From a business standpoint, advertising isn't free.   There has to be an upside.     WifS/FOX has the numbers.   I imagine someone has/will sort thru them.   On the surface, HBD seems to be where it was when the last advertising blast went thru.   If that's the case, it did not work.    300 people joined at $5 a pop and virtually all of them left.   $1500 with little/no upside.     If advertising cost $2500, would you run another ad blitz?

Good point.  They will have to have the numbers to make that decision.  If only 3% of the 300 hundred who joined in October stayed for a full price season then yes it failed and I wouldn't want to try that again (spend $2,500) to only gain 9 full price users.  However if it is closer to 10% or 30 people then absolutely I would do it again since once you buy a full season you are really close to buying 10.  So it all depends on what the actual numbers are.

Yeah, I'm just working on the surface.  Seems to me that there were around 300 openings when football started.   There was a big burst of worlds filling, a big lump of "Need owner for abandoned team" in classified and, assuming the numbers are what's been posted in this thread, we're back to around 300 openings.   But it is true that the guy that re-ups is likely to be a guy who buys a four-pack, joins a 2nd world when he's comfortable and sticks around a few years.   There aren't a lot of owners with only 4-6 seasons before quitting altogether.   It's usually 1-3.

You guys should hug.

But yeah, in the end I simply think there are too many worlds. And a bunch of veteran owners with 3-4 teams have said to me recently that they are phasing everything out. Which means there are too many worlds. Which ultimately means, there needs to be some contractions.

Every world with openings (inactive world I will call it) also has at least a few long term owners in it who are not paying anything while the world is inactive.  WIS makes most of their money from long term owners who are in active worlds.  Therefore it is in WIS's best interest to have as many active worlds as possible by minimizing the inactive ones.  One way to do this is by merging worlds.  1 active world brings in more money for WIS than 2 inactive ones.  I think it is time to do 1 more merger.  I know it is hard to get all of the owners involved in a merger to agree on it but it really would be a good solution for HBD as a whole.

In the past the mergers have been 2 worlds combining into 1.  Right now we do not have 2 worlds with 16 or more openings.  If WIS can merge 2 worlds into 1, it should be possible to merge 3 worlds into 2 without all that much extra effort.  The messy comes in deciding which teams move into which divisions in the 2 new worlds.  A few may have to go from the AL to NL or vise versa.  Getting 64 owners to agree is probably not possible though unless you give them some incentive to do so.  Giving them credits ($$) would seem to defeat the purpose for doing the merger but if you look long term over several more seasons it would pay off for WIS. It would also go a long way to solving the problem of stalled out worlds because all of a sudden you have fewer openings which get the other worlds filled quicker as well.

They've done 3 into 2. 

With 11 public and 28 private worlds stalled out (inactive) right now, I think it is time WIS did a merger to decrease the number of worlds.

They will do mergers.   Someone else has to work out the details.   Owners in the worlds.

Mergers sound great.  Until season 3 when there are 7 openings as long time owners realize they have lost all the history and don't like the situation in the new world.  Then what?  More contraction?  Yikes.  

Bottom line is somehow (I argue long term sustained marketing campaign) there need to be more people who start playing.  Otherwise it won't be long before the game is a memory.   

I think there just needs to be less worlds.

hbd will pick up after football season/once baseball starts again. happens every year

SJ you are in 5 or 6 leagues that all have 35+ seasons of history.  How many long time owners will be happy to lose all the history?  Will some of them leave if there is a merger?  I would imagine so.

Mergers are great as a last resort for leagues that can't fill any other way, but to say we have 200 leagues now and if we just had less the unfilled league problem would go away is a simplification.  Who is forced to merge?  What happens when next year (as more people leave because the real issue isn't solved) we are at 180 leagues and the same issue comes up?  Would you expect another 40 leagues to merge down to 20?  At what point would WIS just cut bait in the manage down scenario. 

I agree that HBD will pick up some in another month or two.  Both naturally because of baseball season starting, and because it is somewhat like they try and advertise again.

Sometimes people just dont want to play anymore.  Life happens, less free time, less money, health problems.  People walk away from great teams and some people stay with the same lousy team in a world for 32 seasons.  

Posted by gotigers17 on 2/1/2016 3:27:00 PM (view original):
SJ you are in 5 or 6 leagues that all have 35+ seasons of history.  How many long time owners will be happy to lose all the history?  Will some of them leave if there is a merger?  I would imagine so.

Mergers are great as a last resort for leagues that can't fill any other way, but to say we have 200 leagues now and if we just had less the unfilled league problem would go away is a simplification.  Who is forced to merge?  What happens when next year (as more people leave because the real issue isn't solved) we are at 180 leagues and the same issue comes up?  Would you expect another 40 leagues to merge down to 20?  At what point would WIS just cut bait in the manage down scenario. 

I agree that HBD will pick up some in another month or two.  Both naturally because of baseball season starting, and because it is somewhat like they try and advertise again.

I'm not specifically saying this league or that league needs to go or merge. Hell, ask any of the commisioners in Clemente, Hunter, Griffey, or Kaline and they'll tell you I do a lot to help recruit in those worlds. I don't want any of them to die.

What I'm saying is that the total number of teams out there in all the active worlds exceeds demand.

I may be wrong, but I don't think that demand will magically increase after the Superbowl.

I also assume that many, if not most, HBD players play in one or more actual MLB fantasy leagues. Thats already 2 months away. I'm in 3 myself. If anything I would be spending less time on HBD then more.

I'm not saying they should do a dramatic merg-athon with all the stalled worlds right now.  Just take a small step and merge 3 into 2.  There already has been a world that offered to merge about 2-3 weeks ago so there are owners willing to do it now. 

Another option is killing one (1) world.  See my post under suggestions for details on how that could work.