I can't believe we haven't had a 'press conference', statement, ANYTHING from Mr BP.
What is it with our club now? I, like many am constantly checking CL, Twitter, CAFC website.........nothing, well nothing for us fans to read and get mildly excited especially as we all grew to love and appreciate Jose!
(well love might be a bit strong) but you know what I mean. We get some strange explanation WHY he wasn't offered the job. Then we get the drawn out appointment of BP and nothing (much anyway)
I know it is Mr RD's club now but without us he has nothing, just a bit of communication, thought for the supporters, and I'm sure most of us will buy into what he is doing 'with' CAFC but as it is I am getting a bit disillusioned with the whole thing!
COYR......
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Comments
Like your comments CW1 - the message of his article was (unsurprisingly from a former communication man at the club) - the club is currently collectively crap at communication. I have no argument with the message.
I have just one issue. It is one decades old and played out endlessly in businesses probably across the globe. Just what priority does external communication take in a business? and particularly for a football club? I suggest we would all agree it is very important, but how important? To put that question in practical terms let me offer the following scenario.
The club board is meeting discuss its final proposals for next season - overall budgets have been finalised. The Head of Commercial Development has argued his plans to launch a new communications with team staff and extra operating costs £150k per annum. The Sporting Director reports that though player recruitment is going well he has an opportunity to add 2 quality players. His challenge is the wages offer for each is £1500 a week short of the meeting the financial demands of each player to seal the deals. The players have received better offers from other clubs.
He asserts the players would strengthen the squad considerably, are in the early 20s, and on 5yr contracts have significant upside in terms of potential resale. So the annual cost will be almost identical to the £150k but over 5yrs would mean an additional commitment of £780k.
The budget is set for this year and there will be no option to do both. For future years it is likely the additional cost will still impinge on other operational budgets.
What decision would you make? Do you invest in product (the players) or marketing (the communications team)?
This would be a very random way of justifying an increase in communications department. The Head of Commercial Development needs to justify his extra expenditure in terms of increased revenue for the business. Just doing it because it sounds a nice idea is a bad way to run any business. One of the first questions is why £150,000!
I understand the point you are making, and its an interesting one, but since I'm a career marketeer I naturally and profoundly disagree with the basic premise you are putting forward.
Since a football club, like Unilever, offers a product of mass appeal, marketing is generally not an optional extra cost. It is equivalent to suggesting that Unilever invests in a new production facility to produce a new milk based drink that lowers cholesterol, but does not assign a marketing budget to tell consumers that it exists and has this effect.
I'd also argue that it is not, strictly speaking "marketing" that we are speaking of here,(as @redman highlights) but that's probably unhelpful for this discussion. Let's just say it's a type of public relations; one that recognises that the customers are also stakeholders who will spread the word positively if they feel the club is well run and moving in the right direction (and conversely). To be effective, as LforE and Airman indicate, this needs to be appreciated at the very top. If it is appreciated, you actually don't need much of a formal budget to do it well. In the Portakabin years, and for some years afterwards, the Board took this job on personally. They made sure that people like Airman Brown were well briefed on the inner finances, and as a result, what we could afford and expect on the playing front; they knew people like Airman, Henry Irvine, and others, typically those voted as Supporter Directors, would spread the word. Formal cost, close to zero. Effect..well we look back wistfully and remember that, don't we?
As previously said we used to get a lot more communication on the old website a few years back, that is for sure.
I just cannot understand why we haven't heard ANYTHING from our new manager, coach....whatever, saying how pleased he is to be here, how much he is looking forward to the challenge of English football, is that to much to ask.
I sometimes wish we were back in the old days so I didn't keep looking at my bloody phone!!!
COYR
We've announced the new sponsorship as soon as we could
We are hardly going to announce the players we are talking to
Just because a rumour starts on the internet doesn't mean we should jump to confirm or deny it. The pitch is progressing, the sponsorship is in place, a new kit will follow shortly, we have a new head coach. There's obviously a hell of a lot going on that none of us understand so we should just let it happen. If we don't sign anyone then that's when we should be concerned but until then lets just see where it all goes
When we were in the PL the board rejected a number of capital investments that would probably have had a long term financial benefit, such as pitch improvements, including undersoil heating, enhanced IT solutions, in order to prioritise expenditure on the playing side. If I was being mischievous I would point out that they didn't defer improvements and extensions to the boardroom on the same basis, but there you go.
The club's biggest under-investment was probably in retail - however, this may well have been because the business case never stood up. I've always suspected that Charlton's retail performance (and other non-matchday commercial income) is the key to understanding the business and this has long been concealed by relative over-performance in matchday income.
I don't understand why and don't wish to speculate, but that is how it is being played at the moment, and in essence while that is in place meaningful communication (in my view) is far lower than it was under the previous regime where there was at least a collaborative working arrangement and various attempts to pursue a partnership approach of some kind with the Supporters Trust.
Surely they could have taken a photo of him shaking hands with RD, even if the photo was taken in Belgium.
We don't know!
Surely the bloke has a picture that the club can issue to the PA and other agencies, where he at least looks like he knows what he is doing ?
You constantly placate your fanbase, you get a more tolerant crowd....can u value that? Well yeah, 5 pts a season at least
I havent seen an interview by a player or manager that doesnt prioritise the fans for a long time. They are trained to massage our egos.
RD knows feck all about that culture because you cant easily quantify it. Its an intangible, something English people value more than any other Euro nation IMO. Well maybe Russia but thats only because they dont have anything to hold
all we had is the sales ambush side, aggressive hard sell to get your sheckles..necessary and good if done in Tandem with some bloody information about the football as well.
I wanna see quick realisation as he learns. Not his fault - yet!
You cant run a football club like a SainsBury
unless you are partial to
Cheese rolls, cheese rolls, mouldy cheese rolls
You mentioned him as " being on his bike", I believe a few days ago....
Could there be a problem in the Line Manager communicating his policy to the Comms Team if said LM is on his way out of the Club ?
Gardening leave is for superstar managers only IMO, doesnt look bad if you are Van Gaal or Capello - gains you a bit of kudos even. However, emerging young uns need the publicity from day 1.
I am not crticising BP but it wont help him in the short-term..thats no way his fault he is being mugged off by our (non) decision makers.
I really hope his GL ended 01/06