NBA teams

The House of Mouse Raises It’s Sports Brand…

February 27, 2010 by Joe Favorito · Leave a Comment 

Slowly, steadily, the good folks at Disney and ESPN have turned one of the brand’s more quizzical efforts into a mecca, not for characters, but for the character built through sport.

The Mascot Fills A Bigger Branding Role…

February 17, 2010 by Joe Favorito · 2 Comments 

So it’s the middle of winter and you have no idea who your players are…or you are having a terrible season and the trade deadline looms and you need to keep your brand fresh and identifiable.  What to do?  The mascot. Now more than ever, with brands looking for more ROI, fans looking for personal engagement and athletes time limited, the value of having a fun, interesting and marketable mascot is higher than ever.  Ben Hill’s blog on milb.com points out dozens of minor league teams that trotted out nascot’s for Valentine’s Promotions or other teams that have unveiled new or updated mascots during the last few weeks to keep their brand top of mind with consumers.  The New Jersey Nets worked not a player, but their mascot, into a Super Bowl commercial, while NHL teams are trotting out mascots while their players are away or off during the Olympic break.  Now that it is so important to engage the entire family, older alumni may not always work as a compelling interraction, and the ability to have mascots in multiple places works as a fund rasier and a brand awareness tool.  It is true that many major market or more established brands (the Knicks, the Rangers, the Cowboys, the Dodgers) have never embraced the mascot theme, instead relying on the power of their brand and all the pieces around it to drive interest.  However for those really needing relevance, the investment in picking the right looking mascot and then marketing him, her or it appropriately, has become as valuable as any other brand campaign and one that is not taken lightly.

A Cause Worthwhile…Athletes, Pols Step Up To Battle Childhood Obesity

February 16, 2010 by Joe Favorito · 1 Comment 

Big time sports and entertainment events draw big time advertising dollars. We all are more than familiar with the amount of sponsorship spent on Super Bowl, Olympic and NBA All-Star ads these past few weeks, and the payoff in exposure brands got with the largest TV audience of all-time for the Colts and the Saints last  Sunday. One of the biggest categories that support those events is snack foods.  People loved watching those Doritos commercials, and loved chowing down on bowls of the stuff as they were watching the game. The tailgate, the junk food, are all very much a rite of passage surrounding the great American sporting event.

Racing Back To The Top…

February 14, 2010 by Joe Favorito · 1 Comment 

As one looks for continued signs of resurgence in sports marketing…record viewership for the Super Bowl and the Winter Olympic Opening ceremonies, more global sponsors building activation platforms, increased and more diverse ad spending dollars being but forth from ‘09…perhaps one should look to racing as a bell weather.  Yes it is true that “The Great American Race,” the Daytona 500, will just beginning NASCAR’s season this weekend, and that the aggressive new launch of IRL is still a few weeks away, but there are continued positive signs which are showing that racing, one of the the industries hit hardest in the recession the last few years, may be returning to form in terms of viewership, attention and brand awareness. NASCAR has started awareness campaigns in theaters across the country, designed to promote the personalities of the sport, has enhanced their digital presence and begun a more intense program to get their faces out to the widest possible audience going into the season.

Who Will Win The Battle of The Busiest Weekend On The Sports Calendar?

February 11, 2010 by Joe Favorito · Leave a Comment 

It is a good thing the NFL moved the Pro Bowl to the week prior to the Super Bowl this year.  The game got much-needed attention and a record crowd, and won’t have to deal with being an after-thought on perhaps the busiest big event weekend on the sports calendar.  Yes a week after the Super Bowl became the most watched television event of all-time, three major events…the opening of the Winter Olympics, the Daytona 500 and the NBA All-Star Game, will all battle for eyeballs, sponsor return and casual sports fans within 72 hours. Who will win?  The battle has already begun.

For All The Segmenting and Shrinking, Broadcast TV is Still King For Big Events…

February 9, 2010 by Joe Favorito · Leave a Comment 

Maybe it was the bad weather that blanketed much of the Middle Eastern states, or the rain that hit the Western United States.  Maybe it was the allure of a quarterback who has been able to flourish as a marketing maven for brands like Oreo and Direct TV despite being in a small market.  Maybe it was because America wanted to see a team from a devastated region rise higher than the flood waters did that tragic August day.  Maybe it was because we wanted to see Betty White and Chevy Chase again.  Maybe it’s because football is really America’s game. Whatever the reason, it doesn’t matter.  The record crowd that tuned in…made even more amazing in this 30 second, HULU infused, Twitter possessed world…showed once again why we love sports as a release, and why the industry and the medium used to show it…broadcast TV…remains king to brands.

Can Vancouver The Brand Be The Biggest Olympic Winner?

February 7, 2010 by Joe Favorito · 2 Comments 

There has been much talk about Lindsey Vonn’s suggestive Sports Illustrated cover, Stephen Colbert’s great sponsor play, “The Flying Tomato” worrying about snow, Heather Mitts being a klutz and the Jamaican Bobsledders missing the cut, but can Vancouver the city and the region be the biggest winner in this year’s Winter Olympics? The coming events have not had the hype or hysteria that others Olympics have had, probably because of the lack of big name American stars and less promotional dollars, as well as the fact that this will be the first Olympics since the crash of the financial markets. The Winter Olympics are also never the huge casual fan draw that the Summer Games are, but they are still the first Games in North America since Salt Lake City, and may be the last ones for some time to come.  So can a city known for its beauty and with a well established resort as a host (Whistler) find a way to push itself into the consciousness of the American sports fan, the global sports fan, and with that the branding and event world with a successful games? Could the region be a great example as to how established areas, in addition to emerging ones like Sochi for 2014, use the Games to grow and thus justify all the cost spent competing to host a global competition?

NASCAR Goes To The Big Screen(s)…

January 31, 2010 by Joe Favorito · Leave a Comment 

As we near Daytona and the start of NASCAR 2010, it is good to see the brand is again looking for more ways to engage the brand, the consumer and grow relevance among the casual fan.  The latest offering is a program launching in  thiusands of movie screens across North America, the first of a series of “short” videos that will promote ties to brands, drive personalities of the drivers and hopefully grow interest among those who may not be yet on the NASCAR bandwagon and now may tune in or log on to catch more of the excitement.   Now it is not unusual for brands, or even sports brands, to reach out to engage the movie goer.  The New York Liberty for example, used the screens of Cablevision’s Clearview Cinemas to promote ticket availability and awareness, and the Women’s World Cup had a similar program to drive awareness.   NASCAR’s IMAX experience, as well as others shot in large screen format, have also tried to draw feans of cinema to a unique aspect of sport.  What is different here is that the videos are more of a long-term awareness push rather than a call to action for just a race, or a ticket buying experience or a tune-in.  It gives the brands featured, each worked carefully into the short, great ROI with a new audience, and also offers great opprtunity to use the shorts virally as well.  In a time when brands need that ROI and NASCAR, like all sports, is battling for the casual fan and the discretionary dollar, the reach to theaters looks like a very clean, snart approach and if it works will be copied. Start  your engines fans.

The Nets Keep Making Chicken Salad…

January 29, 2010 by Joe Favorito · 1 Comment 

You only worry about the things you can control. That should be the slogan for the Nets this year.  Their sales and marketing staff cannot worry about the injuries, the fired coach, the record losing streak, they just have to find a way to keep a brand relevant in a year of transition and uncertainty.   New owner, a Russian billionaire, new city and arena, first maybe Newark and then maybe, finally Brooklyn. To date, four wins…three of which have been on a full moon (I looked it up). Yet with all that, an argument can be made that the casual fan in the New York area may have more exposure to the Nets than all the other teams playing this winter in the area combined. In the last few weeks, the Nets marketing plans for a 4-40 team were featured in the New York Times, ESPN Magazine ran a contest to let a fan draw up a play and run it during a game, their dancers have been on countless morning shows and on and on and on.

MLK Day A Missed Branding Oppt. For Sports?

January 18, 2010 by Joe Favorito · Leave a Comment 

Monday is a National Holiday honoring the late Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.  It would seem a perfect time…NFL in full postseason, NBA and NHL gearing up for All-Star, college sports pushing ahead, the Olympics on the horizon, the holidays in the distance…for a brand or an organization to take ownership of the weekend, especially in the area of community service and philanthropy. Yes, the NBA does do a good job of playing during the day and looking at projects that serve the spirit of Dr. King well.  Yes, some NFL teams like the 48ers are doing community service events Monday.  However, as brands look to be more community oriented and find opportunities to partner on community programs that give back, there remains no national push.  Maybe it should not be the professional teams or leagues, who would find it hard to muster full support on a Monday in January.  Maybe it should be the NCAA or High Schools that should find a brand to turn the day into one where young athletes and coaches each give back in their community. Maybe it should be the announcement of a mentoring program by each or any of the leagues, with some kind of tie to Dr. King’s spirit. Maybe it should be MLS, coming off their draft and meetings last week, or the PBR, who just started, or tennis or golf, both looking for more diversity. It just seems like with the issues of elite athletes today, and the obvious need for brands to connect to the community, that this mid-January weekend would be a prime spot to reflect, connect and reenergize the spirit and influence that athletes can have, especially young people looking for role models on any level.

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