The Ultra Card story at NK Celje caught my attention for a simple reason: it is one of the rare examples where “digital transformation” actually looks like a coherent operating model.

I spend a lot of time around clubs that have plenty of tools and plenty of data, yet still struggle to answer basic commercial questions. Who are our fans, beyond a ticket barcode? What do they do on matchday besides entering the stadium? Which sponsor activations can we prove worked? Where do we lose people between a first purchase and a second one?

Tomaž describes Ultra Card NK Celje as the club’s central digital fan identity and commercial relationship platform. That phrasing matters. It is not a campaign. It is not a membership gimmick. It is identity tied to behaviour, across touchpoints, in a way the club can actually use.

From the fan side, the experience is intentionally frictionless. The card lives in Apple Wallet or Google Wallet. Fans can use it to enter matches, pay at club touchpoints, and get cashback on selected transactions. That is already a meaningful adoption lever. If the card only worked in one corner of the stadium or required a separate app flow, most clubs would never get it off the ground.

The interesting part starts behind the scenes.

Ultra Card connects ticketing, CRM, prepaid balances, cashback mechanics, food and beverage, online and on site sales channels, digital platforms, and transactional data into a single fan profile. In plain terms, it joins up what is usually scattered across five vendors and three spreadsheets. Every interaction then feeds into business intelligence, giving the club a consolidated BI view.

That is where the value compounds.

Once you can see behaviour across matchday and non matchday touchpoints, segmentation stops being guesswork. You can build segments based on actual patterns: frequent visitors who never buy F&B, fans who buy early and always top up prepaid, supporters who show up twice a season but spend heavily when they do. Those are segments a commercial team can act on without pretending that age or postal code explains intent.

It also changes what “relevance” means in fan communication. CRM and marketing automation often fail in football because the data foundation is thin. You end up with broad blasts because you cannot trust the profile. If a wallet based fan identity links transactions and behaviour reliably, personalisation becomes much more than subject lines. It can shape offers, timing, and channel choices in a way fans actually notice.

Sponsor activation is the other piece that stands out. Tomaž points to an affiliate driven future where sponsors play a central role and where BI ensures relevance and measurable value. That is an important detail. Sponsors do not just want reach; they want attributable outcomes. A system that connects fan identity to spending and engagement gives clubs a stronger language for partners: who the audience is, what they do, and what changed after an activation.

The vision goes beyond the stadium. Ultra Card is designed to evolve into a lifestyle layer that shows up in fans’ everyday lives through affiliate partnerships. If NK Celje executes that well, the club gains something many teams chase but rarely build: a continuous relationship model that does not reset every matchday.

This fits perfectly with how I think about CRM in football. Fans do not experience clubs in “channels.” They experience them as part of their routine, their identity, their weekends, their family life. Systems should reflect that reality. A unified fan identity connected to BI is one of the most direct ways to make that happen.

My takeaway from this interview is practical. When clubs talk about becoming more data driven, I always ask where fan identity is anchored. If the answer is “mostly in ticketing” or “mostly in the app,” the ceiling is low. NK Celje is building around the identity layer first, then connecting every commercial touchpoint to it. That sequence is worth studying.

If you work in sports CRM, marketing automation, fan data platforms, loyalty, sponsorship, or business intelligence, the Ultra Card approach is a strong reference point. It shows what becomes possible when a club stops optimising individual products and starts managing the fan relationship as a system.