NFL's Continuos Innovation

How do you continue to innovate a game that has been relatively the same for over a century? Ask the NFL, they can practically showcase Nathan Furr and Jeff Dyer's concepts from The Innovator's Method.

Once again, I believe the NFL can continually quick test its ideas across the 32 teams. Each team acts as its own profit and loss center, and thus each has it's own ability to market and grow. The big advantage of this is the NFL can see what actions or ideas are working in one area and begin to move them to another.

For instance, in 1974 the Pittsburgh Steeler fans created the idea of the Terrible Towel. This simple little rag became a symbol for the team to rally behind. Now, you can go to every single NFL stadium and purchase one of these towels. Similarly, the NFL had been started as a sports business, not necessarily a pop culture venue. In 1991, after years of most folks tuning out of the NFL halftime show, the league booked New Kids On The Block, a young boy band to perform during halftime. Halftime ratings nearly doubled, and with the ratings came the advertising revenue. This year the league even had a discussion about having the artist pay to perform at halftime.

Recently, the NFL has begun to look into finding new innovative ways to keep viewers watching. They understand that a younger generation does not necessarily want an expensive cable package, nor do they want to sit in a room with a bunch of their friends watching the game on a 50 inch television. Instead, they have pushed and marketed games to be broadcast through cell phones and tablets. Aside from streaming services like Netflix and Hulu, no other sport or entertainment platform provides all of their programing through mobile devices. The important part is the NFL is actively listening to consumers across the board and can rely on metrics provided by a variety of sources. Not every industry has this benefit and perhaps this is why the NFL can be a leader in entertainment innovation.

So what is next? The NFL needs to continue to push its boundaries, as highlighted by Furr and Dyer, companies need to explore new boundaries to gain larger insights. If I were in charge of the NFL innovation, I would begin to develop partnerships with some of the newest visual technologies, such as Oculus Rift, which is currently designed as a virtual reality headset. Instead of being in a room, Oculus Rift transfers the user into the projected environment. It is very realistic and has generated plenty of humorous moments to the users.

Watching the Super Bowl became a reason to invest in a brand new larger television, I don't see why it can't be the reason to invest in a product like Oculus Rift.

Where ever the NFL goes, it had the opportunity to increase its fan base. And as we've seen each of these innovations continues to drive fan allegiance, and that creates more profit for the NFL.