The professional tennis season is in full swing with the French Open and AEGON Championships completed in June and the 125th Wimbledon Championships coming to a close on Sunday, July 3rd. Other ATP tournaments and the U.S. Open are ramping up now. Can you tell I’m a tennis fan?
Whether you’re into tennis or not, there is much to learn from the ATP’s evolution and insights as an entertainment and sports management organization on the Web and in cities worldwide. Conceptually, every business has it’s own stars, matches, tournaments, venues and seasons. Common success themes to consider for any industry are:
- Content strategy and editorial to create storylines and value for key stakeholders
- Realtime content creation and distribution to drive authority, immediacy, sharing and multichannel engagement
- Web, email, social, mobile, search, television onsite and print channels and solutions to enable, grow and interact with communities and individuals
- Affinity and passion that inspires action and participation
I had a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to participate for a few days early in this year’s 125th Wimbledon Championships. An extraordinary experience that was 30 years in the making; a guest of the ATP focused on blogging about and enjoying this grand event as a loyal fan. You can read more about some of my Wimbledon adventures and see related photos. Fun aside, let’s talk about and tune into the business and future of tennis.
Tennis is big business and has been for decades. Everything from equipment, clothing, courts/clubs, tournaments, professionals, sponsorships, etc. generates billions in revenue each year worldwide. So you may ask yourself, “what’s the future of tennis” -- in terms of digital and onsite experiences -- for fans, players, sponsors and friends from the ATP working behind the scenes? John Phillips and I discuss this in our creatorbase thoughts video above and get into some futuristic examples that are in play now, and touch on what's to come.
With more than 4 million people participating onsite at 62 ATP tournaments in 32 countries and more than 4 million people actively engaging online each month via ATPWorldTour.com, mobile and social channels -- there are many opportunities to create and monetize compelling tennis experiences that entertain and WOW the tennis community. Businesses in any industry can learn from the ATP's playbook and successes to date.
If you're doing similar things as the ATP/tennis community in your industry, I'd like to learn more and share your insights. Stay tuned for another creatorbase thoughts video from Wimbledon.
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