Membership is vital to the success of any team. And it is membership that will be a key component of helping ANZ Championship netball team
West Coast Fever build towards a successful 2012 season.
They are aiming high, both on and off the court. With ex-Australian coach Norma Plummer on board as well as the signing of Catherine Cox to the shooting circle the Fever are ready to make some waves in the world's most prestigious netball competition.
Off field the club is already experiencing success with the help of IMG Sports Technology Group (IMG STG).
In 2011 the West Coast Fever finished the season with 816 members. That number has already been beaten, with more than 1,100 members signed up for the 2012 season already and the club looking forward to an expected tally that might come close to doubling the previous year's membership figure.
The IMG STG
membership tools have ensured West Coast Fever meet the increase in demand.
"Even though we have 40% more members in 2012, we have cut the amount of time processing memberships by 50% by renewing members and processing all new members online.” Said Netball WA Commercial and Marketing Manager, James Young.
"The West Coast Fever have had access to the IMG online system for two years but have dramatically increased our utilisation of the system for our 2012 membership campaign". Said Mr. Young.
With such a significant increase in Membership it was vital that the club not be bogged down manually processing applications and subscriptions. The IMG STG Membership module enabled them to send reminders to past members automatically. Almost 90% of all membership transactions were online transactions completed by the member without any need for intervention from club personnel.
With so many members signing up online the club has also been able to make use of the more advanced features in the IMG STG system. Once a member completes their purchase the received an automated email receipt with the members name and login details to the membership portal, dates of all Fever home games, and links to their website, Facebook and Twitter accounts.
The Fever also used the email communications module that is part of the IMG STG system to keep in contact with their members. The club sent reminders to all members that had not renewed to do so a few days before the renewal cut-off date ended, and created a promotion at Christmas time suggesting purchasing a West Coast Fever membership as a Christmas present for a loved one.
IMG Sports Technology Group are part of IMG - the Global Leader in Sports Media and Entertainment. IMG Sports Technology Group are responsible for over 1.5M member records and more than $100M in online transactions annually for dozens of national sporting bodies and hundreds of grass roots sporting organisations. IMG Sports Technology Group specialise in working with sports and member based organisations to provide online solutions to manage their engagement with participants, members and fans.