Imagine you’re en route to the big game, your team is in the Stanley Cup playoffs. You can feel the excitement and smell the popcorn in the air. Your shoes are already sticking to the floor as thousands of rambunctious fans push through the crowd, spilling their overpriced beer as they make their way to their seats. Now imagine, all your favorite players taking to the ice, but wait… there is something off. These guys are all wearing flimsy knee pads, clunky dysfunctional gloves, and where are their helmets? You would never expect to see something as ridiculous as this! It throws you right off. This may very well be the same sort of dismay felt by fans trying to engage in the full experience at a venue with an outdated, under-performing WiFi/Wireless system.
At most major events that occur in our lives, we the millenials are constantly posting pictures, sharing, tagging, tweeting and sending status updates throughout the experience. If this is not you, we find this endearing - Hold Strong! But it’s safe to say that this is most of us. Now why would some of the largest events, drawing some of the biggest crowds; to stadiums that may have the capacity of a small suburb, not be providing its attendees with anything less than the proper equipment to fulfill this constant need for connectivity?
Not only does having a proper WiFi system in your facility help enhance the customer experience and fan engagement; it increases revenues for organizers, helps with team management, training ,analysis, ticketing, merchandising, promotion for the provider and a whole lot more. The investment in these systems will pay for themselves. Owners and organizers who are not serving this IT savvy audience, will just simply not be seeing the benefit from any new sources of information and increased revenue that is has proven to provide.
Revelations within this digital generation, have forced our WiFi/IT providers to create systems specific to large capacity venues. Whether it be customising Distributed Antenna Systems for specific clients to ensure a uniform signal throughout every corner of the property, or creating innovative “low profile” Omnidirectional Antennas to preserve aesthetics on site; they are working hard to ensure their industry benefits by customising its services for this growing demand.
Although the majority of major players in the sports and entertainment realm have been surfing this technological wave for quite some time, it is no question that organizations big and small will be catching that swell right alongside them. We are excited to see how these new technologies will help build bridges between attendees, events, brand awareness, sponsorship value and create invaluable data bases for many organizations moving forward.