Minneapolis-based digital agency SportsDigita operates in a corner of the sports tech world that has probably crossed very few minds. But looking at their client list of around 140 professional teams, including names like the Los Angeles Lakers, Seattle Seahawks and Boston Red Sox, you will quickly conclude that they provide something invaluable to the business side of sports operations.
After working in the front offices of professional sports teams, most notably with the Tampa Bay Lightning, founder and CEO Angelina Lawton noticed the need for a service that could save the salespeople within sports organizations a considerable amount of time.
Thus we have SportsDigita’s primary product—the Digideck—a web-based presentation platform that is fully customizable to the at-hand needs of any sports team.
“We will sit down with their sponsorship team, and we will see what they are currently doing as far as presentation and selling. Then, once we get a good grasp of how they are selling, we act in sort of a consulting role for them on how we would put the deck together,” Lawton said of the SportsDigita’s role after selling a Digideck.
Essentially, teams will approach SportsDigita, and purchase their Digideck presentation platform, primarily in the aim of gaining more and better sponsorships. From there, teams are responsible for all assets, so the pictures, written content and video that will go into the presentation. The SportsDigita team will then take over the design portion of the Digideck. The only hand they do have on the content side is that they send a photographer to a team’s stadium to provide 360-degree viewpoints, among other standard photos to help with the process.
But aside from giving teams a creative and high-quality platform with which to give their sales pitch, the Digideck could be most valuable with the time it saves for those teams.
“What would take a salesperson hours or days to put together a presentation, now takes them less than 20 minutes,” Lawton said.
SportsDigita then couples this innovative presentation format with a touch of analytics, providing each team’s sales department with the statistics of who is viewing the presentation, where in the presentation those people spend the most time and who the presentation is being forwarded to. This gives the Digideck an almost self-improving system, as they pull data and analyze it for future deals.
Though the Digideck is SportsDigita’s most popular product, they also offer a variety of other services within the realms of ticketing and fan engagement.
For ticketing, they use the same skills that apply to gaining sponsorship deals, meaning creative platforms with which to deliver information to clients. Their integration of 360-degree cameras allows for a feature where fans will be able to get their seat’s full view before buying the tickets.
Lastly, on the fan engagement side of matters, SportsDigita has embarked on a number of mobile and social products to reward loyalty and improve general game day experience. They have helped teams in developing apps, along with miscellaneous digital tools like Holiday eCards.
While SportsDigita does not necessarily make a noticeable on-field impact, their presence still gives teams a noticeable competitive advantage. The more money pulled from sponsorships and ticket sales goes directly into those teams fielding the best possible lineup. So, their behind-the-scenes work makes it easier for a team like the Seahawks to reach the Super Bowl two years in a row.