Analysis: How market research gave SPL fans a voice

Market research tends not to be a practice that is commonly associated with football in Scotland. As a paying customer at Scottish grounds for the last 30 years I’ve never once been asked to critique the pies at Kilmarnock, rate the view from the main stand at Easter Road or say how satisfied I am on a scale of 1 to 10 with the performance of the current Raith Rovers manager. To the casual observer football just doesn’t seem that interested in the views of fans, but why not?

Firstly, I suspect that many football clubs tend to assume that supporters will always turn up because of the unique relationship between fan and club. You choose your team then stick with them through thick and thin. I know that the urge to support your club can be strong. At different times in my life my desire to watch my own team has led me to truant from school, tell a white lie to my employer and refuse an invitation to a wedding. If supporters show that degree of brand loyalty then why bother asking their opinions?

Secondly, many in position of influence in football tend to look at the more extreme behaviour of supporters and assume that all fans are the same. They shout abuse at matches, rant on football forums and occasionally go round to a referee’s house and smash his windows if they disagree with his decision to give a penalty. Why on earth would you listen to the views of fan when they tend towards the irrational? This type of thinking creates a situation where the views of fans are considered secondary if they are considered at all.

The tendency to ignore fans was demonstrated in the recent debate on league reconstruction. The Scottish Premier League decided that the only way Scottish football could flourish was to reduce the top league from twelve teams to ten. They told us this would secure vital TV revenue and safeguard the future of our top teams. The two teams removed from the SPL would be accommodated in another league of ten called SPL2 which despite bearing a remarkable resemblance to the current Scottish First Division would supposedly generate more income. There was no reference to whether fans wanted a smaller league where teams played each other at least four times a season and any dissent was limited to online forums, the odd radio phone-in and sounding off in the pub with your friends. The collective voice of fans was missing from the debate and we were told that change was inevitable.

Then Supporters Direct Scotland decided to ask the fans what they thought. They tasked Red Circle Communications and Alasdair Galloway at the University of West of Scotland with designing and implementing a survey to determine and represent the views of supporters. With the festive period fast approaching and winter weather leaving a trail of postponed matches, it was clear that an online survey was the only suitable method of gathering opinion quickly and efficiently.

The questionnaire was made short, focused and easy to complete to encourage response on a level necessary to ensure the findings were robust and representative. The survey was then promoted in online football forums, on Trust websites and in the national media and over the space of five days around 5,000 responses were received from every type of supporter in Scotland. This impressive response allowed us not only to reflect the views of a considerable chunk of fans but, more importantly, it allowed us to break down the data providing robust samples based on age, trust membership and, crucially, at what level the team they supported played.

Whilst others were finishing off their Christmas shopping we were crunching the numbers to and analysing the qualitative comments to determine the main findings from the survey. The responses we had received were thoughtful, considered and insightful and they produced a clear, unequivocal message. Supporters wanted a larger not a smaller top league and an astounding 88% of supporters opposed the move to a top league of just ten teams. Worryingly, nine out of ten fans felt that they hadn’t been adequately consulted on the proposed changes.

Although we now knew the views of supporters across Scotland we also knew that the job was only half complete. We needed to make sure that the findings reached the public domain and contributed to the debate. A briefing for the Sunday newspapers helped provide the initial publicity for the findings that we required. The time of year and the lack of games to report on meant that the survey received extensive coverage in the Sunday Mail, News of the World, Scotland on Sunday, Sunday Herald and the Mail on Sunday. We followed this up by sending the results to every senior football club in Scotland including the twelve SPL chairmen who would ultimately be responsible for voting on any proposed change. Finally to make sure than fans were not forgotten we made the findings available on the Supporters Direct website, individual trust websites and on the very football forums we had used to promote the survey in the first place.

The consequence was that suddenly the fans had a voice. The results were reported widely and for a few days at least it seemed that no newspaper article on league reconstruction was complete without reference to the strength of fan opposition demonstrated by our survey. Supporters Direct was now being asked directly by the media to comment on the proposed changes and invited to provide the voice of fans on TV, radio and in the opinion pieces in several national newspapers. The SPL even invited them to Hampden for face-to-face talks on the future of Scottish football. Opponents of a ten team top league often quoted the 88% opposition statistic to support their stance and the Daily Record even launched a ‘Just Say No’ campaign to oppose the change. The views of fans had entered the debate, momentum shifted and suddenly the feeling of inevitability around a ten team top league started to dissipate.

As someone with experience in political campaigns I am always wary of claims that one event, one poster, one editorial or one survey won an election. These claims are usually exaggerated and frequently made by the person responsible for the supposed ‘game changer’. No one knows whether or not the publication of our fan survey will have a significant lasting impact on the league reconstruction debate. As I write the direction of the SPL is less clear than it had been but we may still end up with a top league of ten teams. The one thing we can be sure of is that the survey made the voice of the ordinary supporter heard and that can only be a good thing. Football is nothing with fans. They are the people who buy the tickets, create the atmosphere, purchase the merchandise and support the professional game. What right thinking business would ignore the wishes of their customers? Fans should have a say in the decisions that impact of the future direction of the game in Scotland and hopefully one legacy of this particular debate is that in future those running Scottish football might be more willing to listen to their views. And if so, perhaps there is a role for market research in football after all.

Steven Lawther is a Raith Rovers supporter and the owner of Red Circle Communications, an independent research and communication agency based in Edinburgh.