Wizard of Ads Partners

By Sonya Winterbotham

Sponsorship shouldn’t be one way traffic of your dollar sign.  It’s advertising, and R.O.I. must be justified, but are you doing everything you can to make it work?

Case Study No. 3:-    XXXX Gold – Beach Cricket – Summer 2007.

It’s already taken… the sponsorship deal you want… Do you turn around head down, tail between your legs and scurry back to the office for an afternoon of self pity?  Or do you reinvent the wheel – to suit yourself?
 
XXXX Gold is Lion Nathan’s biggest volume brand – it pretty much owns the mid strength beer market… but the bullets in this category are always flying.  So when XXXX Gold was looking to align itself with a big sporting event over summer (peak period for beer sales) and all the Cricket Australia related events were sewn up with Foster’s brand VB… XXXX Gold designed their own event.

XXXX Gold approached marketing and event companies to develop a beach cricket concept from scratch.  Now if you’re already familiar with XXXX Gold’s advertising you’ll know it brands (very broadly) to a 35+ male market… guys that grew up with AB captaining Australia, the lanky legs of Curtly Ambrose playing for West Indies and Graham Gooch at the helm of the Poms.  So XXXX Gold recruited these legends of the game for a bit of fun on the sand, playing a sport that unites the nation.  

This concept not only fit with their existing advertising campaigns, but allowed them vital coverage and press normally associated with the big international events.  Fosters chose to call the idea “ambush marketing”, while others just call it – pure GOLD.

This wasn’t just a XXXX Gold sponsored event – this was a XXXX Gold initiative.  They invented their own sponsorship vehicle… one that received massive media hype with Channel 10 signing on to cover the event; and huge local response with ticket allocation (free to the event) exhausted within an hour of availability.

But the sponsorship and marketing went much further and was fully integrated across point of sale.  XXXX Gold released seven million cartons of product tagged with coupons to buy beach cricket merchandise, they also released limited edition “beach cricket” cans and stubbies; and designed a special event website with an online beach cricket game.

Inventing the event you want to sponsor is quite the risk - no proven results or success, just wading into the water to see if you can beat or at least compete with the others.  But the results showed that for the six months ending March 31 2007, XXXX Gold was up 7% YTD, ahead of category growth of 5%... and Lion Nathan attributes that directly to their risk taking sponsorship deal.

Granted… we don’t all have the XXXX budget, but when you open your mind to ideas and opportunity, even when all avenues appear shut, you might just find gold.

Anaconda adventure stores have found a match with their sponsorship of a series of adventure races… A sponsorship that’s seen the company take full ownership of the events.

Anaconda brands itself as “the adventure playground” – Australia’s largest outdoor and adventure warehouse.  The Adventure races are in perfect symmetry with their brand essence.  

These races are for tough outdoorsy athletes, we’re talking minimum 4 hours out on the course - swimming, paddling, bike riding, running… and it’s not pretty either – it’s rough tracks, dirt, sweat, the tough slog.  It’s Anaconda.  Anaconda isn’t for the pretty types… because sometimes when you’re adventurous you have to get dirty.

So the actual sponsorship part – is a no-brainer… this is synergy at its best - the glass slipper is a perfect fit.  But what’s so impressive about this sponsorship – is that Anaconda could have easily taken naming rights and left it at that… but instead they’ve turned this event into outdoor advertising.

Turn up to any Anaconda adventure race and the first thing you’ll see is the Anaconda mobile climbing wall.  Cool… they’ve taken the PEF (personal experience factor) from the store – yes the store has a climbing wall – and delivered this experience straight to their potential customers.  

Every competitor wears an official Anaconda racing bib, complete with their racing number.  At most other sporting events the cheaper option is just to supply the athlete with a cardboard race number pinned to their shirt – no room for brand colours or naming rights there, and even if there was, the cardboard gets ripped off and tossed in the bin post finish line. In contrast the bib is made to be a souvenir – a reminder of competing, a reminder of completing, and a reminder of Anaconda.

The finish line – where all the action happens is a sea of orange and black – Anaconda colours.  Anaconda supply the marquees for registration, merchandise – you name it and the Anaconda flags are flying everywhere.  The event co-ordinators (not Anaconda staff) are all supplied with special Anaconda “race official” shirts – more branding.  And if you really want to remember the race – you can always buy some official race merchandise – yes Anaconda in conjunction with a sports clothing company design race gear specific to these events.

Then when you think you’ve got all the Anaconda you can handle there’s this guy… Anaconda Man.  He’s the super hero of adventure – black tights and an orange cape… kids love him and I think a surprising number of adults just want to be him.  

The point is we all know branding is a powerful thing… How big a role it plays in your sponsorship deal is up to you… You can make it as big an adventure as you choose.

 

PS. Did you read Smart Sponsorship - Case Study No. 1 NRMA? 

 

 

They were looking to make friends and money across the border… who would have thought a football team could introduce them to the locals?  But it’s worked for NRMA.

In 2004, NRMA (predominantly a NSW/ACT based insurance company) signed a sponsorship arrangement with NRL side Brisbane Broncos in a bid to romance Queenslanders.  For the past three years South East Queensland has opened their hearts to the insurance giant and watched them capitalise on a seemingly misfit sponsorship.

Let’s be honest what does football have to do with insurance?  Very little unless a big tackle reminds you to renew your hospital cover.  If it was car insurance and you sponsored Bathurst… it might make more sense.  A home insurer might see value in sponsoring a real estate show… but a football team?  Well I guess most people need some type of insurance, footy fans or not… So if you have a product most people need – you don’t need a perfect match for sponsorship to work – you just need to work it to your advantage.

This is exactly what NRMA has done - Before the handshake was complete NRMA adopted Bronco’s colours, recruited players and fully incorporated their sponsorship into advertising strategies.  Smart alignment!  Now remember, up until this sponsorship deal – most Queenslander’s considered NRMA to be a southern “invader”.

First came the colour change – In New South Wales the NRMA logo is blue – their state colour.  Having signed the Broncos sponsorship, NRMA swiftly changed logo in Queensland to maroon – not only an official colour for the Broncs, but also the state colour – already the integration and localisation had begun.

Smart decision number two – let the players sell the brand.  Bronco’s stars Darren Lockyer, Shane Webke, Carmichael Hunt, Tony Carroll and others all signed on to appear in a series of TVC’s promoting NRMA.  A tongue-in-cheek style campaign played on the stereotype of a typical “footballer” and married their sponsorship deal with the product beautifully.   This is the beginning of brand acceptance… suddenly this brand is gaining local (Queensland) credibility, and they weren’t taking themselves too seriously which is kind of a Queensland motto.
 
Smart decision number three – proving you are a “Queenslander!”  NRMA used a series of press campaigns to congratulate/support/promote the Bronco’s home games during the NRL season; and they weren’t shy in turning this into an all out war with the NSW teams to prove their allegiances lay north of the border.

This campaign has worked two fold for NRMA… Boosting brand recognition and acceptance in a state where there’s very active competition from strong local brands like RACQ.  And it’s boosted the value of their sponsorship.  NRMA bought a “platinum” sponsorship deal along with many other companies… Then there’s Ergon Energy – the company that paid a premium for naming rights.  But if you ask any South East Queenslander who sponsors the Broncos – I guarantee you will hear a resounding NRMA or Norma – but that’s another story!  Let’s just say NRMA has found a way to kick goals with sponsorship.