The Truth

[ponydawg]

All he had to do is follow Mark Cuban's 3 main guidelines regarding marketing:

1) Know where your team is in their “lifecycle” - as stated above by OMD - FAIL by Hart.
2) Know who your long time fans/customers are. Fans know when you care. You can’t fake it, treat them like gold - MASSIVE FAIL by Hart.
3) Price to the market, not to maximize revenue. FAIL by Hart.

Everyone on here agrees that student participation is a chronic problem for our athletic programs. Shetland is correct. Telling students interested in BB that they must also attend soccer games is NOT treating them like gold. IMO another FAIL by Hart.

This x 1000. I know I sound like a broken childish record, but the fact that the team is having a bad season is NOT why I'm not using my "new" tickets. I've dealt with bad coaches, teams, and games for 15 years before the Larry run. I supported SMU thru that and I would have supported them thru the Jank years, but because of the above, SMU gave me an excuse to look elsewhere to spend my money and time. Mission Accomplished.

[ponydawg]

And...if you want to get sad/mad again. Here is the referred cuban blog about SMU and Marketing.
While it makes me angry, it does put a smile on my face for what we once had. I twittered it to Hart back in the day, but no reply.

http://blogmaverick.com/2014/02/23/my-2-cents-on-sports-marketing-and-what-i-learned-from-smu-basketball-this-week/

[mustangxc]

I concur with ponydawg and SoCal_Pony. Fire Jankovich and Hart! I think what Hart has done may be more inexcusable than Jankovich.

[EastStang]

The simple truth is that it is not easy to succeed a legend and that's what Jank was asked to do. There's simply no comparing those two guys. How has Indiana done post Knight? Remember UNC's struggles immediately after Dean Smith retired? I wonder how Coach K's successor at Duke will fare? Those are blue blood programs that saw the "next guy" struggle. Not trying to defend Jank...just saying I don't know how many guys could have stepped into our sanctions and kept this team at the top of the AAC. I would like to think there are several who could have at least kept us more competitive than what this program has become, but now it remains to be seen who might be able to rebuild the mess we are in today.

We had one of Dean Smith's replacements, remember RoboDoh?

Or Thompson's replacement at Georgetown? Or Holland's replacement at UVA?

LB was replaced at Kansas by Roy Williams. They had NCAA sanctions and were ineligible for tournament play the next year. After that they were 30-5 and so on. At UCLA he was replaced by Larry Farmer. After LB's players graduated, Farmer was gone after a 17-11 season.

The fact is that Larry left programs in the NCAA doghouse. Kansas was NCAA royalty and survived quickly, UCLA despite its pedigree withered away for about 20 years.

I hear Rick Pitino is available if you want to win now and then face the consequences.

[mustangxc]

What issues did BU, Providence, or Kentucky face following Pitino's departure?

[Pony ^]

Will gladly take another 5 years of Moody Madness and 120 wins than mediocrity for the rest of my life

[SMU Pom Mom]

FWIW, you didn't actually have to go to the soccer games to get points. Apparently you could just walk by on the way to the dining hall and the GPS was close enough to think you were there. Good system.

I have to share a sad story. At the UCF game, where I purchased a ticket for $3 on Vivid Seats ($7 with fees), I moved to a seat where I could get the best view and met a very nice man named Steve and his daughter (I assume) who happened to be a sorority sister of my daughter and we got along splendidly. Just super great people and I was really enjoying myself despite everything. Anyway, when we said goodbye, he APOLOGIZED to me for Moody not being what it once was. That's just heartbreaking to me. Pony fans, you deserve better.

[PonyPlayer4]

Moody atmosphere is way down and the reseat is the least culpable.

When Moody started rocking was the NIT year. The student section was crazy. The team started to get good and there were no season ticket holders so there were a lot of walk up tickets available and actual Dallas basketball and not SMU fans came to the games.

No season ticket holders?! Season tickets jumped up incredibly because of New Moody.

[BUS]

A few questions.
Besides Bob Sharp, are there any SMU grads in the M-Club or Athletic department? And to follow that, do they have any stroke or power?

I really don't think the current staff, please omit SMU grads, does not much care about success. It is a job. They take is easy, put a little thought into it but, well we are fine and I don't work for Alabama or Oklahoma so I put in enough work.

The treatment of long time fans has been totally against cognizant marketing. My background was Food and Beverage retail marketing, then into Private Label items and marketing. I made private labels for Albertson, Braum's, Schepps Dairy, Sysco and many others. The cost to gain product awareness, then product acceptance and finally product preference is multiple times the cost of customer retention.

Go Mustangs - As I know nothing else as I am the ninth in my family to graduate and my daughter was the 10th last May. Thank you to Bob Sharp for many years of service and over the top assistance. He met me on Christmas Eve in a parking lot to deliver two football jerseys for my two daughters in time for Christmas day.

[DanFreibergerForHeisman]

Moody atmosphere is way down and the reseat is the least culpable.

When Moody started rocking was the NIT year. The student section was crazy. The team started to get good and there were no season ticket holders so there were a lot of walk up tickets available and actual Dallas basketball and not SMU fans came to the games.

No season ticket holders?! Season tickets jumped up incredibly because of New Moody.

Yes that is incorrect. By the time Moody opened for the Connecticut game that January there were fewer than 30 season tickets available.

https://smumustangs.com/news/2013/12/19/SOLD_OUT_Single_Game_Tickets_Are_SOLD_OUT_For_January_4_Men_s_Basketball_Opener_Versus_No_10_Connecticut.aspx?path=mbball

[ponypatrick]

SMU can’t get out of their own way. Been like that for the 40 years I’ve followed them.

60 years for me , and I'm still in denial

[Arkpony]

Over 60 for me

[redpony]

Over 60 for me

Hey Ark- I 'll up you 10 and claim 70.

[EastStang]

Because I don't live in Dallas, I haven't experienced the ticket issue. This problem seems to be a problem of both on court performance and administrative handling of season ticket accounts and students. They've dovetailed to create what was a great product to an after-thought. I've seen it here in Washington where Dan Snyder ran the Redskins into the ground, made the game experience awful and treated season ticket holders shabbily. Add in that NFL popularity is waning to some degree and he now can't sell out the stadium. The Redskins went from the hottest ticket in town to one you can give away. On the flip side, Ted Leonsis, took a mediocre team, blew it up, survived a strike, rebuilt, changed his marketing approach and made the team the hottest seat in town even before they won the Stanley Cup. For example he gave people 11 months to pay off their season's tickets and billed them for the playoff tickets after the fact and only for the games they actually played. Perhaps Hart should talk to him.

[ponyboy]

Regarding the coach, David Miller gonna make it all ok after the season is over. No idea on how or whether the reseat will be made ok. I’m guessing winning will fix that too for the most part.

I am looking forward to supporting my team tonight.