Former NFL players and current sports technology leaders Brian Jones and Kenyon Rasheed, chat with host Christy King, former VP of Tech R&D for UFC, about the revenue opportunities available to sports teams that work toward owning and executing business decisions on their own data.

VIDEO TRANSCRIPT

BRIAN JONES, FANREACH:

Our discussion with teams it’s not to disrupt their current business per se but it is to revolutionize it. Take it to the next step enhance it. And Kenyon says this brilliantly. We hear all this talk about smart venues, but teams they still have a dumb business model. You talk about the smart venue, but yet you’re giving away all the goods to your vendors. They get all that data. That payment process that gets all that effort. They know more about your customer, your fan, than you do. Those are the goods right there. So we’re trying to impress upon them to hey, take a different approach. Yeah you’re going to still have your same partnership, sponsorships, and things of that nature, but you need to take control of that audience. Why is that fan jumping on that plane? Why is that fan staying at that hotel near your venue? Why? Because of what you’re bringing to play. You’re the draw, so why wouldn’t you control all that data? Why wouldn’t you have sight lines into that fan and their behavior.

I thought of a couple of good analogies. The biopic “Ray.” Love that movie. Anytime it’s on I watch it, and there’s a scene where ABC is trying to get Ray Charles to move from Atlantic Records. You know what he said now… I have to have my masters! Atlantic I gotta have my masters. That [fan] data, that’s your master [recording]. Those are your masters. Sports teams, those are your masters. Why are you giving it away? Why are you giving it… and just think about this, if I’m going to marry… if I’m a sponsor I’m going to marry my brand to your brand. If you can’t tell me who that fan is, where they come from, what they’re buying, how they’re spending, you have none of that behavior data to share with me, why the hell am I gonna give you a million dollars or five million dollars throw my name on your stadium?