Prioritize the Factors Affecting the Existence of Empty Seats in a Football Stadium, Using TOPSIS

Spectators who attend in the stadiums to watch sports competitions are very important for every sports league. They are the most important capital for professional clubs, because they play a prominent role in the revenue for sports leagues by buying tickets of competitions in addition to they provide the identity to sports leagues. The purpose of this study was to investigate effective factors in the decline of the Iranian audience in the stadiums and watching football. The method of this study was descriptive analysis and it was an applied research in terms of purpose. The statistic population included all spectators of the fifteenth Premier League Football in the country. Cluster and quota samplings were used by considering of five regions of country. The TOPSIS technique was used to study participants’ weight. Carvalho, et al., (2014) and Jorgensen’s (2015) questionnaires was used in this study. The face and content validity of questionnaires was confirmed by professors of sport management. The internal reliability was calculated through Cronbach’s alpha (r=0.81). According to spectators’ idea, attractiveness factors had the highest important and economic factors were in the next rank. Factors encouraging had the least important. According to results of this study, it is recommended that policymakers pay attention to the attractiveness of stadiums environment and economic dimensions.