Newcastle Falcons Achieve "Maximum Points" By Switching To Capital 21 Telephony Solution

• Fans no longer hear a busy tone - and system pays for itself
• Downturn in gate sales due to bad weather a thing of the past

Newcastle Falcons - like all Zurich Premiership clubs - found they were struggling to cope with the increased ticket demand in the wake of England's World Cup success.

The overriding problem was that the club's phone system was unable to deal with the sheer volume of calls, so that booking lines constantly rang busy - the end result being not only a loss of sales but also increasingly angry fans.

Although attendance last season was hiked by 30,000, Newcastle Falcons Commercial Director Mick Hogan was concerned that the club was still potentially losing business due to existing and prospective fans being unable to get through.

"When people call once and hear a busy tone, you have potentially lost a sale for that game," says Mick Hogan. "When they ring twice and get a busy tone, you may have lost them for several games."

Mick Hogan turned to Capital 21, best known as a specialist supplier of telephony systems to the Football League, to come up with a custom designed solution for Newcastle Falcons.

Today that system has effectively transformed many of the ways the club - which has recently spent £13 million on its 10,000 capacity ground - does business in that -

• All calls are answered 24 hours a day - and no fan ever hears a busy tone
• Latest information such as game times and ticket availability is recorded and made available to fans via the system - and changed instantly should the need arise
• There has been a noticeable shift away from fans purchasing tickets at the gate on the day to pre-purchasing by phone - helped by discount incentives - so there is no decline in sales in direct relation to bad weather
• Key management information is available from the tracking of all incoming calls to make decisions on booking office staffing levels and also to prove which marketing spend is working - and which isn't

And all this has been achieved for Newcastle Falcons without any capital outlay and with minimum disruption in that implementation was virtually seamless.

"On top of all that, our Capital 21 system has a revenue generating 0871 number, so pays for itself," says Mick Hogan. "It's like getting maximum points every week . . ."

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