Vancouver Canucks Take Marketing to the Next Level With Ticketmaster and StellarAlgo

Challenge:

In recent years, the Vancouver Canucks marketing team has been laser focused on growing the team’s fanbase. Based in one of Canada’s fastest growing and most diverse cities, the team needed a solution that would help them identify first-time Canucks and hockey fans and offer them engaging experiences that would bring them back for additional games or even a season ticket purchase. With many disparate sources of data, the team also needed a centralized data warehouse that would allow it to quickly unify, analyse and activate on fan insights that improve the overall fan experience.

Solution:

The Canucks looked to Ticketmaster’s Nexus Partners for a solution that would help pull together over a dozen fan data sources to create a single view of their customers.

StellarAlgo’s best-in-class Customer Data Platform (CDP) allowed the Canucks to do just that. In addition to unifying over ten Canucks customer data systems—including Ticketmaster ticketing data—into a single view, the StellarAlgo CDP also enabled non-technical staff to better understand fans and their experiences, without needing to code.

Enhanced by a predictive toolset, the CDP also generates automated insights that help the team take action more quickly on incoming fan feedback and preferences. In doing so, the Canucks have been able to quickly and efficiently elevate the fan experience both on and off the ice.

“The better you understand what your fans are telling you and create great fan experiences based on it, the more loyal your fan base becomes,” says Joseph King, Chief Product Officer and Partner at StellarAlgo.

“Being able to have these insights available in an instant through innovative technology, furthers teams’ ability to provide what their fans are asking for in an effective way. Our unique partnership and intimate knowledge of the Ticketmaster datasets allows us to make these experiences possible for the Canucks and their fans.”

In nearly eight weeks, the team was able to scale personalized engagement campaigns in time for the 2019-20 season.

Business Impact: 

On top of growing their known (and CASL compliant) marketable universe by over 40%, the Canucks were able to thread a whole new level of personalization into every touchpoint along the fan journey. From dedicated nurture campaigns for new fans to rewarding diehard devotees, the team has seen an increase in attendee experience scores and campaign conversion rates for every touchpoint, utilizing new insights from StellarAlgo.

One example: The team has leveraged StellarAlgo’s fan avidity model to improve engagement and conversion across avidity categorizations. Since this time last year, the Canucks have seen 8% of their fans move from lite – the least avid fans – into casual and avid categorizations. This is especially significant given 160k additional fans were included in the avidity model over the year.

The Canucks have also applied the insights more broadly. By swiftly identifying target fan groups and engaging them with personalized content, the Canucks saw a +37% increase in engagement with every fan touchpoint from the mobile app to social media since implementing StellarAlgo. The team’s new marketing campaigns have proven immensely successful with an increase of ROI seven times the revenue from target fan groups.

“StellarAlgo’s customer data capabilities have brought our marketing efforts to a new level. Understanding our customers across a variety of touchpoints and being able to act on specific fan behaviors has elevated engagement across the board. With StellarAlgo, our efforts continue to become more sophisticated as we focus on reaching our customer with the right message at the right time.” added Kevin Kinghorn, VP of Marketing for the Vancouver Canucks.