The management of the new Major League Lacrosse franchise in Charlotte, N.C., took an unorthodox approach in naming the team, which was annouced as the Charlotte Hounds in an unveiling event Tuesday.
Team president Jim McPhilliamy and his crew, including sales and marketing head Wade Leaphart, have tremendous branding experience from years in the sports industry, including the NBA's Charlotte Bobcats. But instead of making a decision behind closed doors, the group turned to the fans for the name in a voting process that spanned nearly three months.
The process made heavy use of the team's social networking outlets, and in McPhilliamy's eyes was a huge success in engaging the Charlotte community.
McPhilliamy spoke with Inside Lacrosse about the unique process, including some details about the voting and the team.
Pieces of a Q and A with McPhilliamy are below:
Why the fans name the team?
From the beginning, we wanted to engage with our fan base. We believe sports teams succeed (or fail) because a passionate fan base wants to be engaged on an emotional level with the team ? they feel they are part of the team. We hope to foster that feeling of belonging from the outset my involving them in our first major decision, naming the team.
Tell us something interesting about the voting process
One of my favorites was the Charlotte Charge. It was a power logo. I really liked it, but the kids just hated it and decimated it right from the beginning. That sort of thing that's what it's about.
We used a Facebook app where you could do a hierarchical rank. You ranked it everything from your favorite to your least favorite. It was interesting to see the passion and non-passion behind every name. Some teams, everybody ranked them middle of the road and people weren't passionate at all. The ones that were at the top were the ones people were most passionate about: Some people like them, some people hated them. And from a branding perspective that's exactly what you're looking for. You want people to feel passionately about it, even if some people don't like it. If they're indifferent, they'll never buy it.
When it got down to the top three. They took it to the designers to make revisions on the logos and put it out to fans one more time. It was a tightly contested race between Hounds and Legions ? about 20 votes.
Are you happy with the process?
When Hounds was first suggested way back when, I was like ?no way we're going to be the Hounds.? As the process unfolded I really liked it a lot. I'm completely happy with the process because I never would have landed there. If we would have just done it up in our little white castle it probably would have been something like the Charge that the kids hate. If we didn't do this we never would have found this out, thought we were doing a great job and had a huge backlash.
The process has been outstanding. We realize there are people that are passionate about the other names and they're going to be disappointed, but we let them be part of the democratic process.
What has the feedback been from the people in the community and from sports industry peers?
We're the fourth team to do this in pro sports history. It's been pretty cool from the sports industry side. We're small but we've gotten great media coverage.
But our main concern is to engage the fans here. From that standpoint, we were just at a youth tournament with 800 kids out there, and every body came out and they voted and had strong opinions. So we have engaged the local fanbase pretty well. There was a buzz about it, and that's really what we wanted to create was engagement with the people that play lacrosse here.
How will that buzz pay dividends later on?
It already has. The social interaction has built up conversations with people online that we now take offline when people say they're interested in season tickets. We've got a very rich group of people to start moving forward with to ultimately put butts in the seats.
What role will social media play with the team?
We're definitely to continue that. Head of sales and marketing Wade Leaphart is a big proponent of it. He views it as a two-way street not a one-way street. It's our responsibility to not just tell people what we're thinking, but to respond to people and have it as a conversation. We need to use social media to engage people because it's cost effective.
Why will lacrosse be a success in Charlotte?
I think the interesting thing that we found is that it's almost like a secret society or fraternity here. Everyone that's involved in lacrosse tries to help one another out because they want to promote the sport. We have been given tremendous assistance from a 15-member board of advisers that are all lacrosse people, and they are really interested in us succeeding. For the time being, we knew we had to do very well in the depth. People have to want you to succeed for you to succeed. We've got a lot of people here in Charlotte that want us to succeed.
Talk about the growth of the game.
It's blowing up here right now. We're right in the front of it. Kids are just getting exposed to it down here and it's an addictive sport. The original business plan I was putting in front of people, it's a five-, six-year payoff for us to get to where we're breaking even. From what I've seen since then I think we're better than that. The growth of the sport will catch up to the league over the long haul. Ten years from now, even five years from now, it's going to be a substantially different marketplace here in Charlotte and nationally. The more kids that are playing now with this exposure means better athletes that are playing in the future. Better athletes mean more people are going to want to watch it.
Why should a family of four in Charlotte spend their Saturday at the Hounds game?
The families are our primary family target. The players are interactive with the kids unlike any sport that I've seen. They're with the fans before the game, they're with the fans after the game. The product on the field is unbelievably entertaining. Compared to other sports it's much more affordable. For a family of four, you can get inside for $45.
Closing words to the fans?
Our engaging the fans was not a one-time thing for us. That's going to be the contiunuous way we do business. We've seen around here what happens when ownership and management do not listen to the voice of the fan. That's going to be one of the centerpieces of the way we do business. We'll solicit your opinion and we'll try to accommodate you any way we can because we want your business.
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