Two reasons why A-League crowds have waned.

Who knows why the fans are turning up at the A-League. But here's a couple of reasons.

In the first three seasons attendances rose to 15,000 average per game presumably as people came to see what all the noise was about, FFA did some initial marketing and everyone wanted to be apart of something.

Then the crowds dropped; and although in Season 6 the standard of football is at it's highest ever crowds are still dropping. And here's the scary thought. How low can they go?

So here's the two obvious reasons why crowds aren't going.

How many supporters have been to your local A-League club since the first game of Season 1? How does the club know? It doesn't. All tickets are bought thru Ticketek and the emails, data profile of fans rest with that organisation.

Clubs only know their members but a club must be able to track who the 25,000 fans who turn up to watch Sydney FC occasionally are, which fans turn up on a Friday or a Sunday? Can a club somehow gain access to all the supposed football fans who play for a junior club?

They can't and therefore the clubs have no idea who to target. For clubs with small marketing budgets this would seem to be marketing lesson 1.

Surely aiming all your marketing budget, particularly if it's small, at people who have come previously and presumably enjoyed the winning feeling, must be the way to go.

Find out who comes on Friday or for a Finals game, where they come from and find a way to directly communicate with them even if they aren't members.

Secondly: Every game since 2005, and we've had some great games including Grand Finals, big crowds, talking points etc but the only people who can see them are the FOX patrons. So no fan of the game can hook in.

How would you expect them to go to a game if they've never seen the A-League.

Maybe we're only selling to those people who have already been given our media profile and if we are that is a very very small base, and unless they all return which they won't we are selling to a reducing number of possible customers.

But the thing is we don't even know who they are!