I think that 2013 will be a big season for the game and it is time to have some ambition in terms of marketing the sport properly :



- SBW and Folau have returned in Australia - how much is SBW in a New Zealand shirt worth in RLWC ticket sales - just down to his sheer X Factor - 40,000 at Elland Road for the Bulldogs v Rhinos WCC etc



- the NRL cleans up in Australia - its main sponsor, Telstra being the equivalent of BT - watch an NRL game and all the sponsors are A list as RL is the Premier League equivalent in Australia. Even the balls are sponsored by Powerade.



- BBC Sport are in Salford - a natural win in terms of raising the profile



- even in the UK, there are lots of Northern headquartered substantial concerns - Peel Holdings, Leeds Building Society, Skipton Building Society, Tetleys, Yorkshire Bank - who should share the values of the game



- the RL demographic appeals to Irn Bru (Barrs), Gillette - there must be other mainstream banks (HSBC, Lloyds) whose customer base is predominantly a RL audience - middle income families with savings/deposit accounts



- the World Cup is a huge opportunity on the back of the Olympics - provided it is a big event based on the 2008 template in Australia



Time to bang the drum and market the Sinfields, Halls, Tomkins and Watkins as ambassadors for the game and role models - to which sponsors can be aligned

Provident anyone?

I see Rugby League dazed, in the centre of the ring, and Nigel Wood in a one-shoulder-strap leotard, emblazoned with Stobart adverts, climbing up the turnbuckles onto the top rope, ready for the "splash", 12 old farts from the RFU chanting "Easy, Easy". Should I get out more?

Yes, get out and go straight to your nearest therapist.

I think some fans believe marketing Rugby League in the UK is easy. It's not done brilliantly at all times by any means but the struggles the game has encountered since 1895 are not due to lack of decent marketing alone.



Not sure what this point is but I can assure you that the fact that SBW was playing put zero bums on seats for that game. His contract with the Roosters runs to the end of the NRL season so there is no certainty he will be appearing in the RLWC. I do agree someone should make a move ASAP to get him involved as he appears to have become a relatively well known individual since he left the game. Whether he deserves to be in the Kiwi team will be another matter though.

The point about SBW is love him or hate him - the guy is (i) box office and (ii) the most complete athlete (bar Ellery Hanley) that I have seen play the game in the 36 years I have been watching the game.



I would find it hard to believe that none of the 40,000 at Elland Road for that WCC - turned up to watch SBW - certainly after the game those two shoulder charges on Bai and one other Leeds players are still current on You tube today and were well reported at the time.



This is one element where the British game has suffered in terms of having recognisable X Factor marquee players in recent years - the increased NRL salary cap will not help this trend in Super League.



In the 80s/90s there were Hanley, Offiah, Davies, Tait, Gregory, Edwards and Schofield as household names and X factor players - in SL at present we have Tomkins and Roby at that level.. and Burgess and Graham in Australia,



Sports marketing is about selling brands and promoting franchises - it is difficult to sustain this in these economic times when few players have the profile of those previously.

There has been no...I repeat, no advertising in NZ for the RLWC13.......apparently Lockyer was in the UK recently and when it was reported on fox sports news, no mention was made of the RLWC. SBW has become known for 2 things....walking out on his team mates and being good at the other code......whether he gets a Kiwi shirt remains to be seen.





The NRL is the second most poular code in Australia...of course it does well with sponsors. Last year the SL swapped it'snaming rights for a few liveried lorries....people need to get perspective and stop comparing ghr NRL and Superleage when it comes to off field issues......different worlds.







Good luck with that....



...yeah, you tell'em tiger





Values are a wonderful thing, but they don't get sponsors to fork out cash...





The propblem is perception...compare the attendances for the autumn internationals in both rugby codes and you'll find your answer......





IMHO, the RLWC2008 was a flop.....15,000 for a semi-final featuring Australia?...of 293k in attendance, only 153,000 attended games that didn't feature the hosts..that's an average of under 11k...in a country where RL is the #2 sport



I agree, RLWC13 could be massive, but there are 590k tickets on sale and even with 300k at under twenty quid, the RFL AND THE VENUES need to get moving NOW!







The only time Tomkins got true NATIONAL coverage was when he played for the Barbarians.....better to market heavily to your core demographic IMO.....all the armchair fans who don't go to matches any more, your chamionship club supporters...France will sell out their 2 home games, England will get good crowds for theirs other than in Cardiff, where anything less than 60k will be a bad start....Englands QF will sell out the Semi DH needs 60k+ and the Final will sellout......but it's all the other game where the hard graft is needed.......NZ V France.....wales other group games, 'stralia in ireland, scotland in cumbria.....

Few people would explain their attendance at game as being down to one specific player, but you can't escape the fact that there exists such a thing as 'box office' players. A team full of them will draw more fans than one without, regardless of the reason any particular fan gives you for his or her attendance on any one day.



My mum once went to a Union game basically because Gavin Henson was playing. I had the misfortune to go with her and witnessed something that was somehow even more boring live than it is on telly. Still, they got 40 quid off us.



Perhaps some *don't* want the game to have box-office stars and all we want is nice hard-working Kevin Sinfields that we can all admire, but let's be honest, just aren't that marketable. But if we're serious about marketing, it's *all* about individuals and their stories. You need goodies, baddies, the vain, the angelic, the ugly, the pretty, etc. and yes you CAN have this without being like professional wrestling.



It wouldn't hurt the game a bit to actively help players with 'personal marketing' and allow them to keep any money they earn as a result ( do we do that already? I don't know how it works)

None of this I disagree with, but it is hard to "create" that kind of box office in an individual.



The claim that a 19 year old SBW was such a player in the 2005 WCC is not plausible - the reason there were 37,000 at Elland Road was almost entirely Leeds Rhinos related. SBW had yet to make the impact he would go on to (including during his team's defeat in that game).

The most obvious example is Dwain Chambers for Castleford reserves.



Im sure the gate at Wire increased once Andrew Johns put a shirt on also increased.

No sherlock......the Harlem globetrotters of RL don't and will never exist though.



A quick glance at the BBC website as well as say 6 of the major papers across the UK and you had to search for the recent international RL fixtures......you pick up the paper or go on-line last monday, which got more coverage...fiji getting murdered by england or england murdering france?.....the Union team AFAIK is not full of star players, but they still packed 82k into TW2......sub 8k for the RL match...the issue is perception.







Back of a beer mat marketing

......walk down any main shopping area in any major city in the UK and show pictures of sam tomkins and nobody would know who he was....this is potentially the #1 player in our game in the UK.







Personal marketing...ie clothes etc will do little for the national exposure of the game.



What is needed is a major overhaul of the RFL marketing strategy....5% of the SKY TV money earmarked for the clubs needs to be put into a central fund and the GAME ITSELF marketed.......what isn't needed is perceived local solutions to a national problem.



Outside of the heartlands, there is very little interest in RL. To change that, you have to look at what the NRL are attempting.....taking games on the road with major draw cards like the Bunnies.......and regardless of revenue streams, the RFL have to bite the bullet next year and sacrafice TV cash for FTA coverage if needed......BBC coverage, Saturday afternoon KO's......and if the BBC are to get it on the cheap, they do so under the conditions that they market the hell out of it.



Putting Adrian Morley in a Moss Bross suit or a River Island Cardigan isn't going to do anything for the game at all.....

Completely disagree with SBW almost single-handedly won the game for a half strength Bulldogs. His performance that day was one of the finest examples of back row forward play many have ever seen. You ask most what they remember about that game and SBW's performance is pretty high up there.