Challenge: The Arena Football League (AFL), the indoor professional football league, needed a new exciting, more representative online look and feel, enhanced online functionality, and a way to both support and leverage its new television deal with NBC. The AFL knew it was going to experience increased exposure and it needed a destination for new and current fans to keep up with the latest news and happenings in the league. The league has 16 teams that it needed to provide articles, stats, standings and scores for. The AFL also wanted a site that would work in conjunction with its live national television broadcasts on NBC, bringing Internet fans to the television and TV fans online.
Approach: RMG3 worked with the AFL to build a site that was not only informational to anyone coming to arenafootball.com, but also one that represented the high-impact and excitement of the indoor football league. The design RMG3 came up with is based on the colors and excitement of the league, eye-catching, and full of information that all AFL fans can use. The site not only provides a way for the AFL to communicate with its fans, but it also allows for AFL sponsors to get exposure through the highly trafficked site. Because the site is built using RMG3's 1Touch proprietary content management system, the AFL staff can update the site at any time with news updates, featured stories, promotions, polls, and other site features such as video highlights. Sponsored areas such as ADT defensive player of the week and Honda “In Your Element” Play of the Week highlight various players while also giving AFL sponsors exposure they desire. arenafootball.com site users also enjoy a weekly HTML newsletter custom designed for the AFL and message boards where various aspects of the league and its teams are discussed. Fans also enjoy live scoring and statisticss during each game, thanks to RMG3 efforts to integrate complex XML feeds from the league's third party statistics provider. And finally, fans can take part in a weekly fantasy game in which users compete against one another by picking the winners of each weekend game for weekly prizes and season-long grand prizes.
Results: The AFL now has a site that is exciting and fulfills all of the league's needs. Unique visitors have increased by over 60% since last season, and page views have increased more than 120%. Time spent on site has more than doubled. The new site is easy to navigate, full of league and team information, and offers many features that fans love. AFL staff members also easily maintain the site and keep it updated.
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