Theo Helped the Trail Blazers Reach 102% of Revenue Goals...By Mid-Season
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CLIENT
Portland Trail Blazers
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TIMELINE
5 months
Digital Leaders in Sports Marketing
The Portland Trail Blazers have led the NBA in digital marketing innovation for more than a half-decade, achieving the highest return on ad spend (ROAS) of any team in the league multiple years running.
The Problem with ROAS
While optimizing entirely for ROAS can make media efficient, it can have a limiting effect on incremental sales. A challenge with the ROAS optimization model was that media prioritized the few showcase games because of the high ticket prices and return potential, while lower ranked games often struggled to hit revenue targets.
We saw an opportunity to help them grow overall sales by adapting their media buying strategy toward increasing revenue for individual games, while still maintaining strong returns on ad spend.
It's too easy to earn ROAS when a big market team comes to town.
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SOLUTIONS
Game Scoring Model
We integrated sales data to create a “live” media plan that adjusts game-specific budgets based on sales pacing. It helps focus the investment on games that needed more sales.
37% of budget was allocated based on game scoring methodology that involved periodic adjustments based on revenue to goal indicators.
Conversion Rate Optimization
We knew that emphasizing smaller games could lower conversion rates. To combat this, we designed and tested a dramatic new experience for the ticket sales page, modeled on eCommerce design best practices.
Our hypothesis proved highly successful, improving conversion rates by more than 11%. This allowed us to send more traffic toward their website in addition to ticketing partners like Ticketmaster.
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RESULTS
A Successful Reversal of Goodhart's Law
"When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure"
This was the premise of our strategic pivot for the Blazers. A small number of opponents would drive the bulk of media efficiency and performance. Through scoring and a tiered activation, we successfully shifted our KPI from total ROAS to Incremental Revenue.
102%
Goal Reached by Mid-Season
24%
Reduced Cost Per Acquisition on Lower Inventory Games
11%
Boost to Conversion Rate
