Taking a look at last season there were plenty of highs and lows for the teams in the QSL, some surprised us all, and others achieved new feats such as Lekhwiya winning the Qatar Cup for the first time.  However off the field, the league’s organisers too had a number of new developments and successes.

Marketing and Communications 

Online content and coverage
The Marketing and Communications department continued to increase visibility and reach of the league with some new initiatives and ideas. The overall aim was to ensure that the QSL website was the hub of all news related to Qatar’s top tier of football.
 
The QSL’s Local English Media Team ensured a high level of quality in many areas with projects such as the Season Preview magazine, the weekly newsletter, high quality thought provoking features, in-depth stats driven analysis articles, exclusive interviews, and daily news.

There was also a drive to have more consistent coverage of the three types of QSL news, which are: football news, league management news and community news.

Radio
The QSL’s Local English Media Team also brought on board a new initiative whereby the QSL was featured on Qatar Foundation’s weekly radio sports show (World of Sport).
 
Social Media
Last season our official social media channels doubled and later tripled in followers and likes as well as QSL news appearing on new platforms such as Flickr, Instagram, You Tube, Snapchat and Periscope. On Facebook in particular the QSL broke the hundred thousand friends mark.
 
The QSL also ran a number of competitions last season using various social media platform and was able to officially verify the QSL’s Facebook and Twitter accounts also. 
 
QSL TV
Over the summer the QSL has been busy putting together a team which will oversee the implementation of our very own TV show which will be known as QSL TV. It will be a 5 minute web-based show, highlighting the Qatar Stars League, the clubs, and the players. It will be disseminated through social media and You Tube and will be available in both languages. There will be interviews, fun features with players, team news and match highlights.
 
The aim of the project is to increase fan engagement and hopefully have more fans going to the stadiums on a regular basis.
 
Commercial Department
The QSL’s Sales Department saw many positive steps taken to improve the core business. The Sales Department delivered ticketing and match day operations for 185 matches last year which resulted in a record number of spectators at QSL matches, 264,167 to be exact.  
 
This year will see the ticketing team devolve more ticketing autonomy to the clubs and only attending matches to support if crowd numbers pass a certain pre-agreed amount.

Football Rewards, the QSL’s loyalty programme continued to grow with 50 great partners and over 10,000 members signed up to benefit from the programme. 

Qatar Airways has once again agreed to partner with us to supply Qmiles and this year the QSL will seek to audaciously grow the number of partners, members and raise the profile of the QSL’s loyalty programme known as Football Rewards across the country.

This year the QSL’S Sales Department will have LED advertising boards in all stadiums, a first for the QSL and the region. 

The QSL has also just recently broken the record for Season Cards sold and the season hasn’t even started yet.

The QSL Commercial Department will also be seeking to bring on new commercial partners, introduce new revenue streams and create new merchandising platforms for the QSL. 

QSL Match attendance
Last season the QSL’s Commercial Department worked with its 14 member cubs to create tailor made marketing plans which required each club to deliver at least two “featured games”, thereby engaging more with communities and partner schools in the local catchment area of each club.

Competitions and Football Development
The Football Development Department constantly aspires to support the QSL football clubs to improve the quality and standard of football in Qatar. With this in mind the department has signed technical support deals with two worldwide recognized football data analysis companies, Prozone and Wyscout respectively. This has been done in order to contribute the development of Qatari player’s performances throughout the season with rich data which can be analysed and acted upon by the clubs.
 
Prozone, an English based Sports performance analysis company started working with the Qatar Stars League back in 2011, and last season recorded and analysed 182 League matches, 3 Qatar Cup matches and 15 AFC Champions League matches.

It included analysis on players, technical indicators, physical indicators, tactical analysis, video and animation. Each club has one expert Performance Analyst assigned to them by the QSL to support the technical staff in monitoring and analysing the games. In every training session player’s performances are also monitored by a GPS system which was introduced last season to all QSL Clubs. 

Wyscout an Italian based company signed an official deal with the QSL last season. Each QSL football club has 2 licenses which enable the club’s management to monitor videos and technical data of more than 273.000 players across 30,000 Teams in 80 countries in 150 Championships including the Qatar Stars League with info, videos, action by action analysis. Statistics are available online 24/7, which is a powerful tool to have at any professional football club. It is also useful when clubs look to buy new players; they can access the database and see videos from all over the world. 

Summary of improvements
Ticket sales, social media engagement, and new Football Rewards members all increased last season. The number of children entering the QSL’s school programmes also went up, as did the QSL’s media coverage and exposure.
 
Aims for 2015/16 season
·         Enhance the QSL’s digital platforms
·         Create exclusive and engaging content on a frequent basis
·         Improve community engagement with higher quality activations across the country
·         Improve ticket sales
·         Improve competiveness of the league
·         Increase number of Sponsors