Those of you that have ever been to a stadium in Greece will know it's probably not a place you'd choose to take your kids to. Violence, verbal and physical abuse, swearing, and -- as if that wasn't enough -- poor entertainment value! There are certain efforts to improve things around stadiums here, but they are still few and far apart...

What you get in a stadium largely varies from country to country around the world. Some share our problems, in others you can truly go and enjoy the show as a spectator.

In such countries, stadiums are ideal places to run proximity marketing campaigns. You have both lots of people there, and also relevant content and services that these people want (they might not know they want them yet, but that's part of our job, isn't it?).

It's an ideal match that still remains to be taken advantage of in most parts of the world, mostly because the marketing departments of the companies responsible for running the stadium are still unaware of the vast number of options they can offer their spectators.

The latest example of a good service for stadiums I came across was the one in the article below:

But there is that 1% of the time, where other people in the crowd disrupt and sometimes completely ruin the experience for you and your family.

For some, we imagine, it is bad enough to make them never want to return.
Some of those things include:

• Excessive drinking leading to obnoxious behavior
• Cursing (especially in front of young children)
• Smoking
• Fighting or aggressive behavior
• Throwing food or other objects
• Sitting in the wrong seats & constantly moving around

In the past, if you were lucky, stadium personnel were within shouting distance.  However, in most cases the only way to report these issues was to get up out of your seat and find someone to help you.  In the amount of time it took you to get help, the situation may have already gotten much worse. Sometimes it even made the situation worse, because it was obvious that you were the one that alerted stadium personnel, even thought you were well within your rights to do so.

Well no more. You can now instantly and discreetly alert stadium personnel to any of the above issues and more, by simply sending a brief text message. Within seconds, your message is received and stadium personnel can monitor and quickly respond to the problem. They can even call you or text you back if they need further information from you.

Got a medical emergency? No need to get up out of your seat and look for help. Simple send a text and stay with your injured or sick party.

This is just one of a whole range of services that can be offered in stadiums, and I know from my own experience, that stadium marketing directors are bound to find such services interesting in more than one ways, and hopefully worth investing in -- as long as they can understand what it is that is being offered to them.

I've also written a couple of articles before, about other mobile marketing campaigns in stadiums, in case you're interested:

• Real Sporting Bring Bluetooth To Stadium (Sep '08)

• Bluetooth Marketing in (More) Football Stadiums (Nov '08)

• SMS Complaints Service in the Super Bown XLIII (Jan '09)