Case Study

Avanade helps Melbourne Cricket Club streamline operations and enhance customer service

Sporting excellence with a technology edge

©2012 Avanade Inc. All rights reserved.

About Melbourne Cricket Club

The Melbourne Cricket Club (MCC) is a

unique organisation. It is a private club

boasting by far the biggest membership

of any sporting club in Australia. The

MCC also has the public responsibility

of managing one of the largest and the

most successful stadiums in Australia

and the world – the Melbourne Cricket

Ground (MCG).

Along with the playing of cricket, today's

MCC is an umbrella organisation for

hundreds of participants in 11 sporting

sections - baseball, bowls, croquet,

football, golf, hockey, lacrosse, real

tennis, target shooting, squash and

tennis.

The club's principal public role,

however, remains the management and

development of the MCG - a stadium

which shares a unique relationship with

its local community and boasts a rare

magnetism in attracting visitors from all

corners of the globe. The MCG plays

host to a variety of events, both sporting

and non-sporting.

Business challenge

With 102,000 members and more than

220,000 people on its waiting list*, the

MCC manages a large amount of data

on a daily basis. One of the club’s major

sources of revenue is via annual

membership subscriptions and event-

related income associated with tickets

and catering. A key objective is to

improve engagement with existing

members and those on the waiting list

for membership.

The club was running a legacy Linux-

based proprietary platform which limited

its ability to scale and provide the best

possible service to members. It was

limited and time consuming in terms of

ability to generate reports for analysis,

and less intuitive for users.

MCC realised that it needed to improve

the database system to include a

customer relationship management

(CRM) layer, enabling streamlining of

operations and member management

and strategically align with present and

future needs.

MCC wanted a system that would allow

it to expand the products and services

offered to members, and integrate with

partners such as ticketing agents, as

well as provide a single view of the

customer across all of MCC’s business

areas.

“We wanted to have a 360-degree view

of our members and the people on our

waiting list,” said Scott Butler, MCC

General Manager, Membership and

Heritage. “We wanted to gain an

understanding of who they are, what

they do when they are at the MCG and

what they spend their money on so that

we can build profiles of our customers

to provide the best service possible.”

“One of the main reasons we selected

Avanade was for their project

management skills... they assured us

that the project would be delivered

seamlessly and it was.”

— Scott Butler, General Manager,

Membership and Heritage

Melbourne Cricket Club

“The Avanade team is skilled and

equipped at delivering solutions in an

onshore and offshore delivery model.

Our teams work using our methodology

called Avanade Connected Methods,

which provides a seamless delivery

experience to our customers.”

— Nicholas P’ng, Business

Development Executive

Avanade

©2012 Avanade Inc. All rights reserved.

Business Solution

As the largest sporting club in Australia,

the MCC needed to ensure it kept up

with world-class standards. The team

from MCC travelled to various large

sporting clubs around the world to find

out what they were using. They then

came back, analysed their business

processes and decided on Microsoft

Dynamics CRM as the platform to use.

The MCC initiated the Affinity Project in

2009 to identify and deliver a robust

and scalable solution that will enable it

to enhance engagement with members

and customers. They then identified

Dynamics CRM as the best platform to

use and build their system upon and

selected Avanade as a technology

partner.

“Our reputation as Microsoft’s Dynamics

partner of choice provided the customer

with the confidence to build that trusted

partnership with Avanade,” said

Nicholas P’ng, Business Development

Executive, Avanade.

Avanade worked in collaboration with

the team from MCC to design a

membership management solution to

meet the MCC’s key objectives.

The solution, based on Microsoft

Dynamics CRM 2011, provides an

innovative and up-to-date technology

platform, aligned to the MCC’s strategic

direction. The solution will also provide

the opportunity for targeted marketing

and communications, customer profiling

and better access to information

through user-driven analysis and

reporting.

“One of the main reasons we selected

Avanade was for their project

management skills. Although they had

their offshore and onshore model of

delivery, they assured us that the

project would be delivered seamlessly –

and it was,” said Scott. “Avanade’s

global footprint and its maturity in its

delivery methodology gave us the

confidence of excellence in execution

and delivery of a high quality solution

with low risk. Their expertise in the

CRM space ensured that the best

Microsoft experts and solution designs

were provided to support the MCC.”

“The Avanade team is skilled and

equipped at delivering solutions in an

onshore and offshore delivery model.

Our teams work using our methodology

called Avanade Connected Methods,

which provides a seamless delivery

experience to our customers,” added

Nicholas P’ng.

Results

MCC executives have been highly

impressed with the support and results

achieved with the Avanade installation,

which has been completed on time and

on budget. Since commencing the

relationship with Avanade, business

processes have improved and been

made more efficient.

The club has improved its efficiency by

having a single view of members – their

membership details, past interactions

with the club and which tickets they

have purchased, as well as how they

wish to be contacted.

The system has also allowed the MCC

to integrate more closely with its

ticketing agent Ticketek, allowing them

to better manage issues such as lost or

damaged tickets.

“Avanade’s global footprint and its

maturity in its delivery methodology

gave us the confidence of excellence in

execution and delivery of a high quality

solution with low risk. Their expertise in

the CRM space ensured that the best

Microsoft experts and solution designs

were provided to support the MCC.”

— Scott Butler, General Manager,

Membership and Heritage

Melbourne Cricket Club

About Avanade

Avanade provides business technology services that

connect insight, innovation and expertise in Microsoft®

technologies to help customers realize results.

Avanade’s services and solutions help improve

performance, productivity and sales for organizations

in all industries. Additional information can be found at

www.avanade.com

©2012 Avanade Inc. All rights reserved. The Avanade

name and logo are registered trademarks in the US

and other countries.

Americas

Seattle

Phone +1 206 239 5600

America@avanade.com

Sao Paulo

Phone +55 (11) 5188 3000

latinamerica@avanade.com

Asia Pacific

Singapore

Phone +65 6592 2133

AsiaPac@avanade.com

Europe

London

Phone +44 0 20 7025

1000

Europe@avanade.com

“The system has allowed for a much

smoother processing of payment online

when tickets are being purchased. It

also allows us to manage and track

ticketing so that on game day, our staff

are able to issue tickets faster so that

guests can get through the gates faster

to enjoy the game,” said Dean Burton,

Member Business Coordinator, Affinity

Project, MCC.

Users have also found the system much

easier to navigate and use because of

the system’s intuitive interface, an

improvement from the previous

command-based system. Members are

also able to update personal details via

secure login on the MCC website, which

integrates with the CRM component to

ensure that member details are always

kept up to date.

“We now have better access to the data

we have on file for our members and as

a result we have better information for

reporting purposes, and has allowed us

to review their business processes and

streamline those processes to manage

things like events, dining and functions,”

said Dean. “The system has helped us

become a better customer service

organisation overall, which is our

primary objective.”

* Numbers accurate as of July 2012

“The system has helped us become a

better customer service organisation

overall, which is our primary objective."

— Dean Burton, Member Business

Coordinator, Affinity Project

Melbourne Cricket Club