The Lakewood Blueclaws Increase Efficiency Organization-wide with DIGIDECK
The Challenge
The Lakewood BlueClaws have been a Jersey Shore tradition since 2001, setting multiple South Atlantic League attendance records over the years.
Along the way, the Class A affiliate of the Philadelphia Phillies has sent over 80 players to the major leagues. More recently, the team came under new ownership in 2017, following on the heels of renewing their lease at FirstEnergy Park through 2055.
These milestones have brought a renewed energy to all facets of the BlueClaws organization, including Sponsorship Services. When Zack Nicol joined the organization as the Director of Sponsorship Services in December of 2017, he saw the opportunity for his team to work more efficiently and deliver better results to their partners with DIGIDECK.
“The fact that you can put in pictures, video, and radio clips — there’s just so many different options for what you can do to send to a partner and they’re always very impressed,” shared Nicol.
Take a look at what you are doing now … Now imagine the possibilities of what could be improved or incorporated. DIGIDECK allows for all of this. It is PowerPoint on steroids.
The Solution
Prior to his current role at the BlueClaws, Nikol worked for the Dallas Mavericks. As the Sponsorship Activation Manager, he became a DIGIDECK power user and loved utilizing the platform every chance he could get. His first-hand experience with DIGIDECK at the Mavs influenced his advocation for the platform at the BlueClaws.
After starting his role with the BlueClaws, Nicol noticed his team was spending far too much time creating presentations for Proposals, Annual Reports, and other sponsorship services needs. It was rare that a presentation could get turned around in less than two days. Frequently designers were spending time laying out involved designs in Photoshop, just to drop them into a PowerPoint slide.
Now, Nicol and his team are able to complete six or more presentations per day, with time to spare. According to Nicol, “They probably take twenty minutes each, if you have things set up right.”
Plus, there’s the added benefit of seamless multimedia support. “We’re in a different kind of age now,” said Nicol, “where clients aren’t impressed by a couple pages of paper.” Nicol explained that while Minor League Baseball is all about fun, the sponsorship team still requires a level of professionalism that DIGIDECK allows them to exceed in.
The Result
In short, DIGIDECK has saved the BlueClaws an insurmountable amount of time since launching with the product. Nicol cites his team’s ability to create presentations in less than half the time it used to take is a key reason they have witnessed a notable increase in sponsorship sales and productivity.
Other departments are taking note as well. “Within just a couple of presentations, we could tell this was making an impact in our sales meetings,” said Nicol. In fact, the Sales and Ticketing teams at the BlueClaws now use DIGIDECK so that they can track who is looking at which slides and when. “In particular, the email notifications when someone opens their deck are proving extremely valuable.”
