http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/28/sports/soccer/28WUSA.html Interesting to hear from marketing guy, who confirms some of the issues I've heard a lot of WUSA fans note.
The Women's World Cup is giving the WUSA an incredible marketing tool. Just run film clips of Abby Wambach's incredible play. Slogan? "WUSA: Where Wombats Rule!" Guys who see her play are just simply in awe. It will help get the league past the 12-year-old girl bracket it foolishly marketed itself to.
It's been pretty clear to me, from my long association with a girl's travel team, that as they got older the WUSA became less and less interesting to them. Marketing primarily to pre-teen girls and their parents leads to a continually churning fan base which can olnly grow at the rate of participation in soccer by this group.
Thank you for summing it up. For a few year, I've been trying say this to anybody who will listen. It just takes me 10-minutes to say and it comes off like a rant.
"The Women's World Cup is giving the WUSA an incredible marketing tool. Just run film clips of Abby Wambach's incredible play. Slogan? "WUSA: Where Wombats Rule!" Guys who see her play are just simply in awe. It will help get the league past the 12-year-old girl bracket it foolishly marketed itself to" Show Malin's free kick for a goal or the pass/save by Victoria to Hanna for her header. Or Alberta's goal against Australia. Good highlights. I am not in awe of Abby though. If anything show Kristine Lilly's runs. She is great.
I have said it several times before but I still think one important change the league needs to do if they come back is to stop having identical broadcast times for their national game as MLS on Saturday. A decent share of their potential viewers and fan base are fans of MLS. Move it to Sunday or anytime except the same time as MLS.