Challenge:
This international sport federation found itself with tons of data, but no way to easily centralize and share it with sponsors or members. 

Solution:
Thanks to Domo, World Rugby can collect and share data ranging from revenue and TV ratings to game statistics and in-match metrics. 

Impact:
Domo helps World Rugby use its data to provide more sponsorship value while making the game safer and more entertaining. 

World Rugby grows the future of the sport with Domo.

While rugby has always had fanatics, those fans are now just as likely to be your grandmother, dentist, or neighbor as the burly guys at the gym. There are millions of players worldwide, while the sport counts over 500 million fans who watch from home or in the stands. With the return of the sport to the Olympics, record-breaking Rugby World Cup attendance, and the growing popularity of women’s rugby and rugby sevens, the action on the pitch has never been more popular. 

Behind this growth is World Rugby, the international federation responsible for overseeing the sport. Located in Dublin, Ireland, World Rugby works with 128 national member federations to hold tournaments and championships, improve player welfare, and make the sport more accessible. To do so, World Rugby uses Domo to leverage data so it can generate value for its players, stakeholders, and sponsors.

Game on.

As an international federation, World Rugby has data coming in from around the world through dozens of systems. Everything from ticket sales to game statistics to TV ratings and social media engagement analytics is brought into Domo to help staff understand its fan base and identify new opportunities for growth.

Faced with a growing need to better manage its data so it could improve reporting, World Rugby evaluated multiple business intelligence solutions. “We tested a number of different systems, and Domo was the best fit for us. Everybody in the business has been able to use it,” Downey said.

“User adoption of Domo has been dramatic, to be honest,” said Caroline Murnane, Business Intelligence Analyst at World Rugby. “At first, we would reach out to different teams to pitch suggestions or offer support. In the last 18 months, it’s completely flipped. These teams are now coming to us with ideas or dashboards that they have built themselves.”

Giving sponsors their money’s worth.

World Rugby brings in millions of dollars each year through corporate sponsorships. In turn, it redistributes nearly all that money to the wider rugby community to provide the income national unions need to grow the sport. World Rugby uses Domo to carefully track every aspect of the sport so it can provide the most value to sponsors, and thus the national unions it serves.

“When a sponsor supports a World Rugby event, they need to see what the return is on their investment,” said Downey. “It’s no longer just about getting tickets to a match. They want to achieve specific KPIs. Domo allows us to meet our sponsor expectations and prove ROI so they continue to help us grow our sport.”

With Domo Everywhere, World Rugby can instantly share data like match attendance, broadcast ratings, website traffic, and social media mentions with each sponsor so they can demonstrate how much engagement has been generated. Because different sponsorship levels come with different levels of support, each sponsor’s dashboard is customized to show how World Rugby is meeting its commitments. Personalized Data Permissions ensure that a sponsor only sees the data relevant to them, saving World Rugby from wasting time creating and sending individualized reports. 

“People expect information as soon as possible, not at the end of the season,” Murnane said.

Preparing rugby for the future.

In addition to improving sponsor value, World Rugby uses data to improve the game itself. Match statistics are collected and analyzed to understand game flow to help inform rule changes that can eliminate unnecessary time stoppages.

This not only makes the game more fun to watch but safer for players by reducing their time on the pitch. Player welfare is World Rugby’s top priority, making it one of its top dashboards in Domo. The Chief Medical Officer carefully tracks injury metrics to determine when it is safe to clear players to play, along with the impact of mitigation efforts on overall trends.

“We’re able to test what works and what does not work so we can make judgments about how to make the game entertaining while protecting player welfare,” Downey said.

Thanks to Domo, World Rugby is prepared to meet the demands of a fast-growing sport, allowing national unions to capitalize on the sport’s dominance in established markets like Australia and Ireland while growing its footprint in emerging markets like the US.

“For the longest time, we’ve been collecting data and storing it, but not making use of it to provide insight or drive decisions. Domo lets us now share that information with our national federations instead of just collecting numbers for the sake of it,” Murnane said.