VSK Fotboll's new way of driving business growth
Most clubs sit on vast amounts of data, but few know how to use it. VSK Fotboll decided to change that.
The untapped asset: data as business-critical infrastructure
While the sporting side is run with surgical precision, many Swedish elite clubs are sitting on a rough diamond they still don't know how to make the most of.
In leadership teams and boardrooms across Swedish sport, new revenue streams are a constant topic. How do we fill the stadium? How do we increase the value of our rights?
Those are relevant questions. But they often overlook an asset that's already there in the office, yet one that few organizations truly look after.
Through the league organization Svensk Elitfotboll, the clubs in Allsvenskan and Superettan have invested in digital infrastructure over many years, and the league has created excellent conditions for the clubs to grow their businesses. What has often been missing is the final step: activation.
Västerås SK Fotboll realized this when a new operational leader joined the club a few months ago. The club is back in Allsvenskan in 2026 and is making a determined push on its commercial development.
Like everyone else, they had data. Lots of data. But it wasn't being used to drive business.
Untapped potential
- The ticketing system knows who comes to the games.
- The online store knows who buys merchandise.
- The membership system knows who has paid their membership fee.
- The email platform knows who clicks on links.
The information is there. But few clubs have the time, resources or know-how to actually turn it into action. The data is collected, but never activated.
For fans, the consequences are tangible. A season ticket holder of ten years might get emails urging them to "buy a ticket". Someone who has spent thousands in the club store is treated like a stranger in the next mailing.
It's not just poor service. It's lost revenue, and a relationship that wears thin instead of growing stronger.
"It became clear to me early on that we at VSK were a long way behind in several areas of digitalization. When I started on September 1, I was convinced digitalization was something I'd be able to handle myself. After a few weeks in the job, though, I quickly realized it wasn't realistic to be Club Director and drive the extensive transformation that was needed at the same time.
Getting help to implement the systems available to us has meant we've quickly taken big steps as a club. At the same time, we've had an active learning process, so with every day that passes we learn more and get closer to being fully self-sufficient." - Robin Hals, Club Director, VSK Fotboll
Infrastructure, not inspiration
What Stratigo is doing with VSK Fotboll isn't about individual campaigns. It's about what's being built beneath the surface.
The club had the same problem as most clubs: data was everywhere, but it was never connected. Ticket buyers in one system. Online store customers in another. Members in a third. Wi-Fi registrations from the stadium that nobody even knew existed. POS data from the stadium that the club neither owned nor controlled. And so on. Thousands of people who had shown interest in the club in different ways, but who had never received the right communication based on their particular engagement.
Automation: more targeted communication, less work
Together with the club, Stratigo is currently driving a revolution in how the club will work going forward. By aggregating data from different sources, we're moving towards a "360-degree view" of the fans and, together, changing the game for the club. If the club decides to go all the way, we'll soon see the whole fan, not just fragments.
"In a short time, I've learned an incredible amount about our fans. The insights I get through Stratigo have given me a clear picture of what our 'customer base' looks like and where we should focus to maximize our potential even further. We've always had data, but in the past it was neither collected nor analyzed in a structured way. With the tools we've now implemented, we learn more every day. We feel much more in control than before, and it's a fantastic feeling." - Robin Hals, Club Director, VSK Fotboll
The pieces are coming together. We're now building automated flows together that work all year round. A season ticket holder who isn't a member is asked whether they'd like to become one. A new member receives a welcome email with offers from the store. Someone celebrating a birthday gets a greeting and a personal offer. These are automated flows that the club will spend its time adjusting and refining going forward, instead of sending everything out manually for years to come. The workload goes down, while the frequency and relevance of the communication go up.
The system works while people sleep. That's the difference between chasing revenue, loyalty and engagement and building them.
"When I gave Stratigo the keys they needed to access our green-and-white systems, they got started straight away. Without me having to lead the work or check whether anything was happening, reports started arriving regularly several times a week, with clear descriptions of what had been done and what insights we could draw from the results. That's how the partnership has run since the start, with a steady stream of new initiatives and insights, week after week." - Robin Hals, Club Director, VSK Fotboll
The problem with "best practice"
Sports marketing has long suffered from a kind of collective complacency. Everyone does roughly the same thing, because everyone has always done roughly the same thing. Same templates, same messages, same results.
Fans' expectations have been shaped by how Netflix, Spotify and their favorite stores talk to them. Personal. Relevant. Seamless.
That's why "best practice" in an industry that lags behind others may not be the path to the best development.
Sport is complex. Revenue goes primarily into sporting competitiveness. That has consequences. The people in sport are heroes with specialist expertise, running hybrid organizations in a stakeholder-intensive industry. Heroes with a lot to handle every day. Heroes who are often firefighting.
VSK has chosen a different path. Not by reinventing the wheel, but by bringing in help and actually implementing what works in other industries. Segmentation. Automation. Personalization. Basic principles that e-commerce cracked ten years ago.
The right message, to the right person, at the right time. Not as a one-off campaign. A relationship built on relevance, rather than something that can come across as spam.
Hear Robin Hals, Club Director at VSK Fotboll, talk more about the partnership in the interview above (in Swedish).
The uncomfortable truth
Here's the part that might sting for many readers: what VSK Fotboll has started doing isn't difficult. It doesn't require revolutionary technology, a multi-million budget or a team of data scientists.
- Understanding the potential. You need knowledge in this area to dare to invest in doing it yourself, or to decide to bring in help.
- Actually using the data you already have. Most clubs sit on years of ticket purchases, online orders, membership records, Wi-Fi, gamification data, POS data and more. The information is there, but few create the conditions to connect it and use it the right way (and we don't mean import/export routines that eat up huge amounts of manual time).
- Configuring the systems correctly. Marketing automation tools are worthless if they're misconfigured. The right setup isn't glamorous, but it's the foundation.
- Thinking like the recipient. Every email should answer the question: "Why should I care about this, right now?" If the answer is unclear, don't send the email.
- Loving the analysis and working in an agile way. Open rates, click-through rates, conversion. Not as reports gathering dust, but as compass needles for the next decision. Test, measure, adjust, repeat. It's not the club with the biggest budget that wins, it's the one that learns fastest.
It's the difference between running faster and building a machine that runs for you.
"I quickly gained a lot of trust in Stratigo and could see early on that they knew what they were doing. That led me to give them fairly free rein to take on the areas where they saw the greatest need. I believe a successful partnership is built on mutual and complete trust to achieve maximum impact." - Robin Hals, Club Director, VSK Fotboll
Soon the new normal
By treating its customer data as the business-critical infrastructure it really is, VSK Fotboll has created a competitive advantage that reaches far beyond the pitch. Despite limited resources, the club will be able to professionalize its fan relationships in months rather than years.
The clubs that understand this will pull ahead. Those that don't will keep wondering why their sporadic mailings have low open rates, why conversions fail to materialize, and why season tickets sell slowly despite "great campaigns".
On the day the partnership ends, VSK's organization should be equipped to take over and keep driving the development forward. That's why we carefully document everything we do.
The question other clubs now need to ask themselves isn't whether they can afford to make the same journey. It's whether they can afford not to.
"We have clear goals for what we want to achieve together with Stratigo, and I see our partnership as long-term. They're an invaluable resource for us." - Robin Hals, Club Director, VSK Fotboll
A new approach
Stratigo's work with VSK Fotboll is built on a simple conviction: build a commercial infrastructure that works around the clock and delivers the right message, to the right person, at the right time. Relevant. Respectful. Automated. When it works, everyone wins.
The club generates revenue. Fans get relevant communication instead of spam. And the relationship between them grows stronger rather than wearing thin.
It's not rocket science. But it requires someone to actually do the work.
About Stratigo Sports Business
Stratigo Sports Business helps sports organizations with Digital strategy & development, Commercial growth, Data-driven marketing and Analytics, data & AI. Curious what's possible for your organization? Get in touch with Kaveh Sarvari at kaveh.sarvari@stratigosportsbusiness.com
