ZachTheZip

Those two quotes tell me alot. First off, marketing's sole purpose is to push products that people otherwise wouldn't know or care about. Your example of the iPhone is a good one, if there wasn't such a buzz, it would just be another failed and ahead of its time product offered by Apple. Now, it was a fairly good product, so once people saw it they wanted it and the whole thing snowballed from there. I'm a firm believer home-field advantage. The more people you have in the stands, the better the product on the field performs. Therefore, the marketing would actually serve to improve UA's athletic teams. Also, the big boys have a product that sells itself, but it wasn't always like that. They had to build a fanbase at one point, which is where we are now. Oncewe have a substantial fanbase, the product will sell itself through the fans buying tons of gear and bringing their friends to games, and when that translates to better records because of more home wins, mentions in the media as well.

I know this is an apples & oranges comparison, but just about everyone I know who spent money to advertise their new websites.... in the end the websites ended up failing. On the other hand, I have never spend a dime to advertise a website, and have had significant successes. The point is the product. Sometimes it doesn't matter how much you spend on marketing, the message is lost, along with the money you spent, if you don't get the desired effect.Some companies spend a lot more money on figuring out market for audience and demographics than they do on the ads themselves. Simply plastering the papers and the airwaves with your message is a waste if 99% of those people wouldn't come to your game if you put a gun to their head. Why drop $50,000 on radio ads all across the dial when the net result if 27 more tickets got sold???If people don't like your product, you need to change what you're selling. It is clear that they don't like our football team partly because it is a losing team, and partly because they play in a crumbling concrete hole in the ground. Have you noticed that whenever the Zips are mentioned in the ABJ, they always throw in that Bryan Williams went to Buchtel? It's in every single article they write about the football team. More local kids means more local interest, but only if they are the talented local kids. Or you can advertise an alternative product. If nobody wants to care about the football team, advertise the Mens Soccer team or the basketball teams more. It's all baout word association, and if they associate one good product with UA, they'll tend to associate other good things with them as well.Also, we already have a target demographic: The UA students and alumni. They are everywhere around here if you know where to find them. Attendance at home games is primarily generated through word-of-mouth. That generally isnt enough on its own.

If UA has your current address and you are an alum, you should be receiving the "Akron" magazine which has lots of stories about the academic and sports achievements and the new campus upgrades, stories about UA alumni, as well as current staff and faculty.I'm still a student, so I wasn't aware that they sent anything out at all. I hear no mention of it from the Alumni I do know, and they seem to be intent on keeping themselves out of the loop at UA. They don't want to be associated with their alma matar. This is the biggest problem conscerning UA athletics and the Z-fund: they don't WANT to be a part of it, or they don't know. You'll never convert the ones that don't wnat to be a part of it, but the university can definetely do a better job of getting the apathetic portion of the alumni involved. The AK-Oldies are doing a great job, but I have to ask: why didn't the university, themselves, start something like that a long time ago? Same with the AK-Rowdies: Why wasn't it the university that filled what to us seems like an obvious need? You can't be successful without an active and involved fan base. Up until a few years ago, UA had a passive fan base. Most of the attendance was from the "casual" crowd who came for entertainment. Now the hard-core crowd is growing a bit. Most big-name schools have a significant hard-core crowd that stays around even when the team is doing bad. They donate money every year, and make their oppinions heard. The casual crowd simply dissappears when the team does bad, and then we get trapped in this cycle of apathy. Nobody goes to the games because nobody goes to the games.The thing that sets big-name schools apart from us is that their alumni stay involved and donate far more as a result. We're just now becoming the type of school that is capable of building a faithful donation base with active groups of athletic fans. We're about 50 years behind most major schools in that regard.

GP1, I see your point, and it is a good one. The MAC is a poor quality conference. There is a bad perception about teams affiliated with it, and it is almost totally justified. But Akron is stuck in it until they can prove that they belong somewhere better, and then you would have to find another conference actually willing to take them in. Growing the Z-Fund would be great, but there is a problem: there is no true alumni base. The people here, the season ticket holders, and a few successful businessmen are all we have. Hardly anybody is proud of their University of Akron degree. Most people forget that they ever came here. There are too many causes to list for that, not the least of which is that UA was not always the university it is now. The campus was just a cluster of tan buildings seperated by busy streets, it was a commutter college in the truest sense of the word. That's where marketing comes in. It needs to remind our alumni base that they are UA alumni. Get them on campus to show how far things have come. Make up fake achievement awards to get them here if you have to. They might find something to actually be proud of. Send out letters with updates of how our sports teams are doing. I am willing to bet that 99% of UA alumni have no idea that our Mens Soccer team is in the NCAA tourney and I bet most of them have no idea that our b-ball team had 26 wins last season. Apathy can be cured through education, and its up the marketing people to be the educators because the alumni won't do it themselves.

The real way to make money is from merchandise. Not attendance or whoring out your team's schedule for money. People only buy merchandise if they like the product that it is promoting. One way to get people to like Akron athletics is to win. Another way is through marketing. Unfortunately we do neither. The marketing should be easier than winning in theory beacuse in order to win you need to recruit better players, schedule better, coach better, and improve everything including attendance to create a home-field advantage, while in marketing all you need is some money and a few creative minds. It takes money to make money, and UA would seem to have money to spend. We can't just slap up a few billboards or paint the side of a bus, though. There needs to be advertisements in radio and TV, and they have to be much better quality than they currently are. 1350 AM runs the same five commercials during every single Zips game in both football and basketball. UA could and probably should come up with several different commercials promoting the university and have them be played during Zips games. They need more than that one TV commercial, and it has to play on many channels during many different hours. You would be amazed at how much a good quality marketing blitz would do for not only attendance at games, but also the perception of the university in general. It would help in recruiting the local talent. Cleveland may be a Pro town, but it is still a large market that lacks its own major university to cheer for. We could fill that void.

uakronkid....it was noted before in this conversation, the MAC has nothing to do with our OOC schedule. Also, if Chryst wanted to bolt after some impressive football between the MAC and BCS schools he could have done so a few years ago when Toledo, Marshall and others were making a name for the MAC. On another topic...I have heard that Brian Kelly from Cinci will be getting the Michigan job. I also was told that Mike Waddell was in town checking out JD at practice last week. Could mean absolutely nothing, but thought I would put that out there.The MAC has everything to do with our OOC scheduling in football. Why do you think the MAC teams are playing more and more Big 10 teams every year, despite it completely destroying our records? It's because the MAC office is encouraging it. They encourage those "money" games over scheduling home-and-home series against teams from the C-USA or the Sun Belt more often because it's a quick-fix for the pathetic money situation the MAC is in. They figure getting blown out on national TV looks better than having a winning record with no TV games. The TV deal causes our in-conference schedule to be horribly screwed up by playing half the games on weekdays, limiting attendance and therefore limiting profits, forcing teams to schedule more money games.If Brian Kelly bolts after just one year at Cinci, I hope he fails miserably. Maybe he will accept the Michigan job because that would mean that he wouldn't have to play at MAC stadiums ever again.

The game is tomorrow. The place should be a sell-out crowd if it is marketed properly, but since we can't really rely on the athletics marketing department everybody needs to bring one friend and tell another. Get as many people to come as you can. I doubt that USF has ever encountered anything like the Goal Patrol before. This is the biggest home game in UA soccer history. Let's make sure the crowd reflects that fact.

We seem to have football scheduling and basketball scheduling backwards. Of course with Rick Chryst at the helm of the MAC, we're stuck playing 3 BCS teams a year, with little to no hope for any return home games. That's the sign of someone lookig to bolt on the first chance, hoping that we pull off a few upsets as a conference in the same year so he can say that the conference is improving and get a better job. Record is far more important than strength of schedule in football. Getting at least 8 wins every season looks good no matter who you play. With the new stadium, we might have a bit more leverage to get some return home games from BCS schools, but we should still play one 1-AA team and one non-BCS team every year.

This team seems to improve game after game. Right now they are playing at about 60% as a team, and still beat Temple. There are injuries, both physical and mental, that need more time to heal. Ced's confidence at the line late in games is non-existant, and it will take some time to rebuild. Linhart still hasn't found his pffense yet, Wood is still slightly injured, and our only true point guard is out with some mystery illness, but we are still 4-1. At the end of the 1st half we saw a glimpse of what this team is capable of, but right now they can't sustain that type of play for 40 minutes. Once they heal and we get the rest of the team is able to play, I see no reason why we can't sweep the conference. Let's just hope that the team can keep improving until then.

Both. Technically he retired after his 16 years of coaching, but after this year's horrible season I have no doubt he was pressured into the decision. He "retired" so that he wouldn't get fired.

Because the MAC was stupid enough to let Temple join as a football-only member, thus screwing up the football schedules and ruining our chance at bringing in a 14th member to boost MAC basketball.

Only 2,309 attended.

Akron: RPI Rank: 258 SOS Rank: 334 Record: 4-1 (0-0)

Zips win 67-65. We got a glimpse of Akron's A-game during the back end of the first half. Once this team is 100% we will be a very very good team. Until then, they'll just have to keep fighting and hope their luck holds a little longer. Wyoming is next, and then we play @Winthrop in the toughest test of the non-conference season.

I would prefer Otto, myself. Just remember that we will have to vote as many times as possible using every screenname you have, every day because we can't leave the playoofs up to chance. Not knowing who is winning gives us a serious disadvantage because if we are winning the other voters will no get discouraged and quit because they won't know.

Tonight, Akron takes on Temple in the JAR. Temple will be the best team we have faced so far this season, so everybody needs to head down there and help with the JAR's incredible home-court advantage. Especially the AK-Rowdies and students. All you have to do to sit behind the basket with the Rowdies if you're a student is go in through the student entrance. It's that simple, so help us fill in the student section. Saturday's AK-Rowdy crowd was loud, but there were maybe only twenty of them in a seasting area that can hold around 100 students. So show up and bring your friends! The AK-Oldies were present and did a great job from the stands (nice job getting a mention by the announcer, it's much more noticable than at the football games), but just like the students, we will need more people in the stands to help the team win today. Temple has already beaten Marist and Bowling Green, and has played a much tougher schedule than us. What are your thoughts on this game? I say that Akron will win a close one.

Great job everybody! A perfect season! :bow:We even got a first-week bye! Keep an eye on the contestants, and try to sway the votes towards the mascot that would be easiest. Or take a week off. You've earned it. Just remember that next week we need to go out full force against Otto/Cavman. The vote tallies will not be displayed during the playoffs, so we have no way of determining who is winning. That will present a challenge, and we can not afford to let up next week, as everybody will be gunning for us.

Zippy is DOWN by 120, with hardly any time left. We don't have that time-zone advantage that we had over western teams. Vote now, and keep voting tomorrow morning.

According to the site the rumor was started on and subsequently told to be false on, A rival MAC head coach started the rumor.

So football season is finally over, and we have more important things to care about, like Basketball! The Zips take on Binghamton tonight at 7PM in the JAR. Last year Akron torched them on the road 90-55. This will be an ugly blowout, but it's the season home opener and the teams injuries and jetlag from Alaska should be gone by now. Show up if you can because it should be a fun night, and a great oppurtunity to see how our roster is doing. This is a perfect game to keep toying with the roster and to see who the playmakers are. These games are essential for a team with a lot of questions, because it gives the coach some time to answer them.Predictions? The Zips might break 100.

Not when you're dealing with Mack Rhoades. He has been bringing in all his cronies from UTEP ever since he arrived, without actually looking for talent to hire in, and this would be no different. If this rumor proves to be true, it wouldn't suprise me one bit.Matthews is a pretty good coach, though. I wouldn't mind him being on the sidelines for us, but I do think that with our new facilities and our proximity to a very good HS talentpool that if a search was held Akron could probably do better. The only thing holding us back is the weak coaching salary that a MAC coach makes compared to even coordinators for BCS schools.

Now it's being implied that a rival MAC coach started the rumor. I don't know about you, butI can only think of one MAC coach that would stoop low enough to do it. Hint:

That's the best we could do with the nations top (pending) facilities? Nothing against coach Matthews, but if this rumor is true then we should be able to get someone with a better overall record.

JD has two years remaining. I don't know how much of his contract is performance incentives, but it's safe to say he didn't meet any of them this year. His base salary is not as much as people make it out to be, and the reported salary includes lots of things that depend on meeting objectives like beating a BCS school or winning the MAC or something along those lines. If next year is anything like this year, UA will only have one year of his contract to buy out. The real question is whether UA is willing to pay enough to attract a coach that could get the program to reach its potential. MAC coaches are underpaid, which is why they bolt as soon as the oppurtunity presents itself. JD could make more money as a coordinator at a BCS school than he he would make if he fulfilled all his incentives in his current contract. You get what you pay for in MAC coaching. Al Golden is the highest paid MAC coach, and he has already dragged Temple out of the depths and set them up to be a conference powerhouse in the next few years. Is the AD willing to make an investment in the teams future by paying for a good coach, or will their cheapness kill them once again?

Good teams and good players create their own luck. They put themselves in positions to get calls called their way, or to make a fast break for 30 yards. They go out and put every fiber of their being into the game being played. They don't just show up, they show up to win. With Jabari and Mackey leaving, we will no longer have any players like that. They went out there and played with everything they had, which helped them overcome other deficiancies like injuries or relative lack of talent. They wanted it badly. JD doesn't recruit competitors, instead opting for the type of players who show up, do their thing, and leave at the end of the day with their minds on something else. They might have talent, but if they do then they lack the will to use it. Or maybe they are not put in the right position to utilize their talents to the fullest. This playcalling has got to go. If JD decides to keep his coordinators, then he needs to scrap the playbook and start again from scratch while consulting the players and coaches to come up with something that fits the talent we have on the field. Or he could opt to replace Moorhead and Fleming, which would buy him some time with a "but they're new guys" excuse if the pressure gets turned on. Another year like this one, and JD has to go. We've made too many mistakes in the past by keeping coaches around for longer than they should've been. With the best facilities in the country, we should have a great oppurtunity to attract a good coach if the need arises (it already is starting to arise). Let's not waste oppurtunity by waiting for some promises in the distant future that will never come to fruition.