Customer-community-focused SoFi Stadium

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Rich Wang speaks in a very matter-of-fact manner and avoids hype and fluff. He presents the facts in a logical and balanced way.

Wang is the Vice-President of Business Strategy of the overwhelming SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California (US). He says that reams of paper have been filled up writing about the amazing SoFi Stadium “but not many people realize that it sits on only five acres of a 300-acre complex”.

Rich Wang oversees strategic partnerships and data/analytics for the Hollywood Park, the Sofi Stadium and the YouTube Theater. He was part of building the inaugural data tech stack and Martech (marketing technology) for the Sofi Stadium.

In a chat with ‘Coliseum’, Rich Wang, VP, Business Strategy, SoFi Stadium, US, says that there is much more to look beyond the SoFi Stadium and the football teams. The SoFi Stadium complex is a component of the under-construction Hollywood Park, a master planned neighborhood in development consisting of a retail district, residential buildings and a 300-key hotel. He doles out details of how they have divided into personas the varied visitors streaming into the SoFi Stadium to get a clear picture of what exactly the customers want and to make the customer journey better and at the same time Wang underscores that they also give due weightage to the community.
 

SoFi Stadium

The SoFi Stadium is a 70,000-seat sports and entertainment indoor-outdoor stadium in the Los Angeles County suburb of Inglewood, California, United States which opened in the year 2020. It is the home of the National Football League (NFL) teams Los Angeles Rams and the Los Angeles Chargers.
 

Hollywood Park

The Hollywood Park is a 300-acre mixed-use development in Inglewood, California (US) which is under construction on the former site of the Hollywood Park racetrack.

Spanning nearly 300 acres across 890,000-square-foot retail area and creative office space, Hollywood Park offers new sophisticated residences, public parks, a lake surrounding its two premier sports and entertainment venues – the SoFi Stadium and the 6,000-capacity YouTube Theater.

Rich Wang began by stating that though the SoFi Stadium opened in the year 2020 when COVID blighted the world but very soon the ravishing venue held major music acts and sports shows.

Added Wang, “We have a rich line-up of major events coming up – “The 2026 FIFA World Cup™ is coming to the SoFi Stadium, the 2027 NFL Super Bowl and the LA28 (2028 Summer Olympics to be held in the United States) Opening and Closing Ceremonies.
 

Customer-community-centric

He stated that Inglewood has a very “vibrant community and whatever steps we initiate we keep the community and the customers in our minds and we have done a lot of research as to what our customers want and what our community needs.”
 

Vibrant Venues

Wang pointed out that the Inglewood area where the SoFi Stadium sits is dotted with venues. Apart from the SoFi Stadium and the YouTube Theater close to the Hollywood Park is the 17,505-capacity Kia Forum which is the “busiest music venue out here in California that does about 180 shows and on the other side of it is the 18,000-capacity Intuit Dome which will roughly hold about 50-60 events in a year. And if you think about the footprint as a whole there are four mixed-use venues abuzz with activities 365 days in a year. So, any given day, there could be a National Basketball Association (NBA) game or a NFL game or a soccer match or an Alicia Keys (American singer) concert or a Beyoncé (American singer-songwriter) show at any given time. We are really talking about moving the center of gravity of Los Angeles into the Inglewood property within the Hollywood Park.”
 

The Personas

A marketing ace, Wang and his team have their fingers on the pulse of the customers who visit the SoFi Stadium as knowing their customers well will help drive business.

They broke down these customers into five different personas – Chris the Urban Escapist “who hates the traffic snarls, the typical City guy of Los Angeles who loves the green space and who prefers to walk into the venue early and leave early. This category of visitors is our main customer as they are looking for extreme sports and extreme activities.”

Next is Will the Sports Dad who is the “diehard football fan who paints his face and wears jersey. He mainly comes to the venue for these kinds of activities.”

Cate the Affluent Curator is the kind of visitor “who wants to be noticed, loves shopping for luxury goods and creates content. A wealthy persona, she is accompanied by her band of friends and we want to amplify Cate’s voice.”

Rosario the Local (male-female mixed gender) – “This is our local Inglewood community – people who live in LA, are from LA and who give topmost priority to the safety and cleanliness quotients in a venue.”

“Lastly, America the Socialite is our youngest persona. She doesn’t have the income yet and is more into window shopping, she desires luxury goods but cannot afford it today. She is the last-minute ticket buyer and buys whatever ticket is available.”

Wang underlined that once they have the above information they can “really target the market and we can be really surgical about our messaging, where we want to amplify, where we want to interrupt the customer journey, where we want to meet them.”
 

Sum-up

Rich Wang wrapped up by stating, “The SoFi Stadium is really a place of wellness and wellbeing. The building fits into our customers-personas personalities. Its 24/7 abuzz with activities character resonates with everybody. We are very particular about who are our customers? What do they want? What are their needs? And we equally work in the best interests of our community – the people of Inglewood.”

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