Motherwell FC - A Thread For All Seasons

[Busta Nut]

I've also not yet listened to this but it interesting to hear even Weir (who I like the sound of) thinks this plan to get investment is fucking daft. Seen "quirky video" mentioned. 

Firing a video to random Americans hoping the don't mind losing money is fucking daft. 

[capt_oats]

4 hours ago, Busta Nut said:

I've also not yet listened to this but it interesting to hear even Weir (who I like the sound of) thinks this plan to get investment is fucking daft. Seen "quirky video" mentioned. 

Firing a video to random Americans hoping the don't mind losing money is fucking daft. 

Tbf, the ‘investment’ and the fundraising project seemed like two separate discussions.

Which isn’t to say they’re not linked but Weir’s discussion of what he thought the investment model could look like seemed to be in line with the situation Hearts have fluked into with Anderson - where you have an independently wealthy person sitting alongside the ownership but acting as a guarantor/benefactor if necessary.

We can only imagine what sort of horror this ‘quirky’ video is going to be but as @Handsome_Devil says the fact that Weir (unintentionally?) leaked, disowned and dismissed the plan suggests that at the very least it’s not going to be what a lot of people seemed to think it was ie: an announcement or confirmation of significant investment.

[Handsome_Devil]

My first reaction to the video was it's a ridiculous idea. On reflection, I think it's a lottery ticket worth buying, although it'll be cringe as f**k and expectations should be accordingly low.

Obviously the Hearts situation is the dream but in the meantime we want cash while not giving up any real control (for our long-term security) or profit (we don't make them reliably).

So what we can offer to an American with more money than sense and a tenuous connection to Scotland is the chance to own his 'hometown' team, boast to his mates at the country club and some red carpet treatment the next time he's here for golf and whisky anyway. And probably a tax break for good measure.

It's worth remembering that the amounts which would make a difference to us, either on an ongoing or one-off basis, are pocket change to plenty of people.

Is it likely we'll find one who considers us a pet project of choice? Probably not. Is it worth the cost of a video and some social media advertising just incase? Probably.

[eliphas]

8 hours ago, CoF said:

I thought a few extra ‘yknows’ and he’d be doing a half decent Mark McGhee impression. 

YES 

I couldn't place the accent (other than my old boss). It's 100% McGhee!

[eliphas]

46 minutes ago, Handsome_Devil said:

My first reaction to the video was it's a ridiculous idea. On reflection, I think it's a lottery ticket worth buying, although it'll be cringe as f**k and expectations should be accordingly low.

Obviously the Hearts situation is the dream but in the meantime we want cash while not giving up any real control (for our long-term security) or profit (we don't make them reliably).

So what we can offer to an American with more money than sense and a tenuous connection to Scotland is the chance to own his 'hometown' team, boast to his mates at the country club and some red carpet treatment the next time he's here for golf and whisky anyway. And probably a tax break for good measure.

It's worth remembering that the amounts which would make a difference to us, either on an ongoing or one-off basis, are pocket change to plenty of people.

Is it likely we'll find one who considers us a pet project of choice? Probably not. Is it worth the cost of a video and some social media advertising just incase? Probably.

Aye, that's fair I think 

I've kinda put on record on here before I'm not sure any of these videos we've done over the years make a huge difference (like the cup final and season ticket ones) but it's worth a shot I guess.

[well fan for life]

4 minutes ago, eliphas said:

Aye, that's fair I think 

I've kinda put on record on here before I'm not sure any of these videos we've done over the years make a huge difference (like the cup final and season ticket ones) but it's worth a shot I guess.

I reckon those ones actually do have some merit tbf. Shift some extra tickets perhaps. 

The David Turnbull one, however. Who the f**k was that actually for outside of the obvious two folk?

[Nature Boy]

The Derek Weir video seems, to me, to be about 95% "good stuff" - some information & detail that will hopefully provide greater context around certain things & might quieten down some of those who seem keen to portray the club as in crisis.

Couple of niggles worth highlighting - I might be reading into it a little too much but it does feel there's some personal irks on his side that he's subtly taking the opportunity to air. Couple of gripes with the Well Society it seems, a bit of deflection & denial around the lack of club comms over previous months (which, given he's doing so on a lengthy YouTube interview addressing a number of issues needing explained due to a lack of club comms over previous months, is a bit daft), and dismissing the upcoming fundraising initiative as a "quirky video" before its even launched doesn't feel like he has any great faith in it.

All of that's fair enough - if he clashes with the Well Society Board, doesn't want to acknowledge the poor club comms & thinks this fundraising campaign thing is going to be a nonsense, fair play. I'm just not sure it reflects well on anyone to do it via this particular medium.

[capt_oats]

5 hours ago, eliphas said:

Aye, that's fair I think 

I've kinda put on record on here before I'm not sure any of these videos we've done over the years make a huge difference (like the cup final and season ticket ones) but it's worth a shot I guess.

5 hours ago, well fan for life said:

I reckon those ones actually do have some merit tbf. Shift some extra tickets perhaps. 

I'm fairly sure that the Paddy Power sponsorship was linked to our "profile" and "engagement". Whether or not you're on board with that ethically it's still directly generating an income I guess.

Also, as @well fan for life says it may be the case that the numbers were artificially inflated by a % of free kids tickets or whatever but our ST sales were reported as increasing year on year which coincided with the previous set up.

Clearly there were other factors eg: increased price after price freezes, changes to kids tickets etc but either way this year's ST were down a fair bit on the numbers we'd seen in previous years. There's obviously context there but the drop in STs reported at the time we scale back the media/comms team along with the fact that we'd apparently decided not to replace our Head of Comms but also hadn't replaced Burrows (who Weir conceded had/has a comms background) by that point probably isn't a coincidence?

Whether the difference in ST sales justifies the extra cost of an increased media team is a different story I guess.

It's often been said that between the Burrows and Russell dream team they managed to successfully create the perception that we were a bigger operation than we actually are which depending on your POV may/may not have value.

It's pretty clear from that interview that Derek Weir isn't subscribing to the Scottish Sports Marketing newsletter or anything and that's...fine. His comment that it "surprised" him we had a "bottom 3" playing budget but were investing as much in the media department is a position that I'm sure a large section of similar Boomers in our support will not only share that POV but will also be scandalised by. #BurrowsOut etc.

Not to age-shame but looking at the profile of the remaining board members it's probably not a huge surprise that they perhaps didn't buy into that side of things as much as a CEO in their mid-30s who'd have no hesitation in jumping on a Sports Marketing podcast to talk about brand and strategy.

Edited January 9 by capt_oats

[Swello]

1 hour ago, well fan for life said:

The David Turnbull one, however. Who the f**k was that actually for outside of the obvious two folk?

The exact moment (well, 60 moments with a break for ice cream) that the shark was jumped. 

Although the whole thing eventually disappeared up its own arse - I thought there was some brilliant stuff put out during that period (the on pitch video of the players doing Hauns with the support after the Aberdeen semi, seeing what it meant to guys like Aldred and Bowman was a magnificent thing). 

[thisGRAEME]

27 minutes ago, capt_oats said:

It's pretty clear from that interview that Derek Weir isn't subscribing to the Scottish Sports Marketing newsletter or anything and that's...fine. His comment that it "surprised" him we had a "bottom 3" playing budget but were investing as much in the media department is a position that I'm sure a large section of similar Boomers in our support will not only share that POV but will also be scandalised by. #BurrowsOut etc.

Not to age-shame but looking at the profile of the remaining board members it's probably not a huge surprise that they perhaps didn't buy into that side of things as much as a CEO in their mid-30s who'd have no hesitation in jumping on a Sports Marketing podcast to talk about brand and strategy.

To me the reality, as with most things, the truth sits somewhere in the middle. The brand/strategy/nice stuff is IMO, more important than Derek Weir seems to consider, but similarly it can't exist on it's own, if that makes sense?

Somewhere along the line the brand/strategy has to translate into money which can be counted on the bottom line. As much as the big ticket stuff; Hartley's piano, Turnbull's documentary, Bigi sacrificing goats and the rest is all great for all of us to watch, engage with in one way or another and either gain insight or positive feeling towards the club, did it make the club any more money than if they hadn't done any of it? It didn't make me, an existing fan want to spend more cash on the club, and will it attract someone who isn't a fan into the club? Probably not? I don't know the answer, but I suspect from Weir's take on it, the hard answer is no. That's not to say these things can't deliver financial results, but you have to build it out from the off that making money is the target to do it.

Even if you're going down the route of social media sentiment analysis towards to club and things like that, my understanding of that as a tool is that it isn't massively accurate as a guide of how people feel, given the extremes that social media lends itself to at the best of times, and even solely by looking at the people that sit around me at Fir Park, you're probably looking at a 50/50 split of people that simply aren't engaged with any of those platforms, so you're missing a huge amount of people anyway, so overall it's flawed as a measurement.

Happy to be told I'm wrong on all of that, fwiw, but that's my read.

[Handsome_Devil]

31 minutes ago, thisGRAEME said:

Somewhere along the line the brand/strategy has to translate into money which can be counted on the bottom line. As much as the big ticket stuff; Hartley's piano, Turnbull's documentary, Bigi sacrificing goats and the rest is all great for all of us to watch, engage with in one way or another and either gain insight or positive feeling towards the club, did it make the club any more money than if they hadn't done any of it? It didn't make me, an existing fan want to spend more cash on the club, and will it attract someone who isn't a fan into the club? Probably not?

I agree with you totally in principle but Russell always emphasised the main target market wasn't current fans.

My understanding was that we weren't trying to attract new fans but rather businesses by saying look at our values - which we plastered everywhere - and associate your brand with them inside our wonderful engagement which extends waaaay beyond our nominal support.

Certainly the club, as @capt_oatssaid, were very strong in the belief this helped land Bet365. The ST numbers, in terms of engaging our own support alongside, certainly went up at the time but proving a link is hard.

Tbh it's the sort of joined up, long-term strategy some think we need but even they (or we, as I'd put myself more to that side rather than with the short-term guys who want everything spent on the team asap) would admit it is brutally hard to do. It's not overnight, it's not even a season or two but development over years - ideally 5-10. And that timeframe puts you at the mercy of circumstances - when on-field performance tailed, we were all sick of it, those involved are understandably looking to their own career as well, other executives can't or don't want to see value in anything which doesn't immediately boost the bottom line etc.

Edited January 9 by Handsome_Devil

[Busta Nut]

Who owns the other 30% of the club?

[Handsome_Devil]

Just now, Busta Nut said:

Who owns the other 30% of the club?

*Waves*

Not much of that 30% mind.

[Busta Nut]

Ah right so shareholders

[Swello]

My main disappointment was that Weir didn't address the most pressing issue that the club currently faces - the fact that we are still using "We exist to improve people's lives" on the twitter bio.

[Busta Nut]

My main takeaway there was that there is no chance we are sacking the manager just now. Regardless of any poor run. 

Edited January 9 by Busta Nut

[santheman]

Was a bit disappointed that he didn't mention some of the things recently put in place to improve fan involvement like the appointment of the fan liason people and the fact that the Well Society are now actively looking to fans to come up with ideas to improve fan involvement.

So things might be moving slowly on that front but at least things ARE happening.

[capt_oats]

28 minutes ago, Busta Nut said:

My main takeaway there was that there is no chance we are sacking the manager just now. 

In the current circumstances sure but I'd imagine that changes if things become more of an existential threat.

Tbh, given how much of that interview could have been lifted off The Thread I'm surprised Weir didn't just say "continually bulleting managers is bad business and bad vibes" (and he'd be right of course).

Edited January 9 by capt_oats

[capt_oats]

On 04/01/2024 at 17:30, crazylegsjoe_mfc said:

I know Edinburgh City are a basket case of a club at the minute and it's in the third tier, but given that Robbie Mahon has scored 6 goals in his last 5 games for them and they'll no longer be paying any contribution to his wages (if they ever were), maybe Kettlewell sees him as a cheap option for the bench.

Not sure what his football manager stats are like. 

On 08/01/2024 at 09:54, Casagolda said:

Think he’s already away, going back to Ireland apparently. 

[thisGRAEME]

42 minutes ago, Handsome_Devil said:

I agree with you totally in principle but Russell always emphasised the main target market wasn't current fans.

My understanding was that we weren't trying to attract new fans but rather businesses by saying look at our values - which we plastered everywhere - and associate your brand with them inside our wonderful engagement which extends waaaay beyond our nominal support.

Certainly the club, as @capt_oatssaid, were very strong in the belief this helped land Bet365. The ST numbers, in terms of engaging our own support alongside, certainly went up at the time but proving a link is hard.

Tbh it's the sort of joined up, long-term strategy some think we need but even they (or we, as I'd put myself more to that side rather than with the short-term guys who want everything spent on the team asap) is brutally hard to do. It's not overnight, it's not even a season or two but development over years - ideally 5-10. And that timeframe puts you at the mercy of circumstances - when on-field performance tailed, we were all sick of it, those involved are understandably looking to their own career as well, other executives can't or don't want to see value in anything which doesn't immediately boost the bottom line etc.

I don't disagree at all that having a strong platform of 'this is what we are' is a bad thing, I think it makes total sense, but also: We took fucking Paddy Power money, so I'm not sure it really means anything? The reporting side of anything like this is absolutely miserable as a bit of fun, but it's also vital. If you have budget, if you're spending that budget, then where's it going and why, otherwise you're fumbling in the dark with a vague 'yeah that's nice, i guess?'. If you're doing it with f**k all budget then that's how you have to work, but as he highlights in the video, that's not what it was.

I do agree with the long-term nature of it, and under Burrows I felt that 'doing the right thing for a long time' was broadly the strategy, and I think that's good, but as I say, from Weir's perspective, that has to yield results at some point, and saying 'it'll come, just trust me' is probably where as a senior member of staff, he needs to ask the hard question of 'when and how?', because if you're enacting a five or ten year plan then you absolutely have to be setting yourself targets and review points throughout that.

Like I say, maybe all of these things were happening, maybe they are, but given the 18 months of drifting (which Weir's reasoning for made sense I guess) then have we missed targets, are we changing targets, are we shifting focus; probably? But it needs a CEO to take the lead on it.