It has been said that there are three factors which influence a consumer’s decision making behavior, aside from the influence of marketing (Blackwell et al. 2001). They are (a) personal differences, (b) environmental influence, and (c) psychological process. The first factor, “personal differences,” includes demographics, psychographics, and personal values or personality. The second factor, “environmental influence”, includes influence exerted by culture, social stratum, and family, relatives, and other individuals. The third and final factor is the “psychological process.” Pre-existing information, learning from experience and attitude, and behavior modification are contained in this factor.
Crompton and McKay (1997) have suggested that it is challenging for sport marketing professionals and researchers who focus on the spectator sport scene to identify the key elements of the decision-making process that influence behaviors.
According to Mullin et al. (2007), the model displayed below (Fig. 5.2) represents the decision-making process for sport involvement. In the first step, “needs recognition,” the consumer perceives their needs. It is often said that needs are aroused when a consumer recognizes a discrepancy between desire and ability to fulfill that desire. For example, an individual may want to go to watch the soccer games at the stadium, but perhaps he or she has never been to that stadium, or does not know how to buy the tickets. When such a discrepancy is perceived, to overcome it the consumer must take an action. The next step, “information search”, occurs when a consumer seeks information on the Internet or from other sources. For example, the consumer may look up what kinds of soccer teams exist in Japan, which team is ranking high in the league, where and when the next games will be held, and so on. There are two ways to access the information: the internal search and the external search. The internal search relies on the consumer’s experience and knowledge. The external search is utilized when the consumer’s pre-existing information is inaccurate and/or inadequate. When the consumer gains some information, “evaluation of choices” will be the next step as the consumer evaluates the alternatives; for example, “was the service given at the venue satisfied to you”, or “did you experience difficulties making your purchase?” At this stage, the most important element is the estimation of service quality. Since service has the unique characteristic of being invisible, service providers must aim for favorable evaluations of their services. The next step is the “purchase decision”, when the consumer buys a ticket for the soccer games. Now this individual is ready to go to the stadium and “experience sport.” After watching the game or engaging in other activities at the stadium, customers “evaluate the experience.” It is crucial that the consumer feels satisfied after experiencing the game, because this will lead the consumer to repeat the action. Consumers have three choices during this evaluation. If they are satisfied, they are more likely to re-purchase the ticket again. If they are dissatisfied, they may never return. Finally, if they are slight satisfied or slightly dissatisfied, they may search for more information or may re-evaluate their choices. In general, when spectators are satisfied after watching a game, they will attend another game, and if they are dissatisfied, they will not be likely to attend a game again. However, if a spectator’s team identification is strong, it does not matter whether they were satisfied or not; they will attend another game (Fujimoto et al. 1996; Matsuoka et al. 2003). This indicates that to increase the probability that spectators will repeatedly attend their games, a team must improve customer satisfaction, and also strengthen their customers’ identification with or loyalty towards the team.
5.3 What Is Attendance?
Attendance is one of the major topics in sport marketing, because the revenue from ticket sales is the fundamental income for the team and also for the league. We define attending the game, as “what makes people come to the stadium.”
Zhang et al. (1995) focused on what affects the spectator decision to attend professional sport games in the United States and suggested that it is necessary for teams to identify the variables that might affect the decision to attend. To assist in this process they developed the Spectator Decision Making Inventory (SDMI) scale. The SDMI was intended to provide researchers and sport marketing organizations with (a) a valid and reliable instrument with which to measure variables affecting spectator decision making, (b) increased predictability of spectator decision-making factor effects on game attendance, (c) differentiation of spectator decision making with respect to the socio-demographic backgrounds of spectators, and (d) implications for the selection of marketing objectives and marketing strategies. The 4 factors introduced in this research were “game promotion (GP),” “home team (HT),” “opposing team (OT),” and “schedule convenience (SC).” After developing the scale, these 4 factors were used to examine the relationship between the social-demographic variables. Age was significantly negatively correlated with GP, OT and SC. Also there was no significant difference due to either genders or to ethnicity.
After this fundamental study, SDMI was applied to measure the dimensions of market demand associated with Major League Baseball Spring Training. The scale was called the SDMI-ST (Braunstein et al. 2005). Forty-two items measuring six factors (Game Attractiveness, Game Promotion, Economic Consideration, Schedule Convenience, Nostalgic Sentiment, and Love (of) Baseball) were included in this scale.
Won and Kitamura (2006) suggested that determining what factors affect spectators’ consumptive behavior is an important issue for spectator sport marketers, because, as mentioned above, the revenue from game attendance is an important income source for professional sport. In the same research, they defined five perspectives that explain the factors that influence game attendance: (a) sport game attractiveness factors such as league standing, record breaking, team quality, and star players, (b) environmental factors such as stadium facilities, convenience of schedule, and weather, (c) emotional or internal factors such as identification with the team and motivational factors, (d) economic factors such as ticket price, and (e) demographics such as gender, ethnic background, and marital status.
Shank (2005) categorized the factors influencing spectator attendance that should be understood by all sport marketers in order to achieve the most effective market strategies. Ten factors were introduced. The first was the fan motivation factor, which was suggested to be a fundamental motive that represents the most basic needs of the fan. The second was game attractiveness, which is similar to Won and Kitamura’s (2006) hypothesis. Economic and demographic factors were similar to those found in Won and Kitamura (2006). Competitive factors, mainly televised games, could be the greatest threat to attendance since several Fizel and Bennett (1989) have reported that broadcasting games negatively influences game attendance. Moreover, stadium factors and sportscape factors both related to the physical stadium characteristics and intangibles related to stadium atmosphere were also recognized as attendance factors. Wakefield and Sloan (1995) reported that more favorable fan attitudes towards a stadium correlate with higher attendance. This implies that the stadium atmosphere is a critical issue influencing game attendance. Other factors were “value of sport to the community,” “sport involvement,” and “fan identification” with a team.
5.4 What Are Constraints?
In terms of effects on attendance, constraints can be described as “factors that prevent people from coming to the stadium.” Jackson (1991), one of the most well-known researchers into leisure constraints, defined constraints as factors perceived or experienced by individuals that limit the formation of leisure preferences and inhibit or prohibit participation in leisure activities. A single model which illustrates the relationship between preference, constraints, and participation, is shown below in Fig. 5.3. This idea was first introduced in the leisure literature with the word “barrier” (Searle and Jackson 1985). The idea of “barriers” or “constraints” was introduced because this concept contributes significantly to improving our understanding of outdoors recreation participation and non-participation. There are two reasons why it is important to study constraints. First, to understand choices and behavior, we must investigate all the positive and negative factors that influence those choices. Second, implications from constraints research have generated new insights into aspects of motivation, satisfaction, and the factors which influence preferences.
Fig. 5.3
A simple model of preferences, constraints and participation (Adapted from Jackson 2005 p. 4)
In the mid 1980s many leisure researchers started to write papers about leisure constraints. Francken and van Raaij (1981) separated constraints into two types, internal and external, and this has been the most commonly used conceptual distinction. Boothby et al. (1981) divided constraints into personal and social, while Howard and Crompton (1984) suggested motivational and physical constraints. Jackson (1988) indicated that these three conceptual distinctions overlap and that is why different leisure constraint researchers have classified constraints in different ways. Crawford and Godbey (1987) suggested that there was no non- theoretical framework by which to characterize leisure preference and participation using barriers or constraints; therefore, they conceptualized three constraints, intrapersonal, interpersonal, and structural constraints, upon the use of family leisure time. Intrapersonal constraints were described as individual psychological states and attributes which interact with, rather than intervene between leisure preferences and participation. For example, stress, depression, and anxiety are included in these constraints. Interpersonal constraints are depicted as the results of interpersonal interaction or the relationship between individual characteristics; for example, is there (or is there not) someone with whom one can participate in an activity? Structural constraints are commonly conceptualized as factors that intervene between leisure preference and participation. Structural constraint examples are family life cycle, financial resources, climate, work schedule, available time, and so on. However, Crawford et al. (1991) suggested that in the previous research, these three constraint categories were disconnected, and did not posit that people might negotiate these constraints and participate in an activity in the future; also, the antecedent research focused on constraints that could account for non-participation. Therefore they introduced the model which is illustrated in Fig. 5.4.
After these models were constructed, many researchers focused on developing scales to measure the constraints on participation in leisure activities shown in Table 5.1 (McGuire 1984; Henderson et al. 1988; Backman 1991; Jackson 1993; Raymore et al. 1993; Jackson and Henderson 1995; Alexandris and Carroll 1997a, b).
Table 5.1
Constraint factors introduced in leisure literature
