[nirvAnA]

Problem:
To grow eSports we have to grow the player base. Sponsors are attracted by numbers, people watching their brands, and customers buying their brands from the positives associated with it. That's their whole point of investing, to get some form of tangible return from it hopefully more than its initial cost. The reason its hard to find sponsors is because its hard to convince them they are getting their money's worth and making a good business decision when they see 20 people turn up at big LANs.

So if there were heaps of people playing in our scene, surely this will attract more sponsors. So how do you grow the player base in sea?

Solution:

Somethings you can do at sc2sea:

• wanna chart and share your sc2 journey? make a blog
• wanna talk with like minded friends? theres our chatbox
• wanna do something sc2 related but not actually play the game or do anything? lurk on forums (lol not recommended actually)
• wanna join a clan? players can easily apply to clans here. or even start then own clan
• wanna join a tournament? there are bsgs, gpds and acls
• wanna learn further? well thats what the forums are for, to discuss the game!

I might sound a bit bias but I think we already have a good homebase and infrastructure set up here at sc2sea. Imagine if we didn't how different things would be. But thankfully we do. So lets make the best of it! If people truly cared about growing the scene, I believe they would put their differences aside and work together to create something the whole scene can benefit from. It doesn't matter what clan or team you're from, we all have a common goal to work towards.

Action plan:

Casters:
These guys bring the casuals in. I think Australia has some of the best casters in the scene.

Players:
They just gotta perform their best internationally. glade and PiG have been doing great imo in foreign tournaments. So we definitely are not lacking in casters or players and the rest of this post is dedicated to what we as a community can do.

Community:
Basically we need to encourage more people to join our community, then get them to STAY. When these guys come, you dont wanna see them see drama and shit fests on forums. That is why we have quite a strict moderation policy. Otherwise it harms the overall community and pushes pple away. We gotta be helpful and welcoming. Look at the new member thread post we have. We have sooooooooo many new faces everyday who take the effort to introduce themselves. But they dont follow up or post anymore I am not sure how to encourage them further.

We go to spread more awareness about the community - make it positive and something they want to be part of. They get more involved and sooner or later they end up attending events and posting stuff. Many of us started off this way. I see a thousand people in the noobschool channel and wonder why i dont see them on the forums, which is arguably a better place to learn then a chat channel. Strategy discussed here is permanent and organised and you get pros replying.

Spectators / LANs:
I think the spectator player base is there too, but they aren't coming. Apart from hundreds of these guys in the channel, you also have thousands of people at barcrafts who dont join in and become more involved. Why did everyone come out for WCS Australia and why are ACLs so empty in comparison? Same thing with IEM singapore where we saw 200 starcraft players we did not know existed. The people who do come are the ones you recognise on sc2sea who are more involved with the scene. I think the market is there but we just aren't reaching it.

Imagine if these more casual players started becoming being interested, and then brought their friends down too. you will get so many more viewers and people at lans. basically lots more pple which is what sponsors want to see.

TLDR: spread the word, tell them about sc2sea. welcome them, have a positive forum environment. give them the opportunity to become more involved in the game, they will start attending events etc more people show up and more sponsors. i honestly feel for whatever plan there is in growing the sc2 scene in australia, we are kinda like the catalyst to make it happen. but we depend on volunteers and people who want to do things to make it happen. and today, maybe of theirs pioneer volunteers have moved on.

We also gotta create content that makes people want to visit sc2sea. i am responsible for this area and this year its been lacking so far thats my fault and why i've been searching for someone who could help take over.

Conclusion

We need less people taking about wanting to do stuff (I've met soooooo many people like this) and instead people who actually do stuff. We had our recruitment thread here which typically gets 30-50 applicants. This year it got about 10, which is really depressing If you want to do something for the community to grow the scene please send in an application. It does not have to be limited to the roles suggested here.

It can be some other plan you have and we will provide you with whatever you can to make it happen. e.g Eddie's GPD and Master Cups were entirely his idea. He sent me a PM 2 years ago wanting to help build the scene and proposed this. I gave him tournament permissions and later news posting then moderator than facebook permissions. Basically anything to do help support this we did. And his tournaments have helped build the scene so much, developing GPD players and giving the top players things to fight for. It was all him. So yes, if you want to build the scene, you can too but it takes dedicating and the willingness to do something to make it happen. You can send in your application here.

http://www.sc2sea.com/showthread.php?t=7760