Why Fans Don't Open Your App

👋 Welcome back to Sponcon Sports, a weekly newsletter dedicated to sponsored content strategy in the sports industry! 

Everyone copied Snapchat Stories.
Everyone copied TikTok’s For You Feed.

But no one copied BeReal?

That feels like a miss, especially for sports.

Because the mechanic is about giving fans a reason to want to show up.

That’s exactly what most team + league apps are missing outside of game time.

I saw a great version of this come to life through the Snapback Sports AI Internship program.

As part of the application, candidates were asked:
How do you take their sports trivia app from 100K to 1M users by the end of the year?

Ahmed Bawla’s answer: Snapback Trivia Live.

A simple idea, built on BeReal’s viral 2022 mechanic:

• One question per day

• 10-minute window to answer

• First 1,000 correct responses earn points

• Real prizes tied to performance

From there, it layers in what actually drives scale:

• Daily questions tied to that day’s games

• Points based on how fast you answer (not just if you’re right)

• Leaderboards for visibility + bragging rights

• “Squads” so it’s not just only individual, it’s social

• A Claude-powered feedback loop to keep questions fresh and relevant

What makes this smart isn’t just the feature set.

It’s the habit.

You’re training users to show up every day, not just on game day.
You’re creating urgency around notifications.
And you’re giving people something worth sharing: whether that’s rankings, wins, or squad status.

That’s how you bridge the gap between games, off days, and the offseason.

We’ve already seen this playbook before:

Stories → Snapchat
For You Feeds → TikTok

This feels like the next one.

If you’re building (or managing) a sports app, this is a must-try idea.

In Today’s Edition:

• Open Rate Offense 🥚

• Kostner Casting Call 🚜

• The Avocado Hole ⛳️

🏊️ DEEP DIVE
How The New York Giants Drove Daily App Sessions

The New York Giants found a way to get fans to open their app three days in a row in early April.

That’s harder than it sounds.

Free agency has cooled off. The Draft hasn’t taken over yet. There’s not much pulling fans into team apps.

And yet, the Giants found a way to change that.

Ahead of Easter weekend (April 1–3), they launched a Cam Skattebo Egg Hunt inside their mobile app, presented by Bob’s Discount Furniture. Each day, a hidden egg was placed somewhere inside the app.

The mechanic was simple:

• Find the hidden Cam Skattebo egg each day

• Enter for a chance to win an autographed football + $250 Bob’s gift card

On paper, it’s straightforward. What stood out was how intentionally it was executed.

What worked (and why it matters)

1. They guaranteed distribution before the campaign even started

This is the detail most teams overlook.

The morning of launch, fans got a text message with a direct link to the app.

No guessing. No hoping people stumble into it.

They pushed fans into the experience.

Once inside, the promotion lived above the fold on the home screen for all three days.

That enhances visibility into controlled distribution:

• Every app user sees it

• Every session reinforces the sponsor

• Every visit compounds impressions

If you’re Bob’s Discount Furniture, that’s the kind of foundation you want to buy.

2. They turned discovery into behavior, not just a feature

This wasn’t a static banner or a one-click entry.

Fans had to search. It was interactive and fun.

The eggs were hidden across:

• The “More” tab

• The schedule page

• The Bob’s-sponsored Giants TV section

That last one is a nice touch.

They didn’t just include the sponsor… they placed the experience inside the sponsor’s environment.

Now you’re generating awareness and intentional interaction with branded inventory.

3. They created a reason to come back during a dead period

Early April isn’t exactly peak attention for NFL teams.

No games. No urgency. Limited reasons to open the app.

This changes that.

By stretching the activation across three days, they created:

• Repeat app opens

• Habit-building behavior

• A lightweight daily touchpoint

And importantly…

It re-engages fans right before the NFL Draft, one of the biggest offseason moments on the calendar (stay tuned for my Draft breakdown on April 30th!).

That timing isn’t accidental.

4. The prize structure quietly improves lead quality

Sweepstakes are everywhere. Most are low-intent.

This one is a bit different.

Yes, there’s a signed football.
But pairing it with a $250 Bob’s gift card does something subtle:

It filters for users who are at least somewhat aligned with the brand.

That’s how you move from volume → qualified leads.

We’ve seen this playbook work before

The Nashville Predators took a similar approach during the 2025 holiday season.

They ran a “12 Days of Hockey Holidays” promotion inside their app, where a scratch-off game appeared as soon as you opened it. Each day unlocked a new prize, and entering required submitting your information.

Partners included:

• Omni Hotels

• Delta Air Lines

• Jack Daniel’s

Different execution, same underlying idea.

The experience was immediate, hard to ignore, and built around daily return behavior. And like the Giants example, it showed up during a time when attention is fragmented and harder to capture (vs NFL, College Football, NBA, Holiday Travel).

Where this gets interesting

Most team apps are still built like gameday-only utilities—sometimes just carbon copies of the team website.

You scan your ticket, maybe watch a clip, check a stat, and then you’re gone.

That model leaves a lot on the table.

The opportunity is in giving fans a reason to come back when there isn’t a game pulling them in—and more importantly, giving them a reason to keep coming back.

There are a few ways to do it, and we’re starting to see teams experiment in different directions.

• You can lean into activations like this one from the Giants and Preds, where fans are rewarded with access to exclusive prizes and experiences for showing up.

• You can go deeper on loyalty and reward behavior (not just spend!) over time, like what the Cleveland Cavaliers have built with Uptop.

• You can treat your app more like a network, building out exclusive content ecosystems a la The Arsenal.

• You can invest in it as a premium content destination, similar to how the NBA continues to evolve its digital experience.

• Or you can take a more gamified route altogether, something closer to Ahmed Bawla’s live, limited-time trivia concept (outlined above), where urgency and habit are baked into the product.

Different approaches, same underlying goal: give fans a reason to open the app today, not just on game day.

Because once you build that behavior, two things start to happen:

• You get a much clearer picture of who your fans actually are, not just that they showed up

• You create a channel where you can reliably reach them without depending on an algorithm to decide if your content gets seen

Both are incredibly valuable, not just for the team, but for the brands investing alongside you.

That’s where this starts to move from a simple engagement tactic to something that actually drives the business.

🔍️ SPONCONSPIRATION
Steal These Ideas

The Chicago Bulls teamed up with Jolly on a Pepsi-sponsored video where the British duo tried Chicago-style pizza for the first time alongside Matas Buzelis and Tre Jones. It’s a sharp move from the Bulls’ content team. Pepsi has been leaning into food pairing content across its sponsorships, and instead of posting this on their own channels (where the fit isn’t as strong), the Bulls let it live primarily on Jolly’s food-focused platform. The bonus? Access to a built-in, international audience while showcasing player personality.

John Deere nailed their MLB partnership announcement. They’re the presenting sponsor of the Field of Dreams game, so they went straight to the source, bringing in Kevin Costner to voice the announcement video.

At the Valero Texas Open, the 16th hole at TPC San Antonio’s Oaks Course is known as the “Avocado Hole.” So when Chipotle signed on as a PGA TOUR sponsor, they turned that detail into a fan moment, triggering a free guac offer tied to the hole.

With America’s 250th birthday coming up on July 4th, expect more partnerships leaning into Americana. Budweiser is already there. A bald eagle at the Houston Astros’ home opener, plus a feature in an American flag post the same day was on-brand, and hard to miss.

The New York Liberty made Ellie the Elephant the star of their Sunglass Hut partnership announcement. It works because it leans into what fans already know, Ellie’s fashion sense. If this was captured during the WNBA lockout, using Ellie is particularly helpful with restricted use of players’ NIL.

The NWSL’s “Pitchside with Pixel” series with Google continues to prove its value as an always-on platform. A good example: using it to spotlight the Denver Summit’s record-setting crowd for their first home match.

🚨 ICYMI
What To Watch For

Bulls Content Blueprint: Chicago Bulls VP of Content Marketing Luka Dukich joined Kaya Yurieff and Jasmine Enberg on the Scalable Podcast to break down how the team became one of the NBA’s biggest social brands, why YouTube operates as its own content pillar, and what went into the Jesser Kids Nation Game takeover.

Ticket Spend Trends: Ramp released a new economic report showing how corporate spending on sports tickets fluctuates based on team performance.

NFL AI: NFL IQ now features an AI assistant powered by Amazon Quick, giving fans a way to ask about team needs, draft prospects, free agency, and more [h/t Ari Entin].

Enjoy The NBA: The NBA is teaming up with creator-led media company Enjoy Basketball on a content partnership that includes an altcast on the NBA App and League Pass, plus a three-episode trivia show airing across the NBA App, NBA TV, and Enjoy’s YouTube channel.

TWIB Reboot: MLB has partnered with X to bring back This Week in Baseball, hosted by baseball creator Kait Maniscalco.