NBL21 Kings Membership Survey

Thank you to all of our members who took the time to participate in our NBL21 membership survey. These results help us to shape what our membership offering looks like for the upcoming season, and ensure we are providing the best experience possible.

Over the last few seasons, feedback from our member surveys has allowed us to bring in more of the good stuff for our members like our member’s only entry and bar, it told us what member experiences and events they valued the most, and it provided us valuable feedback on all aspects of our game day experience at Qudos Bank Arena. These findings are always very insightful, and we wanted to share some of the key take outs that we learnt from this year’s results heading into next season.

The winner of the $100 Merchandise voucher prize draw was Adam Fortier.

OVERALL SUMMARY

As a Club we were really pleased to see that despite a very challenging season both on and off the court, overall our member satisfaction results have remained very high. Many members took the time to share some great comments while also providing constructive feedback across all areas of the business.

For those who are statistically or research minded, our NPS scores (Net Promoter Score, a common research measure used to gauge satisfaction) remained world class for Membership at +52 and Game Day at +69 which are both really pleasing.

Our Game Day Experience rating remained high at 8.2/10 despite the COVID-19 forced changes, and our membership satisfaction rating was 8.3/10.

These positive results give us peace of mind that the Club is on the right track but still has work to do to improve.

The ultimate measure of a membership program’s success is the intention to renew rate which is at over 90% (plus actual renewal rate). The current situation in NSW is obviously impacting everyone and we are very aware that some members are doing it tough at the moment.

To that end we have done a few immediate things to take away some of the stress which include:

• Membership Price Freeze
• Pushing back the same seat deadline to August 27
• Encouraging monthly payments 
• Having our Kings players reach out to members for a chat to check in and hopefully lift some spirits

OTHER KEY TAKEAWAYS

COVID-19 response

There were a number of changes made to the venue and game day experience last season that were brought about by NSW Health Public Health orders, the NBL and Qudos Bank Arena policies. All were aimed at keeping members, fans, staff, and players safe. 

77% of members agreed that the policies in place were sufficient and they felt safe attending. Ideally, the membership team would like to see that number at 100% of members feeling safe, so we will continue working with the venue to maintain the highest of safety standards. 

Demographics

You might be interested to know that the median age range for Kings members is 46-50, 57% of our members are male and the most common family status is a single parent or couple with a youngest child aged 6-14.

About 44% of our members are members of a local basketball association in NSW or have family that are. There are wide range of basketball associations represented with the most common being Sutherland, Hills, City of Sydney, Norths and Bankstown. We loved seeing that our membership base is represented by the entire city of Sydney, as well as throughout NSW.

Overall attendance by members last season was down slightly on previous seasons, but given that the season was being played during a different time of the year, and often games were announced with very little notice, we were still very pleased with the attendance rates of our loyal members.

Having said that, we have strongly requested to the NBL that this season is played during its usual timeslot of October to March (or as close to as possible), and an entire schedule is released at one time, rather than on a rolling basis.

Members told us that the reason you are a member is because:

• You love basketball
• You love the Kings
• You want to have a reserved seat at every game
• You love to share the experience with friends and families
• And you love knowing that your support for the Club will help it to survive and grow

Communications

78% of members told us that the Club got the frequency of communication spot on during pre-season and this increased to 86% during the season. Email remains the preferred channel to be communicated on.

Digital membership card

There was lots of feedback about the introduction of a digital membership. While the majority of members said it was a positive change, there were a few issues raised to which we will develop a response or solution for. This feedback is invaluable.  

Members events or experiences

Due to COVID-19 many of our usual member events were unable to take place so we attempted to replace some these experiences with phone calls, zoom chats and other virtual experiences.

It’s pleasing to know that 73% of members experienced at least one of these and 42% had two or more member experiences. Many of these will continue even after we have returned to ‘normal’ although we understand that the majority of members will also want member events in person. 

More than 80% of members used the Member Entry at Qudos Bank Arena and 45% of members utilised the Members Bar. The suggestions we received for improving the Members Bar were great.

More than half of our members again expressed interest in a Members Road Trip. The ongoing changes to the schedule made this event difficult to facilitate last season but this season we hope to organise one. The four most popular suggested destinations were Melbourne, Illawarra, Brisbane and Tasmania.

Brydens Sydney Uni Flames

It has been very pleasing for us to see an increase in the proportion of Kings members who are now also following the Flames. More than 80% of members believe that double headers with the Flames will add value to their membership and that’s what we intend to deliver.

Game Day Experience

We were pleased to see that member satisfaction with game day remained at similar levels to the previous season despite the forced changes implemented on us.

Members voiced that they would like to see an improvement in on-court entertainment, entry into the venue, security, and food and beverage availability.

In all areas of game day experience members provided many great comments which we will be working through with the venue in throughout the coming weeks. Again, we really do appreciate your feedback and ideas.

A few things to highlight or note regarding game day experience:   

• Entry into QBA from the carpark was an issue - changes were made to the entry procedures at QBA during the season and we will be working with QBA to improve the entry process again as much as possible
• Food and beverages were affected in two major ways –
  The need to have QBA catering staff working in new socially distanced ways and
  2. The reduction in outlets due to covid measures and lack of demand because of lower crowds. As crowds increase again more F&B outlets will open.
• Satisfaction ratings were up for the game day presentation particularly our announcer Eric Stephens and MC Rob Shehadie
• With regard to security, we have identified that the members entry helped over the past two seasons, but the single security entrance created issues again this sesaon. We will be working with Qudos Banks Arena on a solution to this bottleneck

GROUP BOOKINGS

A number of members flagged that they may be interested in group purchases. We’re always looking for ways to increase our crowds, particularly with our members who are our best ambassadors, so we will be in touch with offers and pricing for groups to make it easy for you to organise.

CONCLUDING COMMENTS

In summary, the feedback we received has been very positive with many great ideas and thoughts on how to improve the Kings membership experience.We’re looking forward to working through this feedback and suggestions to make the 2021-22 season even bigger and better. 

This is just a snapshot of the findings we gathered and once again we’d like to thank all of our members who took the time to share this feedback with us.

As always, our membership team is always here to assist members with any specific queries or issues you may have so please do not hesitate to reach out if you have anything further to add.

A reminder also if you haven’t already registered, we are hosting a member only webinar with Kings CEO Chris Pongrass and new Head Coach Chase Buford tonight (Wednesday 18 August) – please do so via your emails. We will discuss a few elements of the survey at the conclusion of the webinar for those who might be interested.