• FOMO
  

• or fo·mo

  ^{[ foh-moh ]}

  noun Slang.

  a feeling of anxiety or insecurity over the possibility of missing out on something, as an event or an opportunity: If I say no to buying tickets to a sporting event, I get a bad case of FOMO.
  
  

  Fans are catching FOMO.  They are fed up with staying home and want to go out and do something.  They want to be entertained. 

  However, you can’t just assume they will come back.  While some fans are chomping at the bit, a big chunk of your fan base may have put you out of mind since you’ve been basically out of sight for the last eight months when they couldn’t come to games.

  In this case, the FOMO virus is a good virus and we don’t need a vaccine for it.  In fact, we want to help you help your fans catch FOMO.  It doesn’t happen by accident and there is no guarantee your fans will even want to catch FOMO so you have to help them get infected.

  There are two symptoms of FOMO:

1. Limited supply.  This has been solved in many cases with restricted capacity, especially for hockey teams starting play this week in the ECHL and right after the first of the year in additional ECHL markets and AHL markets.
   
   That limited supply means you get to create a sense of urgency for your fans to quickly purchase the tickets you do have available or they are likely to get shut out. 
   
   
2. High demand.  This symptom is a little trickier to treat.  This is where you have to engage your fan base and anyone even remotely interested in your team to get excited about coming to a game this winter or spring.  This has to be much, much, much more (did I emphasize more enough?) than just messaging that you are back and you have a good team.  Your hard core fans will buy in to that message but all of your other target audiences will need more convincing.
   
   You have to focus on the entertainment, atmosphere and fact that you’re providing an outlet for fun, family entertainment.  

HOW TO HELP YOUR FANS CATCH FOMO

Once you’ve diagnosed both symptoms, the key to developing FOMO in your fans is engagement.  How are you engaging your fans with content, stories and buzz surrounding your team’s return?  You can’t easily do this right now with the usual events, player appearances or town halls.  You have to do it via social and digital media and effective email marketing.

To learn how to do that, check out our next digital ticket sales webinar on Tuesday, December 8 at noon Eastern.  You can sign up at Digital Ticket Sales Webinar.  We’ll give you examples of teams who are helping their fans catch FOMO and building wait lists in the thousands for as soon as their tickets go on sale.

FOMO might be the most important virus our fans can contract over the next few months to recover from the COVID 19 nightmare we’ve all been living through during 2020.

If you can’t join Tuesday’s webinar, send me an email at stevedelay@theultimatetoolkit.com or give me a call at 702-493-2661 and I’ll fill you in on how my teams, the Macon Bacon and Florence RedWolves are helping our fans catch FOMO.