UNIVERSITY OF FINANCE AND ADMINISTRATION Faculty of Economic Studies Field of Study: Marketing Communication & Master of Business Administration Follow-up master´s study programme in the combined form Michael Rufer Sports Marketing and Its Social Impact DIPLOMA THESIS Prague 2019 Final Thesis Supervisor: PhDr. Karel Eliáš, CSc. Acknowledgements I would like to express my gratitude to PhDr. Karel Eliáš, CSc. For leading my work, for his patience, willingness, comments and, above all, the time and effort he put into me and my work. My thanks also go to the fans of SK Slavia Praha, who willingly participated in my research. Declaration I hereby declare that I have compiled this final thesis on my own and all the quoted literature as well as other sources used in the thesis are listed in the bibliography. The electronic copy of the thesis is identical with the hard-bound copy. I approve that this diploma thesis is published pursuant to Section 47b Act No.111/1998 Coll., on Higher Education and on the amendment and modification of other acts (the Higher Education Act), as amended. Click here and write the Date _________________________ Abstracts The diploma thesis is focused on sports marketing. Specifically focused on sports marketing of SK Slavia Praha club. The work selects procedures suitable for the analysis of marketing strategies. The procedures are then implemented at SK Slavia Praha club. The procedures used are the SWOT analysis and a questionnaire survey. The aim of the thesis is to find out whether the marketing of SK Slavia Praha club has a direct social impact on fans' life. The hypotheses are determined based on the SWOT analysis which evaluates marketing strategies of the club. The results of the hypotheses will either confirm or refute whether marketing of SK Slavia Praha has a direct social impact on the life of the fan. Keywords marketing, social impact, media, social media, sport, sport marketing, research, marketing communication, SK Slavia Praha Table of Contents ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ....................................................................................................... 2 ABSTRACTS ...................................................................................................................... 4 KEYWORDS....................................................................................................................... 5 TABLE OF CONTENTS .......................................................................................................... 6 INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................. 7 1 THEORETICAL PART .................................................................................................... 9 1.1 Marketing communication ........................................................................................................... 9 1.2 Marketing mix ............................................................................................................................... 9 1.3 Marketing communication mix ................................................................................................... 12 1.4 Sport marketing .......................................................................................................................... 21 1.5 Empirical Research...................................................................................................................... 27 1.6 Qualitative research ................................................................................................................... 29 1.7 SWOT analysis ............................................................................................................................. 34 1.8 Quantitative research ................................................................................................................. 36 1.9 Questionnaire ............................................................................................................................. 38 2 PRACTICAL PART ...................................................................................................... 42 2.1 Marketing mix of SK Slavia Praha ............................................................................................... 43 2.2 SWOT analysis of SK Slavia Praha ............................................................................................... 56 2.3 Hypotheses ................................................................................................................................. 62 2.4 Questionnaire ............................................................................................................................. 63 2.5 Hypothesis no.1 – resolution ...................................................................................................... 68 2.6 Hypothesis no.2 – resolution ...................................................................................................... 72 2.7 Hypothesis no.3 – resolution ...................................................................................................... 77 2.8 Recommendation for SK Slavia Praha ......................................................................................... 79 CONCLUSION .................................................................................................................. 82 BIBLIOGRAPHY ................................................................................................................ 84 INDEX OF APPENDICES ...................................................................................................... 87 ANNEX A QUESTIONNAIRE FOR SK SLAVIA PRAHA FANS ................................................... 88 ANNEX B LIST OF PICTURES ......................................................................................... 94 Introduction Nowadays, sport is becoming not only a huge phenomenon but also a big business. This implies the need to sufficiently developed management, marketing, and professional requirements in this area. The world's largest sports clubs operate de facto as highly organized companies, whose goal is to link the essence of their business with the achievement of their sport goals, while providing entertainment, excitement, and pleasure to sports spectators. I have chosen the topic not only because of my long-term interest in football, but as a club fan, its marketing communication also touches me. I am most fascinated by SK Slavia Praha fans, who support the club even in times when it fails. Thanks to the fans, SK Slavia Praha is still a brand that has sound not only in the Czech Republic but also abroad. I was especially interested in how marketing strategy and communication of the club changed after their recent accomplishments in the first Czech National League “Fortuna Liga” and the good results in Champions League. The main goal of the thesis is to evaluate the current marketing strategy of the football club SK Slavia Praha and to evaluate whether it has direct influence on fans or not. To achieve this goal, I will use theoretical knowledge of marketing communication and specific sport marketing environment. The research will be based on a careful examination of all means and media channels of SK Slavia Praha. SWOT analysis will be performed on this basis. SWOT will help us determine our work hypotheses. We will try to confirm or refute the hypotheses by means of an online questionnaire with fans of SK Slavia Praha. Following will be possible recommendations for marketing management of SK Slavia Praha. The combination of qualitative and quantitative methods seemed to be the best choice for studying SK Slavia Praha. The qualitative method was used to elaborate the SWOT analysis and hypotheses, which can then be clarified using the quantitative - questionnaire method. 7 The first chapter is purely theoretical. I will define and determine marketing communication with focus on sports marketing. I would like to describe the differences between the specific sports marketing environment and common marketing. Various forms of marketing communication in sport will be listed and described. The chapter will be an important theoretical basis for further writing of the thesis. Second part of this chapter will be a description of methodological bases, which will include a description of the SWOT analysis, methods of qualitative and quantitative research. The two types of research will be combined in one, describing their structure, process, and evaluation of results of both methods. The second chapter will start with the description of the researched club, its history and its present form and its current situation. All this information will let us understand the current situation of the football club SK Slavia Praha. A significant part of the second chapter should be devoted to the description of the current marketing strategy of the club, which is the object of research. After a thorough description of the marketing strategy of SK Slavia Praha, we will carry out a SWOT analysis that points the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats of marketing strategy of SK Slavia Praha. Three hypotheses will be created of this SWOT analysis. In the third chapter of the thesis I will examine the marketing strategy of the club by testing three hypotheses which were created. The research will be realized by a questionnaire survey. The questionnaire will be aimed at fans of SK Slavia Praha. The questionnaire and hypotheses will be described