With the world darts championships on at the minute, DARTS! Yes darts, has it's own channel on sky. It's been quite good seeing old matches, interviews and reviews of past players etc. It would be brilliant, if even just during the league season, if sky would do this for us. Interviews with Billy Boston and Neil Fox and the like whilst they are still around. Interviews with players I've only heard of and never listened to talking about their experiences and views on today's game. Past matches (not just grand finals) with reviews of players who were in the games. I'd love that. Big Nige, do what you can.

Agree with all that. Especially like the idea of having the transfers/signings etc thing and I think there is a decent sports & General interest tv market out there who would relish seeing the inner workings of a top sports club along with the trials & tribulations the players/coaches/owners etc have to go through each year. I'd love to see a documentary crew given unfettered access to a club for a whole season which can then be shown in the following off-season.

We could have a Boxing Day 9's comp. I was amazed at how few clubs had Boxing Day games this year, I think it's something we're missing out on.

reality is the vast majority of sports are not 12 months a year content and fan interest in the off season of any sport is minimal. Sky obviously have enough content in winter without spending money producing RL off season content and it's not the job of the RFL to produce it. Plenty of RL online you can watch if it's old games your after.

Anyone with a media background will tell you marketing for season launch needs to commence around 8-10 weeks before start and gradually hype up to it. I honestly think many of you live in Gaga land with your expectations of the Rfl.

Thank goodness for that, and there I was hoping that the RFL would tell the media that there maybe, possibly, could be, perhaps a RL international series against New Zealand come autumn 2015.

Now they don't have to.

Lets face it if the Union bods could promote their 2015 "entertainment" during the summer et al of 2014 and continue chirruping about it, they really were wasting their time as no one was interested.

Anyway it's nice to know that the RFL's responsibilty is not to promote the game they are responsible for, and the clubs wont do it because they would rather waste money on overseas crocks.

I look forward to the non interest and media involvement keeping its current low standard throughout the year.

I'm sure you wont be disappointed! Or you could get on social media where there is plenty of RL news coming out daily from clubs, supporters groups and governing bodies.

Great idea.

However, Sky and the game itself have spent the past two decades urinating on its history. Nothing, pre 1996 and pre-Super League is regarded as worthy of recollection, interest or comment. The game was unprofessional and played in winter when it was freezing, the pitches were all bogs, the players were covered in mud, they drank too much, they smoked too many cigs, and they were all slowcoach porkers with pot bellies playing in dilapidated grounds surrounded by slum housing.

If Sky, the RFL and the vast majority of summer-era fans are disgusted by the history of the game pre-1996 and have consistently sent out that message, why should anyone else be interested?

from next year Sky lose the champions league, that is a tonne of broadcast time they need to fill, we have just renegotiated with them, why aren't we filling it?

It costs us nothing to give a production company unfettered access to a club, £0. The BBC used to screen RL Raw which was a behind the scenes look at what was the NFP. It was very well received. There is a repeat of a documentary on Emile Heskey on sky sports tonight. Im pretty confident they would be happy to screening original programming in the form of a documentary like that, especially as the cost would be so minimal and serve as an advert for their own product.

It is the RFL's job to grow the game, to do that we need more content. People need to know who is playing, they need to care for them, they need to know the narrative. We do nothing to do that.

Oh great, im sure that has a huge reach to new fans.

Which only gets to people who search for it. The reason why print newspapers articles and TV programmes are so important is because they get to people who don't actively follow RL.
RL doesn't have a problem marketing/advertising to its die-hard fans, it has a problem getting to everyone else.

Social media is a no no for me, but can you see a problem somewhere?

When the Tour De France kicked off in Leeds during the summer, I walked part of the route on the day. A couple of miles along that route up Scott Hall Road at it's junction with Potternewton Lane, there were all sorts of festivities going on, marquees set up selling stuff. There was one marquee which stood out from the rest. It was giving away shirts, rugby balls, badges and stuff to kids. That marquee said RFU on it and was advertising England RU and the RU World Cup in 2015.

Meanwhile, back in Moonieworld, the Kiwi Series in 9 months time (allegedly) has disappeared off the radar completely as the RFL concentrate on flogging tickets to the converted for the Moonie Weekend, the CC Final and the SL Grand Final. Hardly a mention of the Kiwi Series in the compliant Moonie Express or Moonie Weekly publications for past couple of months either as they both pay their respects to the RFL for the critical (only?) advertising income they gratefully receive from them.

To be honest, I think that the clubs get too much of a free ride on that front. I agree that the RFL has it's failings (Will has pointed out the poor promotion of the NZ series) but the biggest problems in marketing this sport come at club level, not ruling body level.

We've got into this position where clubs have got absolutely no idea how to market their product. The local promotion is appalling, they have no idea how to use tactical offers to create long-term followers and they are not doing enough to attract the 'right' mix of supporters. That's not an RFL problem, it's a club one. Unfortunately, the clubs get an easier ride because it's easier, and fashionable, to blame Nigel Wood.

Oh no doubt that clubs are failing massively in this respect, but it's hard to criticise leeds or Wigan getting 15k when we will likely get that for CC semis and international games.

I'd also argue that we get a lot more 'bang for our buck' by marketing more centrally, I certainly think the build up for the start of the season is down to the RFL or Super League. Now the RFL have parachuted their man in to run SL they can't really complain that people expect something from them. Right now the RFL seem intent in controling as much as possible and being responsible for as little as possible. It's not a sustainable position.

Super league needs to be treated as a single entity where a rising tide lifts all boats. Leaving each individual club to just do their own thing just doesn't work.

I think Leeds in particular should get much better attendances than they do, they never seem to grow them and they are in a massive city and have had a lot of success.

Headingley should sell out every home game.

Not to put on fine a point on it, they don't really need to bother. They run at a profit, they pay the SC, they have extensive facilities, coaching and youth development. They aren't really pushed to increase attendances. We have to remember they are already getting double or triple some SL clubs.

I have no doubt that if Leeds really wanted it 20k isn't beyond them now. I also don't doubt that in a growing league 30k isn't beyond them. I also have no doubt that right now they are milking the cash cow and have no real need to start trying to blow everyone put of the water attendance wise why spend that extra money?

Smokey's response is probably close to the mark. Also, a fair chunk of the ground's unused capacity is in the South Stand. When the attendance is at, or close to, 21k there will likely be just as many newbies who are put off by the experience as there are those who decide to try it again. I suspect that without major improvement work - in itself likely to reduce the ground's capacity - Leeds will never draw capacity crowds on anything other than an intermittent basis.

I think there is a bit of a timing issue aswell with both the north and south stands due for improvements it doesn't really make sense to set out on a big attraction campaign when that is happening

The problem is that different clubs have different challenges. The whole "Leeds should be getting 20k" argument demonstrates that.

The leisure market in Leeds is very different to the leisure market in St Helens or Castleford. Yes, Leeds is a much bigger catchment area, but Leeds also operates in one of the most competitive night-time economies in the UK. It also has a much more transient population than most other towns and cities in RL land. The people living within 10 mins walk of Langtree are probably lifelong St Helens residents and supporters. The same catchment area around Headingley is made up of people who live there for six months of their lives or Yuppies who have moved to work in Leeds from elsewhere.

The clubs should know their business and their target audiences better than anyone else, which is why an RFL mandated 'one size fits all' approach to marketing is not the way to go IMO. A club like Leeds may decide that they have enough 'families' and want to focus their efforts and budget on attracting high-value corporate supporters, whereas another club may feel that they don't have the facilities or capacity to achieve the same and would instead prefer to attract the 'family day out' dollar.

When we still have games of our supposed elite competition being watched by less than 6,000 people, the blame has to lie at the foot of the clubs rather than the RFL.

this is partly true. But there are different types of marketing we are looking at, and as much as some is at the grass roots, some is necessarily centralised. Of course clubs are responsible for their own marketing, but they can't market SL as a whole and even a single match has too parties to it. That needs a certain amount of central control simply because we have numerous parties involved.

also whilst I agree that clubs may have different strategies for their market, we dilute and even undermine our efforts if we are all going in different directions. Leeds can't sell their game against Cas as a premium event when Cas are selling theirs against Leeds as a discount family day out. Wire can't try and sell theirs as the biggest sporting event in the area if Salford are selling it as knock down Nigel's cheap and cheerful game.

We need our strategies to be coherent. Yes clubs are responsible for getting people spending and making them fans, but we need a central strategy and outlook otherwise we will be swimming with one arm going one way and one going the other and wondering why despite all our efforts all we are achieving is keeping our heads from going under.

The fact is we will have a lot more success with 12 clubs pulling in one direction towards common goals than we will have with 12 clubs running around doing their own thing and sometimes deliberately undermining and downplaying each other.

There are very simple things the RFL (and by that I mean SL aswell, you parachute your man in, you are responsible) could do to raise attendances and to make it easier for clubs to do so, for instance why isn't the first game of the season a replay of the GF on a stand alone weekend? That's simple, easy, free and would attract extra fans. It's something that can only be done by the RFL? Why don't we have a heritage weekend? These are simple easy things and that we don't have lies only with the RFL top brass.

The RFL need to create an environment where clubs are encouraged, able and supported in trying to grow, where ideas are valued and not only implemented but implemented well, where cooperation for the greater good of the game is not wanted but demanded. We don't have that, We don't have a cohesive strategy, and it should come as no surprise that we aren't growing.

Considering the quality of the game as a spectator sport, the history and the level of involvement around the country at various levels the RFL have proven time & again to be the worst marketeers of any sport ever..Even if they checked this thread alone they'd have half a dozen ideas that would be easy & relatively inexpensive to make happen.
It's all well and good saying the responsibility lies with clubs, to a degree and on a local level that's fine but raising brand awareness on a national level to not just increase attendances at SL level but furthering interest throughout every root of the game can only be achieved through a concerted and meaningful effort from the hierachy. There are some good bits but they fall woefully short time & time again spurning huge opportunities that somehow seem to alude the thinking of those supposedly being paid to help further the sport..it just isn't good enough, not by a long stretch.

It's not the ideas that are the problem. It is the implementation of them.

It needs experienced marketing professionals, not some guy that found social media at 45.
RL is a big business that needs to be marketed properly, at club and league level.
We have always struggled at that.

These projects are so far off that it shouldn't stop the club from attracting new fans - it would be a nice problem to have if they had to move to Elland Rd whilst the improvements were underway.

I don't agree with your Cas v Leeds idea. If Leeds played Wakefield it would be one Wakefield's biggest games of the year the reverse fixture at Leeds would not have the same importance. Same if Salford were playing Cas the same weekend Warrington were playing Wigan you can't market the two games in the same way.

What the RFL need to do is work out they can improve the product on the field and then how they can get that message across. Clubs need to conquer there own challenges independent of the RFL's bigger marketing effort.

I agree with your marketing point but they don't need to improve the product, just the message telling people about it. The product has always been looked after. The marketing has not.

Google rfl employs marketing guru. We've had a guy who apparently turned city into a global entity on board for 2 years now. As far as I can see he has given us some extraordinary cartoons and a decrease in fans at games......
The rfl will have trouble attracting true marketing talent until they understand that in marketing, you really do get what you pay for.