Visit Indy’s Hoops Pass Turned a Four-Day Event Into a Citywide Win

The Goal

Jeff Robinson is the Managing Director of Marketing for Visit Indy and isn’t a stranger to Bandwango. He was the mastermind behind the super successful Indy Attraction Pass, as well as multiple gamified check-in challenges – but he had never created a short- duration pass that was specific to one event. Having the WNBA All-Star game in his area seemed like a big opportunity, though. 

He said, “We host a lot of very large sporting events. But the challenge is that most people come in, they fly into Indianapolis International Airport, they come downtown to their hotel, and they're usually just going between their hotel and the event venues. My goal with this was to get them to explore deeper into the destination. By using the pass in a scavenger-hunt style experience, the hope was that we could get them into neighborhoods and places that they would not have seen.”

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The Indy Hoops Pass Experiment 

The Indy Hoops Pass was built as a tool to get visitors to experience more of Indy, even though their main reason for traveling was the WNBA All-Star game. It was a four-day pass that was only live Thursday-Sunday, and it had 25 check-in locations. Those included the main venues associated with the event, but to accomplish their goal of getting visitors to dive deeper into the destination, Robinson said they also included other spots, too. 

“We focused a lot on artworks associated with basketball – we have a number of murals across our city that feature famous players. We also included some of our legacy courts – these are basketball courts that have been revitalized as part of hosting an event. And then on top of that, there are a number of attractions in our city that have basketball-themed elements. So we have the NCAA Hall of Champions, which has an old-style basketball court in it. We have the Children's Museum of Indianapolis, which has an outdoor sports experience with some basketball courts on it. We had this kind of mix of diverse locations, many of them were well outside of downtown.” 

Robinson also used this as an opportunity to try out some of Bandwango’s new features. For the first time, he utilized QR codes as his check-in method. They printed out 24-inch circles on a material that could be applied to sidewalks, and those included the QR code. They installed these at the participating locations so passholders could check in, but Robinson said an additional perk came from it. “They also acted as promos for the pass,” he said. “So, when people were entering the fan experience at the convention center, they were seeing these graphics on the ground. If they scanned the code and they didn't know what it was, it would prompt them to sign up for the pass. So it really acted as a way to get signage all around the city promoting the pass, while also being utilitarian in the fact that people could check in with it.”

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Marketing the Indy Hoops Pass

Robinson shared, “A pass is only as good as it is marketed.” 

Visit Indy promoted the pass through their owned email lists, social media, and on their website. He also shared that it’s important to collaborate with partners. “Visit Indy worked with the local organizing committee and we had a dedicated landing page built that shows all of the things to see and do while you're in town for the WNBA All-Star Game. We got some push from our friends at Pacer Sports & Entertainment to get visitors to that landing page.”

He also built a social media toolkit to share with the locations that were featured on the pass, which made it easy for them to promote it as well. He shared his reasoning behind that effort, saying,  “We did this so that they could very easily post about it without having to think about writing their own message, pulling their own graphics. You want to make it easy for people to share your story. I think that's really critical to success.”

Results

With this pass being completely different than any other one they had ever done, Robinson admitted that initially he wasn’t sure how a four-day pass would perform, saying, 

“Honestly, I did not know how it was going to go, but I was extremely pleased with the level of engagement that we got out of it.”

For Visit Indy, it’s important to be able to have data to show the success of their initiatives. 

“As DMOs, our job is to influence travel and tourism, and I think we all want data to show our value. That's why I love these passes, probably more than anything else. When I go to our stakeholders and partners, I now have metrics that draw a straight line between me and a visit. That is priceless in our world.”

Using Bandwango’s reporting data, Visit Indy was able to see the results of their Indy Hoops Pass that was live for only four days. At the end of the campaign, Robinson was proud to share the results with participating businesses. 

• 549 Registered Passes
• 39 States/Provinces Represented
• Top Five States: Indiana, New York, Illinois, Ohio, Florida 
• 2,257 Total Check-Ins

“I was pretty shocked to see the number of people that went all in on this and used it as an opportunity to explore greater Indianapolis. Some of our more far-flung destinations had over 70 check-ins over the course of four days, which I thought was quite good. And it really achieved our goal of being an engaging experience for visitors.”

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This pass also generated significant earned media value

“I will say another really cool part about these passes that often goes underestimated is the earned media value,” said Robinson. Anytime we launch these passes, it gives our PR teams an opportunity to pitch and get screen time with all of our major local news outlets, and oftentimes, far-flung outlets who are talking about why to visit Indianapolis.”

Some of the earned media from the Indy Hoops pass included: 

• I took on the Indy Hoops Pass challenge. Here’s what I discovered about basketball in Indy, IndyStar
• Indy Hoops Pass gives fans chance to earn merch, win signed gear, Fever suite tickets, Indianapolis Business Journal
• Your guide to WNBA All-Star week in Indianapolis, Axios Indianapolis
• Coverage on four TV stations: WTHR, CBS4, FOX59, WISH-TV

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Visit Indy’s Five Tips for Success 

Offer the right prizes. 

The prizes for the Indy Hoops Pass included things that were easy for everyone to win – such as stickers and t-shirts. But they also had sweepstakes drawings for basketball tickets, signed balls, etc. 

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Build your pass gradually. 

According to Robinson, Experience Builder was very efficient and helped him build the pass as he went. He shared, “I found the whole experience to be very easy to manage on our own. The minute I started getting the idea going, I started slowly adding locations as I secured them, rather than having to do it all at once. I was slowly building it over the course of a month. That was nice, because it didn't put pressure on me at the last second to get everything done.” 

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Give clear directions for QR codes. 

This was the first time Visit Indy used QR codes, and Robinson shared one important tip. “Since we were placing the QR codes at these locations – in some cases, a very large location – we had to make sure we let people know where that QR code sticker was. So, we would write in directions on the pass so that they could make sure they found that QR code when they got to that location.”

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Do a PR push. 

Robinson is a big proponent of using these opportunities to garner earned media, sharing, “When you bring big events like this to your city, all of the news outlets are  just salivating for stories to tell. This was another story that we could pitch them. And, you know, when the DMO's the one driving it, I think it reflects very positively on us.” He suggested leveraging not only your contacts, but your partner contacts around the event, too. They also worked with their local organizing committee and Pacer Sports and Entertainment to help share the message.

Use your valuable data. 

Zero-party data is becoming crucial for marketers, and Robinson has made use of his Bandwango data so that he can continue speaking to visitors about things they’re interested in. He said, “We all want to have a direct line of communication between ourselves and our visitors, especially if these are niche audiences. For example, we have the Indy Craft Pass, and we now have a newsletter that we send out every month, specifically talking about breweries, wineries, and distilleries. I've now got that information, and I have a direct line to them that they have given permission for me to speak with them. The value in that is huge, but you have to take advantage of it. So I think it’s vital that you build intentional programs to message those folks.” 

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Conclusion

So was it worth it to build a pass that was only live for four days, and was focused on only one event? Robinson enthusiastically said, “I thought it was incredibly successful.”

Indy is hosting the Final Four next April and since this pass was a success, they’ve pitched this idea to the NCAA. Everyone was excited about it, and the Indy Hoops Pass will be coming back next year as a short-duration pass for visitors coming to town for the Final Four. Visit Indy expects to see more basketball fans dive deeper into the city like they did this year, and is excited about the future of this pass.  

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Do you want to maximize the results of an event in your city? Set up a demo with the Bandwango team to learn how to help push visitors deeper into your city.