Red Bull gives Felix wings

Red Bull firmly have their foot within extreme sports, showcasing their newest project on Sunday night with Austrian-born Felix Baumgartner free-falling 24-miles above the earth's surface. 

Felix Baumgartner pushed the boundaries of human limits by pioneering a new world record for the highest ever sky-dive. The jump involved a 3-hour journey in a stratospheric balloon before jumping out at over 120,000ft above the earth's surface where he reached terminal velocity at over 700mph. 

The world famous jump

It actually took the brand over 6 years to create and develop this idea, which included the world's leading minds in aerospace medicine, engineering, pressure suit development, capsule creation and balloon fabrication. Needlessly to say, it was a ballsy attempt by Felix with rumours that there was a 30s delay on the live feed in case they needed to cut the stream in the event of the worst happening. 

However, the fact that it was a brand initiating this madness is even more ballsy - most brands would have a coronary at the thought of an untested event which risked human life, but this is just part of every-day for Red Bull. Their strategic sponsorship and co-creation of extreme sports aligns with their current brand values of re-vitalising your body and mind and their apt comms positioning of 'Red Bull gives you wings'! 

Twitter conversations took off

This event showed the increasing popularity of content creation as oppose to a sponsorship badging exercise. In fact, Red Bull is a leader within this area as they were the first brand to move from sponsoring an F1 team to actually buying their own - a move which has proven to be very successful, especially in light of Sebastian Vettel's recent win in Korea. 

Creating your own content allows you limitless opportunities in terms of developing something newsworthy. The Stratos stunt alone triggered 3.1m tweets, 8 million tuned in to watch the event live and according to Forbes it generated tens of millions in global brand exposure. 

This clearly gets people engaging with the brand but does it shift enough cans? Only a sneaky-peek at Red Bull's sales data after an event like this would be able to show us how much it drives people to buy their products.

All in all, Red Bull is certainly leading the way in terms of innovative and mass engaging content, however, they have set a high bench mark - not only for other brands, but even for themselves!

Well done Felix!

@mecaccess @rebeca6gonzalez
www.mecaccess.com

Olympic ambush

Since the announcement in 2005 that London was going to be the Olympic hosts for the 2012 games, brands and business were biting at the bit to know how they were going to capitalise from it. With the lead-up to the games and after the official national sponsors were announced in 2007, many legal restrictions have been developed in order to stop unofficial brands from associating themselves with the games through their marketing communications. A local Stratford cafe preempted the arrival of the games by naming his cafe 'Cafe Olympic' post the 2005 announcement. Subsequently he was asked to change the name of his cafe due to legal restrictions around the word 'Olympic'. Needlessly to say, he has probably done better off the back of the publicity which surrounded this story.

The newly renamed 'Cafe Lympic'

Ambush marketing is a hot topic for LOCOG at the moment and is defined as; a marketing strategy where advertisers associate themselves with a particular event without paying a sponsorship fee. Although, the term conjures up images of camouflage men running around in combat doing surprise attacks with branded paraphernalia. It comes about as the Olympic committee try desperately to protect and please their official sponsors of the games. As a result, there have been many articles around the legal restrictions of businesses using Olympic signs, logos and the like, which is clearly outlined  in the 'Olympic rules'; of which, rule 40, uses the term 'ambush marketing' 7 times! 

Rule 40 is essentially the LOCOG 'black-out' period, where non-official sponsors of the games are not allowed to use any Olympic athletes in any of their marketing communications. Any brand found in breach of this may be subject to a fine, as well as the athlete being banned from the Olympics or disqualified from their Olympic accreditation. The restrictions on the black-out are so tight that official sponsors have to request permission to use any of the athletes within their marketing communications during this period. LOCOG have provided this very 'useful' illustration as to what marketing communication is acceptable;

The well illustrated 'black-out' Dos and Donts

Somehow, though, it can become a bit 'obsessive' when it comes to determining what is classified as 'ambush marketing'. Currently, no branded products are allowed to be brought into the Olympic village, but how far does this go? Your clothes? Your bag? Apparently yes. Lord Coe, chairman of LOCOG said in an interview that if you are seen wearing a Pepsi t-shirt, you may not be allowed to enter into the Olympic village but you may be able to get away with wearing Nike trainers. He further went on to say that there are restrictions on "any objects or clothing bearing political statements or overt commercial identification intended for 'ambush marketing'". This contradicted the initial statement of LOCOG who said that people visiting the venue can wear what they want.

Nike 'Olympic' campaign

These rules and restrictions have been about since ambush marketing took center stage in the 1996 Olympics, when Nike had given out branded Union Jack flags to fans visiting the stadium in an attempt to ambush the official sponsor 'Reebok'. However, Nike's clever marketing campaign during the run-up to the 2012 Olympics but before the LOCOG 'black-out', meant that they came out as the top brand people associated with the Olympics despite them not being an official sponsor. 

This shows that the power of the Olympic logo and slogans are not that powerful after all! Therefore, as true in all sponsorship, a 'badging' exercise does not achieve cut-through - it is how you engage with your consumers on their emotional level which will get you the association. 


The premise of the restrictions put in place to prevent ambush marketing are completely justified considering the games would not go ahead without the support and financial backing of the official sponsors. However, due to the pressures put on by official brands, LOCOG have become a tad overzealous and paranoid as some of their public comments and statements around the matter seem rather ridiculous. The restrictions are becoming so tight that it is affecting local businesses who not not trying to make money off the Olympics rather just trying to get into the spirit of the games. Essentially, LOCOG should be renamed The Fun Police.

@mecaccess @rebeca6gonzalez 

http://www.mecaccess.com/

Scribbling sense #Squared

Did you know that people hire graphic scribblers to draw out dialog which is said live at meetings, discussions and presentations? They are hired in order to produce a visual representation of key points and messages from the speakers. We had Cara Holland, a freelance graphic scribbler, come in and show us how it is done. 

Example of Cara's work

Visualising dialog is very hard; you have to think about the core message you are trying to convey. In order to do this you have to strip back waffly paragraphs and sentences to one key message. Once you have your sentence or your key core message, you have to underline the key words you need to draw in order to depict the message. It is very easy to get carried away with metaphors and cryptic messages in order to release your inner artist, however, you have to keep it legible to anyone who is reading it. People have to be able to look at your drawing and immediately understand the message you are trying to convey. It has to be said that my drawing abilities are not the best but Cara reaffirmed that you do not have to be a good artist, in fact its not about art at all, it's about being able to communicate your message through drawings. 

Another Example of Cara's work

This workshop really helped us bring out our creativity but it also made us think about the messages we communicate to people every day. Suddenly when you are made to think about the core of what you are saying, the key messages are really quite simple and easy to find. Needlessly to say, it looks like a very fun job but one that takes a lot of experience and skill to become good at. In essence, it's like learning a new language. If you are interested in more of Cara's work her website is www.graphicchange.co.uk

My attempt at drawing my key message

Our constant companion #Squared2012

Mary Meeker believes that by 2014 there will be more people accessing the internet through their mobile than their desktops. The UK is certainly edging towards that way with 51% of the population owning a smartphone, 93% of which access the internet through their mobile phone. Mobile internet is certainly not going to replace the desktop, however, learning how people use technology within their day-to-day lives is crucial within the world of advertising.


I hear people often say 'this is the year of mobile' - which people convince me it is. However, people also say 'every year they it's the year of the mobile but it never is' which then makes me think, maybe it's not? Though, after a presentation by one of Google's top advertisers for mobile communication, I have been more inclined to think that maybe this is the year for mobile advertisement.


The mobile revolution was started by Steve jobs - he brought about the iPhone; the most internet friendly smartphone which changed the way in which we use our phones. This revolutionised the market, which later Samsung and Motorola fully embraced, bringing some tough competition to the market.


The mobile has now become our constant companion, something we check more than we think we do. In fact, on average our phones are never more than 80cm away from our body. This has brought about habits such as dual screening, where we watch TV with our devices at hand; 54% of people actively use their smartphone whilst watching TV.


We know how often people use their smartphones - think about how often you unlock your phone, it is something we use throughout the day at different touchpoints - but it's knowing how and when people use it, in order to determine whether to invest in mobile advertising. It's about knowing when to jump on the band wagon. For example, purchases made via a mobile phone usually have low price points - 28% of items bought via a smartphone include flights, concerts and trains.  This is where Easyjet were smart to develop an app which allowed people to buy and manage bookings via their mobile phone as a result of some valuable market insights of an emerging market. On the other hand, if you sell luxury cars, you might not necessarily sell your cars through the phone but you might direct them to a show room.

There is also a trend of brands creating apps just because everyone else is, but this is dangerous territory and could be counter-effective, The point of the app is for people to use it regularly, which statistics say that we only have maximum of 8 apps which we use actively. There are too many mundane apps which people do not use or want, but brands feel they should be there. If anything, we are starting to experience 'app fatigue', so making sure your brand is relevant for an app is absolutely crucial - they need to be engaging as that's why we have apps in the first place. 


I do feel however, every website should be mobile optimised - to allow people the choice to find out more about the brand via mobile should they wish too - after all, you do not want to be missing out on potential visits to your site. A staggering statistic shows that 40% of people will go to a competitor website if they suffered a bad mobile experience - so this in fact can tarnish your reputation as a brand! Despite Easyjet having a brilliant app, they still have not mobile optimised their site - which suggests to me that they have missed a trick there.


Some tips about how to go about mobile optimising your site are;
- Simplify navigation
- Be thumb friendly
- Design for visibility (use of colours, plenty of space, 3D effects)
- Make it accessible
- Make it easy to convert
- Listen, Learn and Iterate
(for a full personalised report - howtogetmo.com)


In all, mobile advertising is a great place to be, with some very strong statistics backing this up - but making sure you understand how people use their mobiles will help you develop a mobile advertising campaign relevant to your audience. You can get mobile statistics for free at ourmobileplanet.com.

'We don't pay for perfection, we pay for non-crapness' #Squared2012

In advertising, it is our job to make consumers aware of brands, services and products. It is the job of the brand, service or product to fulfill the needs of their consumers. But what makes a consumer need and want them? What makes the consumer decide on a particular brand, product or service?


Rory Sutherland, vice-chairman of Ogilvy One, came to talk to us at Squared about the irrational intelligence of behavioural design. I have touched on this previously in behavioural economics, but I am going to bring another theory to the table - the dual system theory.

Evans and Frankish believed that the brain has two systems - System 1 and System 2 (see table). These two cognitive spectrums of the human mind are in constant battle when we come to making decisions. The way to look at our brain is to think of a rider (System 2) on an elephant (System 1) - the rider thinks it has a plan but ultimately he is not in total control. All our feelings and motivations are determined by what gets filtered by the ‘elephant’ - this processing power is deeply uneven. In neuroscience, decisions are taken elsewhere in the brain, but the rational side of the brain tries to make post-hock rational sense of the decision. Ultimately, we are very bad at making decisions, ‘we do what is convenient and then we post-rationalise’.


System 1 is do to with our belief - it is our instinctive feelings. It has a tendency to see everything in context, whereby we see things in light of our beliefs; this is what Stanovich referes to as 'fundamental computational bias'. However, sometimes there is a need to decontextualise a problem in order to make more rational and logical decisions - this is the primary function of System 2. Businesses focus on talking to the rider, whereas marketeers focus on talking to the elephant.


Businesses often believe that you need to change the attitude of the consumers and this will change their behaviour. This is not necessarily true. The trick is to change their behaviour and then their attitude will change - if the elephant turns right, the rider will rationalise as to why it did so. Humans are very good at post-rationalisation, we always attribute success to a grandiose strategic design and not a fluke, it is this idea of proportionality, big effects = big causes.

However, some of the best creations come from small ideas. In evolution, there is no grand design, sometimes it is about changing smaller things overtime and seeing what happens - progress happens through little improvements. The invention of the generic coffee cup lid for all coffee sizes was a small solution yet it changed everything - we no longer have to search for the 'small', 'medium' or 'large' lid, the difference is in the volume size of the cup, not the rim. Yet, no one gets a noble prize for a coffee cup lid?


Many businesses and marketeers are not doctors in psychology, nor do they use it as a primary mechanic in making their decisions. Most successes and fundamental truths are stumbled upon by accident. Who would have thought that McDonalds, an average burger company, would become one of the most internationally recognised burger companies in the world? The truth is, people don’t want the best burger in the world, they want the same as the last one they had. McDonalds is standardised to military levels. It is pretty safe to eat something that you have eaten before - humans are socially heuristic, you eat what you know it safe. People pay a premium on reassurance - not perfection, just non-crapness. Essentially, brands are a proxy for non-shitness. Although our System 2 brain would massively disagree with this, our System 1 brain tells us 'it's OK, McDonalds won't kill us.'


We need to start thinking more heuristically, so that we can target the elephant more empathetically and strategically. Intuitive judgement is nothing to be sniffed at, some of the best chess players in the world play heuristically - not probabilistically. Rational thinking can cloud creativity, though this is not to say that an element of rationality should not be included when creating advertisements and campaigns. However, being arbitrary can very, very valuable.


Essentially, when designing advertisements and campaigns, think heuristically and target the elephant. You will win.


Rory Sutherland was one of the most inspirational speakers I have ever had the enjoyment of listening to. Follow him on twitter @rorysutherland.


Lesson 17: It is possible to be irrational but highly intelligent, as it is to be rational but illogical and stupid.

Don't give the consumer ''4", give them "2 + 2" #Squared2012

Jeremy Bullmore has to be the most interesting, intelligent and funniest man in media and we were lucky enough to meet with him on the Squared programme. He has written many books and has many awards for his work including an OBE, but the message he gave to us was inspiringly simple; do not give the audience 4, give them 2+2.


The message process in advertising was simple, you have the sender (client) - the medium - the receiver (the consumer). The messages were also simple; it was what the client wanted to say to their consumers and their consumers responded by acting on their message. However, this did not always work, consumers were not always aware of their roles as 'consumers'. Therefore advertisers had to think of another way around this.


Nowadays, commercial messaging has gone from a dialogue to a conversation. Although this has always existed, the difference is that the consumers have more methods of engaging in this conversation. As a result, brands are forced to be honest and forefront with their consumers as they have become much more active, as oppose to their former, more passive roles. What does this mean for brands? Well, they have a golden opportunity to learn about their consumers and use that information to further their brand, not all negative comments are necessarily bad - they are opportunities to learn. It also means they can engage with their consumers on their level through starting debates and conversations around the brand.


Brands can now do much more than just talk to their consumers. Agencies can advise them on what to say but not on their actions. Consumers will draw conclusions of the brand from their actions. Jeremy Bullmore recounted a flight with Air Canada; the pilot did a disastrous landing which frightened and shocked all the passengers and probably almost killed them. The pilot, instead of ignoring the situation, came over the loudspeaker and said:


"in all my 15 years as a pilot, that has to be the worst landing I have ever done"


The pilot empathised with them; he said what they wanted to hear at the right time. The passengers flew with Air Canada again. 


The actions of the brand can help consumers draw their own conclusions of the brand instead of what they try to message through advertising.  A comedian does not stand up in front of an audience and tell them he is funny. He has to say a joke, then the audience will make up their mind whether he is funny or not - it is their choice. This is the same for brands, they should let the consumers make up their own mind about them and draw their own conclusions from their actions. You can help them draw their own conclusions through triggers and stimulus which relate to the product. This encourages brands to strip right back to reveal the core of the product and simplify their message.

Taking this sign as an example, we have no doubt the eggs are fresh, the stimulus of the greenery, the placement and context of the sign allows us to reach to that conclusion. If you write the exact same message and give it a different context, you do not reach the same conclusion.

Nowadays, the messaging process looks a bit like this; sender - medium - stimulus - response. In order to get the best responses, you have to understand their needs and act in their best interests.


That's the point, the brands which are the most empathetic to a problem they are trying to solve, will prosper. 

In the words of Sir John Hegarty.... #Squared2012

Today we had an inspirational presentation. In fact, the word inspirational does not do it justice. Sir John Hegarty spoke to us today about why he believes we make 'now' the golden age with our ideas and creativity. In fact he thinks it is the best time to be in advertising and here is why...

Agencies can refresh conventional media.

In a technological revolution there is a creative deficit, people focus too much on the technology rather than what it delivers. New technology reinvents old technology. The trick is to use traditional mediums to generate a conversation or a debate and then add social to facilitate that conversation.
You can start a debate using the mediums in an incredibly bold and daring way to get people looking at it.The guardian advert made an old medium new through use of technology - it reinvented the way they spread news. It refreshed the newspaper industry.

Agencies can make small ideas big.

Creativity needs technology to expand - otherwise it’s just storytelling to each other. You can get ideas out there which you couldn’t before. Technology has allowed for our ideas to be leaked out and be as big as they can be instead of being constrained within traditional mediums. The hardest thing is getting your client to change with you, but you can change how a client feels and thinks by suggesting ideas on the side and encroaching them into the centre of your big idea. We should celebrate the fact that we are now in a world where we can get a massive debate going. The Homeless Hotspot in America campaign caused a lot of controversy - people were at first very cynical about it at first but it soon became accepted (http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-17345926). This idea which cost $8,000 to set-up, generated $620,341 in publicity value - proving that a good idea can be very valuable and can spread very, very fast.

Agencies creativity can be the media.

In some sense creative agencies piggy back the media and piggyback other peoples creativity. It is really challenging to come up with an idea which is the media itself and forces people to pass it on. We are in a creative deficit at the moment with the technology - it’s about understanding it. It's about breaking from the past and creating something new but how do you break something that has no past?

Agencies can persuade clients to be brave.

It has to be brave and bold to be passed on - creativity is the media. Instead of researching, why not put different video content on Youtube and see which ones connect and then develop that one? When they launched the new xBox they had a radical idea which was very hard to sell to the client. In fact, the client was never going to take it on - instead, they persuaded the client to put it on the internet to see what happens - in 3 days it got some 14 million hits - this proved the idea worked instead of doing ‘stupid’ research. If you see the video below, you can see why it was difficult to sell to the client.

Agencies can tackle growing social issues.

Advertising it not always about selling something but raising awareness. Barnados is a client which wanted to raise awareness about how they help troubled children. Advertising can be powerful and emotive which can help the awareness of good causes. This has to be one of the most emotive adverts I have seen in a long time.

Agencies can expand their influence with clients. Integration is now vital.

Integration has always been there but now it is fundamentally important to creating success. Relationships that you have with your client have changed completely. Now more than ever we need to use our contact points and creativity to create something profound for the client.

Agencies can invent products.

Agencies never make important decisions, they make recommendations. Suddenly when it is your money - you make important decisions. Agencies can look at markets which are lagging behind - 'ila' is a brand and range of products developed by an agency - they saw a gap in the market. Other products include Scootrix; personalised scooter plates and mobile phone pictures which can be sent as postcards. If you are in a world where you analyse markets and are being constantly creative, it only makes sense to take on those important decisions instead of just recommendations?

The future is creative. The final point. No question about it.

It is about having ideas and how you implement them and technology is a fundamental part of that. It liberates the creative process. This is why it is a fantastic time to be in an agency.

Just Add Words #Squared2012

In the wonderful world of search, brands which are investing in Google Adwords are facing an endless battle to make sure their brand comes up trumps when a consumer types in a related search query. The concept of Adwords can seem amazingly complex but can be understood through simplified definitions as reiterated by Einstein ‘Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler’.

I managed to have my own experience in setting up an Adwords campaign in order to increase traffic to a website, if you are reading this now, it has probably worked. These adverts appear either above the natural search results or down the right hand side. The whole concept of Adwords is that you produce an advert (be it text, picture or video) and bid on keywords which you think the consumer will type in when looking for your product, with the aim to get as high up in the search results as possible.

Google Adwords Campaign main screen
(Before any clicks)

A brand wishing to invest in a search campaign has to consider who they are trying to connect to, how they are going to communicate their message and how they are going to convert them. A brand has to fully lay out their marketing objectives before starting the process.The best thing about Google Adwords is that it is real-time - brands can monitor and optimise when things are working/not working and quickly react to external affects which maybe affecting searches for their product. Each campaign will be totally different from the next as product, budget and time are great influencers in the process of the campaign.

How Adwords Adverts appear on the page

However, it is not as simple as bidding on keywords and then suddenly your brand is on the top - there is a science behind it. The most important aspect is the quality score - this is a score that Google places on your website which will determine where you sit in the pecking order of sites. The quality score is essentially how Google make their money and it's what keeps their consumers using them as their primary search engine. There are 3 fundamental things which influence the quality score, these are the CTR, relevancy and landing page. The CTR is one of the most contributing factors to the quality score as it directly relates to the queries, keyword and the creative. 
The higher your CTR, will reflect on how relevant you are which will contribute to your quality score. Moreover, the landing page where you are sending consumers to has to be as relevant as the advert itself. It is a massive Google NO NO to use a fake and alluring advert to then send them to a completely irrelevant website. Therefore Google not only monitor the advert the consumers are clicking on, but also where you are sending them.

A good quality score affects your eligibility (whether your ad is eligible for the query), the position (how relevant is your ad related to the query?), the price (better quality score reduces the price) and the top slot (only quality ads are eligible to appear above the natural search results).

The quality score essentially is the money-maker for Google, so it is very hard to get to the top - many people who work in search strive for the highest possible quality score - but sometimes you have to accept the score you have even if you have done everything right and by the book.

So, how do Google make their money out of the quality score? Well, the more relevant the ad, the more the user experience is enhanced and therefore keeps consumers coming back. If the ads are more relevant and appropriate to your query, the more likely you are to click on the ad, thus making google money. The quality score helps eradicate spam as it is useless to the user and might stop them from using the engine. Imagine if you typed in a search for toothbrushes and you got bombarded with irrelevant spam that had nothing to do with toothbrushes? Useless, right? The fact that google also monitors the landing page, further ensures the relevancy of the search results.

So why would you use adwords search as part of your integrated advertising campaign? You are targeting your consumers when they are actively looking for you. You only pay when you get people clicking on your advert. Simple. If you want to see an absolute kick-ass search campaign, where the benefits of search are hugely exemplified, check out Converse Domainaition.  

Lesson 16: Quality scores are what make Google Adwords interesting

What exactly is Brand Awareness?

If there is one term you will hear again and again in the media industry, it's 'Brand Awareness' - but what does this actually mean? The term is so flippant and used so casually that I begin to forget what it actually is. Media owners are always the first to say that their medium will create 'high brand awareness' and it's almost as if upon hearing this, advertisers are meant to jump out of our seats and book them right there and then. Brand awareness, to me, is almost now a selling terminology which is not always used at the right moment and in the right context - at least people don't explain it properly, I mean what metrics are people using?


Brand awareness is essentially a marketing concept, used to represent how many consumers are aware of a brand - it's metrics are usually referred to as 'high' or 'low', but what exactly is high brand awareness? It is usually measured through surveys by way of brand recall, brand recognition and top of mind awareness. Looking more closely at these metrics; Brand recognition is when the brand and brand category are presented to the consumer and they say if they are aware of them or not; Brand recall is when only the product category is given to the consumer, who then lists all the brands they know within that category and Top of Mind Awareness which is done in the same way as Brand Recall but only the first brand answer is recorded (spontaneous brand recall).


Research has suggested that there is lack of consistency and stability in consumer responses, as their responses can be very attitudinal with lots of external factors affecting their choices. For example, people may recall your brand as you have a campaign running at that moment, but might forget as soon as it finishes. However, if most people say your brand(depending on how many people you ask, of course), even if its not 100% consistent - that is still high brand awareness right? I suppose the very best position for companies to be in, is 100% of all consumers in the world are recalling their brand unaided, both pre and post campaign.


However, what exactly do you do with this information? I suppose high brand awareness becomes an asset which needs to be maintained. The level of a brands consumer awareness is always taken into consideration when planning marketing campaigns and coming up with the idea for the creative. In terms of brand awareness, questions we ask ourselves are; how well do people know it? Can we afford to be more risky with the creative? Do we need to let more people know about the brand? Do people know about the brand but not buying the product/service? What is the level of their brand awareness relative to other similar products/service within the category? This basically allows brands to place ourselves against the competition and form a strategy based on consumers awareness, consumers attitudes and perceptions of the brand in order to change a certain type of behaviour.


Lesson 15: Challenge the next media owner who claims that their communication medium gives 'high brand awareness' - I would like to know exactly how they go about proving this and why they are better than the next.




Laurent, Gilles, Jean-Noel Kapferer, and Francoise Roussel (1995), "The Underlying Structure of Brand Awareness Scores," Marketing Science
Day, George S. and Robert W. Pratt (1971), "Stability of Appliance Brand Awareness," Journal of Marketing Research, 8 (February)
Dall'Olmo Riley, F., A.S.C. Ehrenberg, S.B. Castleberry, T.P. Barwise, and N.R. Barnard (1997), "The Variability of Attitudinal Repeat-Rates," International Journal of Research in Marketing

A try for Rugby Sponsorship

I am doing a presentation at work on Rugby sponsorship which I wanted to share my thoughts on. Just to give some context around rugby sponsorship; the Rugby Union Association was founded in 1871 and as the sport became more popular for both playing and spectating, it went professional in 1995 (compared to Football which went professional in the 1800s). This attracted a lot of brands to the forecourt, as sport sponsorship was not a new concept and this introduction of a new and popular game allowed brands a new source of sponsorship revenue.Tetley's was the first brand to nationally sponsor the game as rugby sponsorship became the ground for many alcoholic drink brands, mainly larger/ales/beer etc. At the time rugby sponsorship was very much new territory, however, 17 years later after it went professional a total of 80% of sponsorship goes on sports, with the Rugby World Cup being arguably the 3rd most popular and viewed sporting competition in the world. 

Sponsorship has developed so much more than a t-shirt badging exercise, where advertisers now activate the sponsorship through making brands engage with their consumers in a helpful and entertaining way - it is all about creating an experience around the brand and the game. 

So what is so attractive about Rugby Sponsorship for brands? It firstly taps into an audience which are usually hard to target, rugby reaches a wide affluent audience - 63% of which are ABC1, compared to the 55% in Football.  It is an emotional sport, you get fans when they are at their most engaged and arguably their most receptive - allowing brands to tie in with those passionate feelings. Rugby also has a large fan base, both in-stadium and at homes around the world. Rugby fans are typically fans of the game before they are the teams – allowing for more cut-through to focus on the support of the game rather than just the teams themselves.

Rugby sponsorship can take many forms as brands can sponsor; a team (e.g O2 for England), an athlete (e.g Jonny Wilkinson for Jaguar), a tournament (e.g Heineken Cup) and a League (E.g Aviva Premiership) - based on the budget you have, the relevancy of your brands and what you want your brand to be associated with. In terms of what brands can get out of it - you get high brand awareness from putting your brand and product into the public domain, you get brand affinity - where brand names are synonomous with rugby concepts and brand association - where your brand values are represented by the values of the game, i.e rugby is seen as passionate, brave and adventurous. Additionally, it allows brands to form a deeper relationship with their existing clients, staff and potential consumers through engaging them with content specific to them. 

Sponsorship is also perfect breeding ground for some good (and bad) PR. Brand ambassadors act as a good source of PR - it gets them and others to back your brand by engaging consumers on their level. If your brand ambassador is a popular and trusted figure within society, then those values will transfer to the brand, encouraging people to buy the product/service based on those values. However, getting people/teams etc to represent your brand can be a risky business as you rely on other people to ensure the image of your brand remains  positive - the famous 'bloodgate scandal' had a rugby team member put fake blood in his mouth to encourage what would have been an illegal substitution. This caused havoc in the rugby world as pictures of his bloodied shirt, sporting the airlines brand 'Etihad', stormed press headlines. This automatically links Etihad to 'bad play' with a lot of negative PR - however, Etihad supported the club throughout and even renewed their sponsorship with them, which begs to think that maybe negative PR is not that bad after all?

Social platforms are another great way to activate a sponsorship by getting people to talk about your brand and the game. Aviva Premiership and Heineken cup have branded Twitter and Facebook pages, reaffirming brand association with the games. Social platforms are brilliant for sharing rugby content, which are usually viewed well after the games have finished. YouTube is a perfect platform for this as highlights and game plays can be accessed through brand channels or user generated videos. An example of a successful rugby video is the New Zealand and Tonga Haka which got 9.1 million views and still counting! This is a perfect environment for brands as they continue to be associated with rugby whilst obtaining lots of media value. 

O2 for the England Rugby Team is a perfect example of how sponsorships can be activated effectively by ensuring consumers have an 'experience' with the brand. O2 have; 'Priority moments' where customers can get get access to other areas, win food/drinks at the stadium, and chances to win home match tickets; 'O2 Scrum on the beach' which is an opportunity for people to go and play rugby on the beach and meet England players based on their ethos of 'making rugby accessible to everyone'; 'O2 inside line' is video content of 20 episodes to see exclusive player interviews, player cam, match analysis and predictions; 'O2 touch' is the setting-up of community clubs of touch rugby and helping local people get involved - the website allows you to find the nearest club, how the game works, when they are on, who else is doing it etc… which shows they are really trying to get people into the game. They also have 'The O2 blue room' in Twickenham stadium which is based on the mantra that the experience goes beyond just watching an 80 minute game but playing on the fact that it is a whole day-out with friends - it gives O2 customers the chance to get a free beer, pie and to meet players within the comfort of the O2 tent. This focus on consumer engagement inside and outside the stadium allows to target all rugby fans and heighten their experience with the game and the brand - the activation will help O2 associate themselves with consumers who are passionate for the game whilst trying to get others involved and enjoying it too. O2 have also just renewed their sponsorship deal which will see them into the world cup 2015, a great opportunity to really get their teeth into activating an awesome sponsorship!

Rugby Sponsorship is essentially all about creating an experience around the game using your brand as a method of communicating this. When considering sponsorship, brand values must transfer and must fit together naturally with the game, atmosphere and people - otherwise, consumers just won't understand the connection and could create a negative bounce back. Finally, sponsorship must be activated effectively and used to it's maximum potential using all resources at your disposal - otherwise, just activating a badging exercise will not only be a waste of money but a complete waste of effort as people just won't care.

We are only just the tip of the Iceberg...

Our industry may be very important to businesses as we communicate their message to the people they want to say it to and how. However, understanding the whole business and their objectives is vital in order to get our job right. This can be seen as the 'Iceberg Analogy', where you must know about the whole Iceberg even if we only work at the tip of it. 

The bottom of the Iceberg is 'Business Objectives', where we understand how the business functions, what is important to them and what they want the business to achieve - this could be by way of profit, growth, ROI, shareholder value etc. 


The middle of the Iceberg represents the marketing objectives - this can be to influence sales, market share, price, product and distribution. Understanding the marketing objectives will help you gear your campaign to obtain these goals whilst keeping campaigns in-line with the business objectives.


The tip of the Iceberg represents the communication objectives (this is where we come in), which will involve influencing people's feelings, attitudes, opinions and behaviours. This will communicate the messages that fundamentally derive from the business objectives and which were refined and contextualised within the marketing objectives.


All three sections of the iceberg need to flow harmoniously whereby each section is in line with the one before - more and more agencies are focusing too much on the tip of the Iceberg whereby they lose sight of the fact that the communications strategies are used to deliver the key objectives of the business as a whole. Immersing yourself in the whole business will allow agencies to understand what they are trying to achieve, and in turn will create a better campaign in order to meet their objectives and deliver a healthy ROI. Maintaining a close and well-managed relationship with the client and fully understanding their business is essential in order to create strong future campaigns.

You choose first, then I will...

The whole concept of behavioural economics is the study of people and what makes them behave the way they do when it comes to their purchasing decisions. Marketing used to be governed by the classic economist view of 'people will try to get the most for the least effort', whereby people make rational decisions 100% of the time. It has come to light that this is not strictly true; people can make irrational decisions. Behavioural economics believes that decision-making is full of conscious and unconscious factors - which is why marketeers will look at many psychological ways to influence their audience to purchase their product. People are heavily influenced by what we think other people are doing (social norms) and how choices are presented to them (priming) - which is where the line between choice architecture and behavioural economics blurs. There are various ways of presenting choices to the consumer, which I will outline below;

Framing

This focuses on the belief that we make decisions on relative and not absolute information. I'll outline a basic example to prove this point based on a real American magazine;

If you go onto their site and see these options:

Online only - $59

Online and magazine - $125

People naturally go for the cheaper option as that is the most rational decision as you have nothing to base the value of the magazine on. In fact, 68% of people went for the subscription of 'Online only'. Now if we add another option into the mix:

Online only - $59

Magazine only - $125

Online and magazine - $125

The original options have not changed, but now the choice becomes more relative and people think that the third option is the better deal as it seems you get online for free. As soon as this other option was added, 16% of people went for online only and 84% went for the combined package.

Apple are also very good at this, no one realistically needs a storage device which will hold up to 140,000 songs of which you actively listen to, but as the choice is there, people will go for it.  

Apple's iPod Touch data selection

Additionally, in the restaurant world, owners will put a significantly expensive dish on the menu so that the comparison of the other dishes look cheaper and thus increasing average order value - a clever little trick to make you pay more. 

Automatic to executive decisions

Fly on the Urinal concept

People often repeat behaviours and some behaviours are done on auto-pilot. making people aware of their behaviours can help change the way you act. Which is why a lot of governmental campaigns will draw attention to your behaviour, so as by making you aware of it, you can change it. 'The fly in the urinal' concept has been proven to work - if you put a fly in the urinal, a man will look at it and suddenly be drawn to their behaviour, thus making them aim better and essentially not 'piss on the floor'. In the words of my manager ' it is why we see strategies which recognise our own habitual nature: in this instance trying to raise a decision to lock your care from the ‘automatic’ mind to the ‘executive’ mind, or unconscious decision making and conscious ones'.

Scarcity value

People place more value on things they believe are hard to come by or not a lot of. Diamonds are not allowed to come into the UK by the bucket load, there is a restriction in place on how many we can import - which is why people believe they are harder to come by and thus put this 'scarcity value' on the diamonds (this makes a lot of revenue within the jewellery business). Similarly, a Chanel nail varnish had a limited edition colour called 'Jade', as soon as they were hard to come by and celebrities were seen sporting the colour, the varnish were being sold on eBay for £85! Essentially, it is only a nail varnish where other brands offer very similar colours. 

Other scarcity tricks are things like 'closing down sales', 'private member club' etc, all tricks to get the consumer to place a higher value on the products - very prevalent within the luxury goods market. 

Social Herding

The Asch Test

We all think we are individual, special and unique but unfortunately this is not true.... it is in our nature to conform to social norms and do what everybody else is doing. The 'Asch test' developed in the 1950s was designed to do this (see photo), people were invited into a meeting where they were shown this picture and were asked which line A,B or C was the same size as the line on the left? It is C, right? Well they were told that they could only choose between A & B, even though it is quiet clearly C. Everyone in the meeting followed everybody else and no one was brave enough to go with what they thought intuitively, rather what everybody else thought. This is still very true today, looking at the army, people are being groomed to harm people and inflict violence which goes against our instinct, but they feel as everyone else is doing it, they have to too.

Loss Aversion

People place higher value on things they already have than what they haven't got. Confused? It is the £100 lost vs £100 gained. People have emotional value on things they own, so people put extra effort in preventing from losing things. An experimental study was conducted where people were given mugs, they had 1 cup of tea from the mug before they were asked 'how much will you sell your mug for?', whilst other people who had not been given the mug were asked 'how much would you pay for the mug?'. The people who owned the mug, on average, said almost double the cost than those who did not have the mug - and they only had 1 cup of tea from it!

Loss aversion techniques include: money back guarantees and introductory free trials - as people already own it, they don't want to lose it.

Chunking

People are more likely to complete tasks which have been broken down or made easier. Banks are notorious for creating rigorous advertising campaigns about promoting the 'easyness' of switching bank accounts with them - they will do it all for you and you do not have to do anything. This attitude wins them over a lot of new business as it simplifies a complicated process. However, people have to want to change in the first place which is another massive hurdle banks have to jump over as many people will only switch banks 1-2 times in their life. 

This is very basic overview of behavioural economics, but shows you how relevant it is in today's society. As consumers, we are constantly being analysed and studied as to our behaviour and what makes us buy certain products. There is so much information out there now, its scary! Soon hypnosis will be widely used and they can just hypnotise us to buying instead of relying on our own decision-making processes.

For further reading on this topic: 

Behavioural Economics: Red hot or red herring - IPA Publications

Freakonomics - Steven D. Levit and Stephen J. Dubner (I personally think this is an excellent book)