So... recruitment, huh?

[Peace 1,562]

I'm supposed to be talking about recruitment, or something like that, but really I just leave that up to the recruitment team -- for the most part they've done a pretty good job keeping the league growing just through periodic YouTube advertisements and Reddit campaigns; I've tossed in my ideas around, though, so that means I can do a media spot on different types of recruitment drives I think would work in bringing new members into the Victory Hockey League. 

Pay for a brief Facebook Ad.

Facebook is a pretty decent place to -- guess what -- connect with people who may be interested in joining a simulation hockey league, as long as the advertisement is targeted towards the right people and not just loosely hockey fans. This opens up a ton of potential avenues, but also presents a lot of risks, such as cyber bullying and overcrowding. The benefits are limitless, though, which includes stable growth and exposure for the league. A Facebook Ad might not work with the current league structure, and I can hear Victor already tensing up at the thought, but it might actually work in it's intended purpose. Of course the issue there is what is the right price for potential return. 

Establish more affiliations.

 

I know the topic of affiliation is a pretty open wound at the moment, but if the recruitment team went out and googled even moderately sized sim leagues to affiliate with -- or even managed to negotiate an affiliation with a larger league -- it would obviously be beneficial for the VHL. We have numerous members that are already split between the VHL/EFL/SBA and SHL, but honestly I have to assume this route has already been explored but I haven't heard, seen or read anything regarding affiliations with other leagues. I used to run a post by post Halo RPG forum, and at it's prime -- before turn based post by post role plays died -- we shared members between dozens of different PBP RPG forums. 

Pay for a Google Ad.

A little more expensive, but casts a wider net, and uses peoples search history and what not to accurately (somewhat) target people who would be interested. This option -- coupled with expansion being a split in the BoG as far as I am aware -- could grow the VHL into a more popular league. Now I'll be the first one to admit I don't have any experience with Google Ads, I don't know their terms of service for advertisements or how it works. I can tell you, however, that paying for an ad is usually worth it if you feel like the potential return is there. Sometimes you have to spend the money in order to grow the community. It's not like the VHL is struggling to field drafts right now, like it was before the portal and honestly my return (I actually joined in 2013. Surprise!), so these paid options probably aren't worth it. 

Stop the paid YouTube advertisements.

Here's the thing about content creators. Sure, they'll advertise your business, and if it's a product might even use it -- but for a sim league, which isn't a product, they don't actually stick around. If they do, it's pretty rare, and they're probably using alternative accounts to hide from subscribers. How many YouTube personalities has the VHL advertised to that are still around? If there are any, I don't know who they are. In theory it seems okay, but when you advertise to EA Sports hockey fans, they come to the website more often than not expecting a NHL 20 hockey league and that's not at all what we are. If you have to advertise with YouTube content creators, you have to target the ones that aren't playing NHL 20, but rather covering the sport... and for the love of god, give them a better script that establishes VHL as... well essentially a post-by-post hockey simulation. That's what it is. 



Over 500 words. I'm out! 

[Beketov 9,140]

2 minutes ago, Peace said:

Pay for a brief Facebook Ad.

We could definitely try it again but we have tried in the past. It cost a small fortune and got us barely any viability and no members. Could have been how the demographics were set up, Im

not sure, but it definitely didn’t work.

 

4 minutes ago, Peace said:

Pay for a Google Ad.

We’ve looked into actual YouTube ads (as in not with the creators) and the cost for return was insanely too high to be valuable. Again though, might have been set up wrong.
 

Not shitting on your ideas at all of course, just pointing out what has been looked at and what might have been the flaws with them.

[Peace 1,562]

3 minutes ago, Beketov said:

We could definitely try it again but we have tried in the past. It cost a small fortune and got us barely any viability and no members. Could have been how the demographics were set up, Im

not sure, but it definitely didn’t work.

 

We’ve looked into actual YouTube ads (as in not with the creators) and the cost for return was insanely too high to be valuable. Again though, might have been set up wrong.
 

Not shitting on your ideas at all of course, just pointing out what has been looked at and what might have been the flaws with them.

 

I assumed the forum had explored these in the past. Advertisements aren't a big net you cast, they've got to be properly targeted. Unfortunately, the more you spend, the more people see it. If you only spend say $100 on an ad, the targeted audience is very small and it's likely wasted on people who ignore ads (me) or run AdBlock. I'm not saying it's an entirely viable option, just an option. 

[Motzaburger 1,590]

23 minutes ago, Beketov said:

We could definitely try it again but we have tried in the past. It cost a small fortune and got us barely any viability and no members. Could have been how the demographics were set up, Im

not sure, but it definitely didn’t work.

 

We’ve looked into actual YouTube ads (as in not with the creators) and the cost for return was insanely too high to be valuable. Again though, might have been set up wrong.
 

Not shitting on your ideas at all of course, just pointing out what has been looked at and what might have been the flaws with them.

 

Twitter ads tbh...quite inexpensive and lots of analytics that come with it. Easy to target specific populations whether it's "hockey" in North America or followers of Bob McKenzie let's say.