It has long been known that the avid NASCAR fan is also very loyal to sponsors of the sport, dwarfing the loyalty of fans of other sports. In fact, a study released by James Madison University’s Center for Sports Sponsorship states extraordinary awareness of sponsors and considers NASCAR “the best buy in sports marketing” with unparalleled awareness, favorability and effectiveness of brands connected to the sport.

The above mentioned study concluded the following of NASCAR fans:
93% said sponsors were “very important” to the sport
83% said they “like sponsors” (“somewhat” or “a lot”)
51% agreed when buying a sponsor’s product they are supporting the sport
47% agreed they “like” a brand more because it sponsors the sport

So, now you ask – how is Fantasy Football the new NASCAR? Well, it’s not a sport in the traditional sense, but it is an online sport and “killer application,” providing a deeper penetration into the physical game. The similarities are striking.

For those that do not know how fantasy football works: like NASCAR, fantasy football fans root for a single athlete – not a team. If you don’t believe me find a good friend that is a fan of say, the New York Giants and also has Tony Romo (QB, Dallas Cowboys) as the starting quarterback on their fantasy team. Now watch closely a game where the Cowboys play the Giants and you will see a single man stretched in two distinctly different directions…wanting his team to win and also wanting Romo to score touchdowns. It’s the ultimate catch-22 and it tears at the fabric of the NFL’s support system.

Research conducted by the Fantasy Sports Association, utilizing Nielsen Net Ratings usage analysis and Copernicus Consulting research, shows that attitudes toward advertisers of fantasy football applications and content were very positive. The most commonly associated responses were consumers stating support because the brands were more of interest to them; they wished to support brands and the sites that provide for their interest, the sponsors were more heavily noticed because of regular site visits and the big one – trust.

In fact, the above mentioned research also found the following of fantasy football fans:
80% expect to see ads on a fantasy sports website
62% expect the brand advertising will “fit with their interest”
56% are “more likely” to notice an advertisement on a fantasy sport website than another website
50% are “more likely” to purchase products from a sponsor

All of the above is strong data to consider when planning an online sponsorship for a brand, particularly one with a focus on a key demographic of males 18 – 49 years of age.

More importantly it begs the questions: Has fantasy football become such a fruitful source of passionate consumerism that brands should consider outright sponsorship of the applications themselves or perhaps sponsorship of the sites that produce the applications and service? Or maybe, sponsorship of the leagues created by the fans? All of which would endear brands to the consumer for a fraction of the cost of a deal with the league or a single player alone.

Consider that the latest data shows there were nearly 9 million unique users of fantasy football sites in October 2005. These 9 million passionate fantasy football consumers averaged seven visits to their fantasy site of choice, logged nearly 2 billion fantasy football-specific page views and created a “multiplier-effect” for those sites, resulting in an additional 1 billion page views per month for those host sites.

In terms of online significance when it comes to fantasy football, consider the Super Bowl is not even a factor in the minds of fantasy football fans. In fact it is an event without a heartbeat on NFL.com, ESPN and Sportsline, three leading sports sites. Trend data derived from Compete, Inc shows that online traffic surges as preseason begins and maintains high volume throughout the season – with an added pop for the NFL Draft.

Gentlemen fantasy football has arrived and the opportunity for media value is endless. If you listen you can hear it coming – Click-Clack. 

Click-Clack is a trademark of Under Armour.

Fast-forward ten years and it’s easy to see that a lot has changed. Today, there are companies with market capitalizations exceeding 100 billion dollars which have only been around for a few years (say hello Google).  There are semi-celebrities of the online media world such as Nick Denton, Perez Hilton, and a slew of YouTubers.  There are different size ad units, new consumer driven formats in the form of blogs, pod casts, video and social networks.  There are new ways of doing business and yet there are still some things that have not changed – some online marketers irrelevantly focusing on “hits” rather than other, more important, metrics.  As I see it, a hit don’t mean sh*t.

Every element of a web page when loaded from a server is recorded as a “hit”.  This includes graphics, text, interactive items and the page itself.  Go to the home page of Yahoo! on any given day and you’ll likely come up with 150 to 300+ “hits”.  The reality is that a “hit” is a useful metric in determining loads being exerted by a server and that’s where its significance ends.

Today, online marketing is rich with the ability to track the micro-details which go well beyond “hits”.  When considering the important metrics you should be tracking – the ones that allow for more meaningful insight from your web site, ask yourself the following (and by no means is this an all-inclusive list):

1. How many unique visitors and total visitors am I seeing over a given time frame and what is the trend of these two numbers?

2. What are the referring sources of my site’s traffic and which sources yield the most desirable traffic?

3. How much time are my visitors spending on my site? 

4. Which areas of my site are visitors spending the most time and conversely, the least time on? 

5. What are the exit points on my site? 

6. What are the pathways or funnels that users navigate through and what does the data tell me that can help me to improve my site’s flow and navigation? 

7. What are the actions/conversions taken on my site and are these desired actions?

8. Am I tracking only click-through conversions or am I tracking view-based conversions as well?

9. How am I reconciling the online activity with offline transactions?

While some of the questions are easier to answer than others, taking the right steps to answer these questions will give you more control of your campaigns, your web site, and ultimately yield a bigger payoff in the end. 

So, the next time you are watching your favorite news program and the reporter mentions a celebrity that lost custody of her children and how when they broke that news, according to the reporter, it resulted in 17,000 hits to their web site in one day – grin and know that you are steps ahead of even the big media behemoths and that even they don’t always get the facts right.

The history of advertising has dictated that the measurement of media be based on reach and frequency and this process has largely led advertisers to pilot campaigns by line of sight and not based upon exact or hard data.  In short, this measurement has been and continues to be judged or rated, by systems that at this point should be questioned or quite frankly be considered, antiquated.

Old media measurement states that the television viewing habits of over 300 million Americans be based upon little boxes attached to the television sets found in only 9,000 homes.  The data collected is then applied to nearly 300 million others.  When it comes to magazines, the readership or “circulation” is based on a measurement method that states multiple people will read a single copy of a magazine.  These numbers, while accepted by the industry, are estimated to be inflated by as much as 3 to 4 time’s actual readership.  Old media measurement methods need to change and will change.  The sight-based media mentality of, “I see it, therefore it is” will crumble and give way to what we call, instrument-rated media.
  
The emergence of the Internet as a key marketing and business tool, allows advertisers the opportunity to measure virtually everything, extending well beyond the basic old school mentality of just “reach” and “frequency”.  I co-founded Levelwing Media with this in mind and as an interactive advertising agency, our job is to assist clients in mapping successful campaigns, measuring everything imaginable, and making changes to campaigns in real-time, based upon those measurements, to improve results.

Advertising agencies have long subscribed to the past methods of media ratings and much of their business is built on that foundation, albeit a crumbling one.  You see the large statuesque agencies trying to adjust everyday, but to rebuild a foundation from the top down is very difficult, if not impossible.  The new agency mentality must be one of continual advancement in a world that is full of sudden changes and emerging technologies.  The Internet is the form of media that most lends itself to instrument-rated governance. 

Detailed tracking, reporting, analysis, as well as real-time optimization, give Internet media an advantage over other forms when it comes to quantifying ROI.  Yes, the Internet has begun to transform the way companies do business, and specifically the way companies advertise and manage their media initiatives.

Today, a small business can compete with a much larger one.  A strong brand presence can be eroded by a more adapt and flexible competitor.  Signs of media change are all around us.  These changes will force old media habits to change as well.  W. Edward Deming said, “It is not necessary to change, survival is not mandatory.”  It’s fitting that Deming was by trade a statistician and widely credited with improving production in the United States during World War II.  His teachings taught the management of corporations how to improve design, quality, sales, and so forth.

As media flies forward, so to will the technologies that create, deliver and track those processes.  Your staff and advertising agency should understand this and be prepared to take advantage of all of the opportunities this brings.  And let’s face it, in changing times or in bad weather, when the visibility is clouded and can approach zero, you need an instrument-rated pilot.