ZachTheZip

Zips up 3-0 at the half!

That's what led to the short kickoff on the final drive. Edwards was just that dangerous.

Students can buy scarves at this game, plus there's the opportunity to mock Cicerone. Should be a g turnout.

University President is a position for fundraising, and being a figurehead (provided they can hire competent VPs). The real power is with the Trustees.

So Chapman had exactly zero time to prepare as starter. No snaps with the 1st team, no time to get in the right state of mind. Not even during warm-ups for the actual game. No surprise that it took him some time to settle in.

Pretty sure there were three Zips turnovers in the 1st half.

My poor heart

I'm not even sure if Kent knows at this point.

I know a lot of students don't like sitting next to the band. It's way too loud to hold a conversation.

Is this increase in football, specifically? Also, a slight increase in a small amount isn't much to celebrate. The reason a lot of the discussion about marketing is focused on students is because it's infinitely easier to get them to show up to games compared to non-students.

The only slogan that had any real success was "Fear the Roo". I don't understand why they scrapped it. One problem I've seen is that every new marketing staff wants to have their own big idea, and due to rapid turnover, this means every marketing campaign for the last decade has died before it had a chance to catch on. Whatever happened to Roowards? What's needed is a conservative, long-term approach to athletic branding. Stick with something for more than two years and you might see it catch on, or even see a tradition be born.

It's called a "verbal commitment" because it's not in writing. It's worth less than a handshake.

The Black Keys wrote a song about Akron, but it might just confuse people when we play OU.

Zips dominate stats, but can't find the net. 0-0 draw.

The game is going to OT.

There are some posters who could say more. That they haven't said anything should tell you something.

Thanks for the response. I wish I knew of a way to get more student orgs involved. That's something that marketing needs to get creative about. They're way too flaky. Their feet don't get held to the fire like the Rowdies.

This deserves its own discussion. OK. Where to even begin? Let's start with the AK-Rowdies. The AK-Rowdies were created in 2005 to be an organized student cheering section at basketball games in imitation of Ohio University's OZone. Basketball has been their primary focus since the beginning, with a strong focus on soccer beginning when Caleb Porter sought out the groups leadership in an effort to create a unique atmosphere at his home games. Soccer student attendance was poor for quite a while despite an excellent team and the coaches actively courting students to attend with giveaways, free pizza, and typical marketing. It took years of persistence to get things going, and then momentum took over. Basketball continues to be the AK-Rowdies primary focus, though, as it is the only sporting event where they are allowed special privileges (floor seats) over other students. As far as football goes, during the end of the Rubber Bowl era, the Rowdies had nothing to do with football, but marketing towards students in general was strong with free shuttles to and from the stadium, and an open area for them to tailgate in without supervision (this is important). In 2009, the novelty of Infocision Stadium boosted attendance until the losing really set in. Then Rob Ianello happened. Not only did he kill all enthusiasm for the program in general, he had the gall to call out the Rowdies leadership for not getting enough students to the games. Couple this with the university's administrators beginning to grow dissatisfied with complaints against the Rowdies for being too Rowdy at other sporting events, and you have a difficult situation if you're trying to boost student attendance. The athletic department loves the Rowdies and wants them to grow into something bigger, but the university dislikes having to police them (sometimes literally) and some see them as an easy scapegoat when they need someone to blame for unruly students at sporting events (many of which aren't members). I can't tell you how many times I've seen police officers and university administrators go up to the Rowdies leadership to yell at them for something somebody else did or said. It happens multiple times a game at every sporting event. One other issue is that the Rowdies are what I call a "secondary" student organization. Most members are also part of something else, like greek life or some club that comes first to the students, so when marketing does greek week or a res life challenge, it only cannibalizes the impact of the Rowdies. I don't really have a point with all this. I just though it was information that seems to be left out of attendance conversations I've read where people suggest that more or better marketing toward the Rowdies would fix things. Now, on to the life of the modern student. This really does seem incomprehensible to some posters here, but the life of a university student is vastly different than it was even ten years ago. Today, student loans and a job combined are barely enough to stay out of abject poverty. Time to be entertained is a luxury, thanks to the internet. Classes now require far more time put into them outside of the classroom because professors can so easily put up course material, homework, quizzes, and tons of other stuff on Springboard (that's a web portal for your classes, old-timers). It's really at the point where time spent in the classroom listening to a lecture is a waste of time you would rather spend working on the online stuff where the meat of your education lies. Classes are more self-taught than ever before, because technology makes it possible. This is a tremendous time commitment. Students as a whole don't party like they used to in past decades, they don't even just "hang out" as much. Then factor in the need for a job (need, not luxury, unless you want to be in six-figure debt for life), access to things like Netflix which allows you to be entertained on-demand while you study, and it's no surprise that student attendance is less than it used to be across the country. The only places where it hasn't been affected are the programs where demand outweighs a limited number of student tickets. If student tix were unlimited and stadium capacities no issue, you would see the decline there as well. So, what can be done? The ultimate key is to make athletic events , whatever they may be, seen by students as the place where other students go to have fun. They want to be a part of something, they want to meet people, have fun together, and enjoy themselves. Whether it's at a restaurant, a stadium, a bar, whatever, it doesn't matter. That's the trick. But getting something like that going is a bootstrap paradox of a problem. How do you create self-sustaining momentum? Something happened at the App State game that gave me some insight into this. So, the university has set aside a portion of Lot 9 for all UA students to tailgate in. It's a fairly big space, right by the SE entrance. The Rowdies set up a tent, had a grill with hotdogs, chips, water, cornhole, giant jenga, KanJam, and music. As an official student organization, they can't have alcohol at the tailgate but students could bring their own. Now, during the home opener, there were also some other student tailgater there that set up alongside them (I forget if they were greeks or some other organization) and it was a pretty good event. At the App State game, however, no other student organization was present in the student tailgate lot, and so it looked sparse and kind of pathetic. The other groups had set up elsewhere, way out by the JAR or spread all over the place away from the stadium. Things were good when you had synergy, and things were bad when you didn't. This is entirely on the University. The Rowdies did their part. The other student organizations need to be pushed by the university to also use the lot, if the university actually wants there to be a good student experience at the game. There needs to be cooperation. The Rowdies can't do anything without the university breathing down their necks and forcing things, but these other groups can set up wherever they like and do whatever they like and nobody even gives it a second look. There's potential to have a big event, which creates the thing where students see other students together and having fun, which creates the kind of atmosphere that attracts more students. They can't rely on the AK-Rowdies alone, because at the end of the day you'll only get the small core of dedicated sports fans to show up if you're not also involving other groups. I realize that this whole thing has been very apologetic towards the Rowdies, but that's my perspective on the situation right now as someone on the outside but close enough to see what's happening. I won't deny that they could have done more in certain years. It's not all on them. I just feel that it's relevant now with Matt Newhouse coming back. Another thing I want to touch on is UA's social media marketing. It's just not good. There are too many accounts. There are accounts for every sport, plus a main one on both Facebook and Twitter. It's too confusing. Not only that, but it's a little too promotional. Everything they post sounds like a press release or a commercial. People filter that stuff out subconsciously before they even read it. Where are the pics of people tailgating or cheering at the games? No cheesy captions or comments attached, just some pictures of people having fun in Zips gear. That resonates. Where are the highlight clips posted just minutes after the big play happened? Every professional team in every sport does this, and most colleges, too. People want to share the experience they just had right now, not three hours later after the game ended and the excitement has worn off. If you look around, the most successful social media accounts are about the raw experience. Also, somebody please help get coach Bowden verified on Twitter. That little blue checkmark goes a long way. As for more traditional marketing, UA has it all wrong. Billboards don't do anything, traditional newspaper ads don't get you anywhere (but the newspaper itself might warm up to you if you give them enough money... there's a thought), TV ads don't get you anywhere with cord cutters, Internet banner ads are useless for students because nearly all millennials use ad-blocking software (and more are also using tracker-blocking software to make the ads that do get through irrelevant). So what do you do? First, you go to where they are. You make ads designed for Spotify and other streaming apps, which ad blockers can't touch. Also, you do whatever you can to get yourself mentioned in the dominant media for the region. The TV news channels and the big sports talk radio stations. Those are the only ones that matter in a lot of people's minds. Maybe less so to students as a primary source, but those places chop up their segments into clips and podcasts that can be shared on social media, and that's key. People don't watch the news live, they check the website and watch the clips. Less commercials, more convenience. This turned out to be way more rant-y and longer than I had envisioned. Still, it felt good to get it all out there. I hope we can have a good discussion about student attendance and marketing.

Speaking of commuter schools, does anybody know if the students that live in the big apartments downtown count as commuters?

Hoban is a heavily run-focused team, so Clark's production stats aren't going to be the best. If I were coach Bowden, I would find a way for some of our OSU transfers to get in touch (indirectly, if need be).

A pro-style QB would fit well here. I would be surprised if he chose Akron, though. He could go to a number of top programs. Still, staying local is what all the cool kids are doing these days. Clark would be the exclamation point on the heavily Akron-centric 2017 recruiting class.