March Madness Organizers Are Pros At Managing the Insanity

When March rolls around each year, sports fans come down with a special kind of basketball fever that is affectionately known as March Madness. Millions of fans tune into one of the biggest sporting events on the planet as college basketball launches into its' annual ritual of crowning a champion. But as thousands of fans file into arenas across the country to watch the games in person, the event organizers are dealing with the logistics of handling of the largest and most diverse tournaments in existence. For them, March Madness can have an entirely different meaning, one where coordination and timing are more of a focus than any last second buzzer-beater.

March madness features basketball games in different locations all over the country, but even as dizzying as the prospect of multiple teams playing in the same arena over a few short days, is the prospect of the legions of fans for the various teams that parade in and out of the stadium depending on the game. Fans of specific schools will be seated together, and often even the digital signs behind a group of seats will be changed from game to game.

To manage this complex feat of fandom, event planners utilize several methods to keep everything running like clockwork. Of course, early reconnaissance is vital to learn as much as possible about the specific teams that will be attending and what their fan bases will be expecting.

Event coordinators also can leverage arena management software to manage the extrapolated schedules of the facilities, such as meeting rooms and luxury boxes. Additionally, arena management software can handle document management, CRM and the ever-important scheduling of staff, which becomes immensely important as the tournament games require peak staffing levels at several different times over the course of each day's games.

Coordinators can reach out to the planning staffs of the individual schools as well. Often these institutions already have experience with their own fan bases, and they generally manage ticket distribution and communication within their alumni as well as those who travel to root for the team. With several teams descending on a single location, it is crucial to pull in as much outside support as possible, and the college staffs are specialized in a way that can make them extremely beneficial.

Using advance planning, arena management software and reaching out to the attending institutions, event coordinators use every tool at their disposal, in the hopes of making Mach Madness a little less crazy and allow the fans to focus on the games, not the surrounding arena.