The Super Bowl LVI champion Los Angeles Rams might call SoFi Stadium home, but right now the real action is taking place in the team’s new virtual space.
Earlier this year, the Rams launched a year-round virtual venue. Dubbed the Virtual Rams House, it’s the first virtual venue in the sports industry, offering fans, corporate partners, and other stakeholders an online space to engage with the team.
Built by event tech company 6Connex, the virtual environment allows fans to connect with each other via community chats on game days, debate on discussion boards, and more. Think Reddit threads, Facebook groups, and Twitter chatter—but in a much cooler setting. In 2021, 6Connex and the Rams entered into a five-year partnership. As part of the partnership, 6Connex has branding and signage at SoFi Stadium during Rams home games and sponsors a content series released throughout the year.
According to a study on engaging sports fans year round, conducted by Deloitte, more than 60% of fans said that having a great “year-round experience” would make them more likely to be more engaged with the team in the coming season, and 55% of fans said that it would make them more likely to purchase a ticket in the future. So it makes business sense that the Rams would want to tap into that interest.
“Our STMs [season ticket members] and partners are a very engaged group, and we wanted to take the way we were engaging with our most loyal fans to the next level,” said Chris Edwards, Los Angeles Rams’ director of strategic and international partnerships about the decision to build out the virtual space. “When we first connected with 6Connex, we were enthused with the creativity of their platform but also their willingness to customize the environment in our vision.”
The Virtual Rams House features a lobby, which displays all of the critical navigation and signage to help at-home visitors orient themselves.Screenshot: Courtesy of 6Connex
- Fan Caves take season ticket holders to their seat sections, which mirror the sections of the actual Stadium. This room allows them to engage with their section neighbors as if they were at the stadium, fostering communities within the larger Rams fanbase.
- The Film Room is an area where the team can share presentations and videos and host fireside chats with their fans.
- The Draft House is where the Rams can share information about their draft picks.
- And the Community Lounge is an area for fans to gather, engage in a public chat, and network with each other.
Fans are also able to network by engaging in one-to-one chats and creating their own group chat or video chats. “As far as functionality, we see the environment evolving to incorporate AI in the navigation. This will allow for better communication targeting, as well as increase opportunities for additional engagement between the Rams and its fanbase,” said Luiz Martins, 6Connex’s chief marketing officer.
In addition to the continued evolution of the current features, the company aims to “allow the Rams' sponsors to leverage the environment for their own purposes, such as meetings, marketing activation opportunities, branding, etc.,” Martins said.
Edwards added that the team continues “to integrate partners into the Virtual Rams House in authentic ways. Partners can have a visible, virtual presence in the environment or they can use the Virtual Rams House to host unique events for our fans and their customers.”
Fan Caves take season ticket holders to their seat sections, which mirror the sections of the actual SoFi Stadium. This room allows them to engage with their section neighbors as if they were at the stadium, fostering communities within the larger Rams fanbase.Screenshot: Courtesy of 6Connex
Martins said that 6Connex is in talks with several other pro sports organizations to create similar environments.
“From positioning a new physical venue and allowing sponsors to see what their physical in-venue signage will look like well before the arena or stadium is ever built, to sharing what the view will be like from a specific suite under consideration by a sponsor, to navigating a 3D model of specific stadium areas, to giving fans the opportunity to enjoy a second-screen experience, our technology can help many professional sports organizations deliver a unique virtual experience to their fanbase.”
