, therefore each tactic would only recieve 2-3 transit station ad spots and only during the first 4 weeks of the season.

ONLINE ADVERTISING

Google adwords and Facebook ads will be employed to drive traffic to the blog. Both platforms will be used to drive traffic amongst the target group to the blog, with Google focusing on queries related to Vancouver-based events and Facebook highlighting the tactical marketing programs.

SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION (SEO)

SEO will be achieved through 2 initiatives; the creation of the Canadian’s blog will immediately enhance the ratings for the team’s main webpage provided it is updated as scheduled, and paid SEO work at the beginning of the season will simply employ best practices to ensure better exposure.

7) Timeline

Off Season June July August Foundation promotion Tweet Your Neighbour 2 Footer Club Most Meagre Meal Canadian’s Biggest Fan Transit advertising Google Adwords Facebook ads Blog updating

SEO work

8) BUDGET

Rate per Games Hrs/game hour Total Labour

2 Footer Club - blog highlighting 38 3 40 4560 Meagre Meal - entries moderation 8 6 40 1920 Biggest Fan - Posting to screen, blog 38 3 40 4560 Tweet Your Neighbour - posting to screen 38 3 40 4560 Social media moderator / blogger 38 3 40 4560

Prizing

cost per Games per game unit Total 2 Footer Club Foam Fingers 38 10 2.5 950 T-shirts 38 10 4 1520 Table for 4 @ BBQ pit 1 1 250 250

Biggest Fan Biggest fan t-shirts 38 10 4 1520

Most Meagre Meal Tickets 8 2 20 320 Meals 8 2 15 240 Swag/Survival Kit 16 2 15 480

Tweet Your Neighbour Table for 4 @ BBQ Pit 38 4 50 7600

Total number Cost/per Total Offline spend Transit station posters 12 600 7200

Online spend SEO 1 5000 5000 Facebook ads (cost-per-click) 2500 1 2500 Google Adwords (campaign limit) 2500 1 2500

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Total budget $50,240

9) References

1. www.Facebook.com/vancouvercanadians 2. www.Twitter.com/vancanadians 3. www.Youtube.com/vancouvercanadians 4. www.MILB.com 5. www.Statcan.gc.ca 6. www.Wikipedia.org/Vancouver_Canadians 7. www.Wikipedia.org/Nat_Bailey_Stadium 8. www.StudentAwards.com 9. www.Comscore.com 10. http://www.aved.gov.bc.ca/publicpsed/universities.ht m