Beacon on the Hill Sports Marketing

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16 Signals of Success in Business and Sports Enterprise

Whether beginning or continuing a major or minor sports league or sports franchise, or any other business enterprise, there are 16 signals of success. Here are 16 that provide clues as to why so there has yet to be a long term successfulnew league. We are asked continuously by potential investors, "why hasn't there been a new and successful league since the AFL that merged with the NFL?

Here are our 16 ONE-SENTENCE SUMMARIES to answer the question of why others failed and why we feel we'll succeed at starting a new football league.  For some, it was only a few of these that follow; for others it was a great many of these tht follow.  Same end:  revenue negative, leagues failed.

  1. …did not follow the innovative wealth building strategies available, including our 40 Revenue Streams in 26 (Mostly Local Revenue) Categories.  Most focused on game day sales and sponsorships. Some felt that if the launched, the NFL would pick them up as a "D" league, solving their financial problems.
  2. …did not provide adequate focus on financial success or Stadiums as Anchors, including losing focus on football (didn’t protect “the geese” that laid the golden eggs, ignoring marketing/PR/sponsors and the “40 in 26” revenue categories; in a word, they were not go-getters.  Three of the 32 NFL teams are go getters that each generate $200-300 million per year more in revenue than each of the other 29 teams, which means $200-300 million “lost” annual opportunity revenues for the other 29 teams.  In a decade: the 3 each generate $2-3 Billion more than each of the other 29.
  3. …did not collaborate; instead used outdated “ Shut up and sit down” anti-Golden Rule management styles, bowing to false “golden rule” (he who has the gold rules) rather than accept enabling people to work/collaborate together through a "Master Mind" Brain Trust Approach, a great way to get the best ideas on the table, and a great way to engage what is needed as agreat way to deal with “human nature,” checks and balances with all involved having a "seat at the table."
  4. …had “wish world” blindness instead of “is world” understanding based on a positive analysis of evidence about the abundance of coaches, players, staffs, and investors.
  5. …did not fully raise all investment need to launch, believing if they built it investors would come.  They didn’t come.  We know of 60 that had an interest in UFL franchises but were not if they would have been shown the books:  request denied.
  6. …did not follow their own business plans, breaking Business Start Up 101’s basic rule:  don’t break plan.
  7. …did not put all investor dollars into escrow until fully funded to demonstrate strength of development.
  8. …did not have benchmarks, deltas, and time frames with feedback loop analyses to guide decisions.
  9. …did not secure foreign media distribution revenue streams, which can equal at least a season’s revenue needs, if not 1.5 times income needs for league and league franchises.  In dollars and cents: worth $100M/year or more, and will grow. 
  10. …did not launch with a safety net (fully funded or pledged for first two years, after which should be self-sustaining, causing some investors to believe they would be getingt authorization from NFL as an NFL "D" development league, and not just an alternative league.  Needed is to operate on a sure footing such that the NFL comes knocking on their door, not the reverse. We proposed to operate as separate entity, independent of the NFL, being near-NFL in quality of play (coaches and players, many who would be ex-NFL). 
  11. …did not believe they could leverage their launch (including selling franchises) with $2 million;  falsely assumed they had to initially raise $100M or more and thus have to be backed by high net worth individuals of 9 or ten figures net worth.  Did not understand required executive and player salaries, nor did they provide coordinated raises based on league by-laws established performance parameters.
  12. …did not take advantage of tax codes, investment rules, other tax strategies (how to lose and still be ahead).
  13. …did not have and/or did not use the technology available today to enable providing content to all mobile devices (including  smart phones, smart tablets, lap tops, etc.), social media, nor an abundance of digital apps for many ways to communicate with fans and sustain active and interactive interaction.
  14. …did not honor and respect the communities they played in (expected to be honored by fans & still be allowed to do as they wanted, especially regarding not paying bills; led to fan collapse, reduced viewers, reduced fans in the stands, lowered ratings, reduced revenue and collapsed league or collapsed launch.
  15. …did not have plans to enable sustained great attendance through the full season.  We have Fan Plans.
  16. …did not trust that cities awaiting the opportunity to embrace a team of their own in both the USA and Canada.

 


Page content written September 2014 / posted: 04-18-15

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