Putting mics on the band kind of sucks, from my experience in road stadiums. I'd rather not do that - just don't play music and PA announcements over the top of the band and it'll be OK.
Literally every time GT has sent me a survey for the last few years, I've written them a paragraph about our hamfisted use of the AV system and how we could be using it for an actual competitive advantage. Things seldom seem to get better, and if they do improve by the end of the year, we forget everything at the start of the next season.
- Coordinate with the band. It's annoying to have two different songs playing at the same time. In particular, never step on the band playing White and Gold, Ramblin' Wreck, or the Budweiser Song.
- Have a good (and varied) arsenal of songs available. Rap songs (whatever the team is into, plus some classics), classic rock (stuff to get the old white people in the stands fired up), cheesy crowd pleasers (YMCA, Sweet Caroline, whatever). No Vanessa Carlton girly piano pop songs, even ironically.
- Operate the system competently. Fade songs down instead of stopping them cold. Don't skip from song to song in short bits.
- Pick your spots. Be aware of the game situation. Don't play loud music or get the crowd riled up when we're going to the line on offense. Do play loud music and get the crowd riled up when we're on defense. Watch the players and the sidelines - they can help you figure out what's warranted.
- Train the fans. You can train fans to get loud in key spots with PA announcements, stuff displayed on the video board, etc. If we'd introduced the "Yellow Jackets" thing early in the season, by the end we could get it going easily without the 30 second preamble. You can't go to the well too often or people start ignoring the requests, but even our fans proved in the last couple of games that they'll respond when the moment is right, given the right encouragement.
- Personally, I like what I've seen at various road stadiums where they do fun little bits with players and coaches (name that tune, trivia questions, etc.). Yeah, it doesn't make you any money, but it's fun and lets fans get to know the personality of the players and coaches a little more, and maybe makes you support them a little harder because you like them.
- Establish an identity. Our pregame is OK, but it lacks personality or any kind of "signature" thing - a song, a video, a cheer. (We don't have anything like Enter Sandman at VPI, or even the goofy but fun Cavman entrance videos at UVA.) We're trying with the "What's the Good Word?" thing, but we need to keep working on it.
We need to send people on the road to see how other teams do it, steal their good ideas, and come up with a plan for ourselves. I'd like to believe this could help attendance over the long term - you don't get the insane, bleachers are shaking crowd energy when you're watching at home, nor do you get the sense that you, as an individual yelling and clapping, can actually help your team win. I think a lot of our fans and students have forgotten what it can be like to be in a stadium that's going crazy and how much fun that is.
JRjr
