Gemba Group and Futures Sport to team up with Football Federation Australia

Football Federation Australia (FFA) has appointed the Gemba Group and Futures Sport to better understand its fans through a strategic research and insights program.

With football fans recognised for generating a unique atmosphere in Australian sport, the FFA will work with gemba and Futures Sport to ensure this continues to flourish as football in Australia grows.

Explaining the move, FFA Chief Executive David Gallop stated "we are excited to be undertaking such an important project with respected business Gemba and Futures Sport.

“Our fans and the atmosphere they generate are one of our greatest assets and this research and insights program will underpin FFA’s fan engagement strategy going forward. It gives us a tremendous listening platform to better understand and engage with our fans and valuable information for our commercial partners to leverage effectively.”

Gemba was selected to provide a range of research deliverables spanning participation, the Hyundai A-League and the national teams and will manage the FFA’s consumer insights program for the next two years.

Gemba Chief Executive Rob Mills explains "we are obviously excited about being appointed by the FFA to manage key components of their insights program.

"The FFA has a lot of momentum across all aspects of their organisation and we are looking forward to helping them with their next phase of growth.”

The appointment compliments recent strategy work completed by gemba for the FFA focussed around participation and commercial operations.

A leading provider of insights to the sport and entertainment industry, Gemba also provides to insights to Cricket Australia, Tennis Australia and the Melbourne Cricket Club.

In addition, FFA also announced that Futures Sport, who works with football clients across a wide variety of major leagues worldwide, will provide a wide range of data and advisory services to the FFA. The work will cover partner media valuation, consultancy on optimal partner signage artwork and understanding of fans’ match day experiences.

Futures will also build a bespoke dashboard to the FFA, providing the organisation with a best-in-class ability to view all of its data and reports in an easy-to-use format, updated weekly to provide the FFA with the very latest information.

Futures Sport Managing Director Kevin Alavy concluded “we’re super excited to be working with the FFA.  We share their vision and passion to translate football’s global popularity to Australia and are confident that the quality of our research will help them reach this goal.”

Gemba is a market leading provider of insights, strategies and communications to the global sport and entertainment industry.

Gemba’s work is underpinned by one of the largest consumer insights programs in this industry and its client list includes some of the world’s best brands and sport and entertainment organisations. With offices in Shanghai, Sydney, Melbourne and Auckland, Gemba has delivered projects in most major markets around the world and is increasingly bringing a truly global perspective to this rapidly changing market.

Futures Sport is a strategic consultancy that works with federations, teams and sponsors to help them maximise the value of their investments in sport. Through in-house development of proprietary technologies and the creation of unique data sets, Futures provides an objective perspective into the business of sport. Futures’ work constantly challenges received wisdom, in order to deliver the deepest possible insights.

Football fan image courtesy of Damian Briggs Photography.

12th November 2013 - FOOTBALL PARTICIPATION REACHES 1.96 MILLION AUSTRALIANS