MLB and NCAA Baseball A Good Fit: It came out the last few days that Major League Baseball is looking into a partnership to help enhance collegiate baseball in a number of ways, including putting money in a scholarship pool. Regardless of the scholarship money, an MLB/NCAA partnership would be a boon to college baseball, one of the most under-marketed properties on the college level. Bringing the marketing and promotional muscle of MLB to the table would lead to greater interest in the sport at the collegiate level, where many of the young stars of tomorrow would be coming from. Cross-promotions on campus with brands looking for an added spring pop for baseball would also help offset costs and create new opportunities to reach a younger male demo. MLB has done tremendous work looking to reinforce the sport internationally through the development of the World Baseball Classic and at the grassroots level with Baseball tomorrow and RBI and adding in a push at the collegiate level would make great sense. It is also not without precedent on the joint marketing front, as the NCAA and the NBA have teamed up to form ihoop over the past few years. While college hoops does well on its own, ihoop has given the sport great grassroots support. An NCAA/MLB partnership would shore up college baseball, enhance promotion and make sure that some of baseball’s future stars are getting an even greater opportunity to grow.
Avenging A Sports Experience: While action films have long used a sports platform to market, few have really embraced promotions that could involve athletes. Maybe through the success of the Avengers that could change. This week a number of athletes, from the Indiana Pacers to several NFL stars, were heard in the social space debating the merits of the film and their favorite characters and scenes. Several blog posts speculated which athletes could morph into which super heroes as a spoof, and a bunch of minor league teams (the Camden River Sharks being one) will be running Super Hero themed promotions for fans this week. However the real value would be creating a digital space where athletes could either create their own super hero or tell the stories of which super heroes they have followed throughout their lives. There is certainly crossover product support for such an idea, as evidenced by all the key brands activating around the movie.
According to Front Row Analytics, Acura led the way in brand value as it continued serving as the vehicle of choice for S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents and Tony Stark. Acura vehicles have also appeared in past Marvel films with The Avengers tie-in, including “Captain America: The First Avenger”, “Thor” and “Iron Man 2”. In addition, The Avengers are seen wearing Bose headphones and Oracle engineered systems are visible in the opening scene. Dr. Pepper, Southwest Airlines, & MAC Cosmetics as well as other brand partners also received exposure during the film.
Marrying those brands with some of the real life super heroes people idolize on the hardwood, the gridiron and the baseball diamond…even the soccer pitch, could make for a fun and engaging promotion.
Dewing An Urban Experience: Another interesting program worth a follow is PepsiCo’s work with their Mountain Dew brand, trying to find even more of a young urban niche for the brand. The Dew Tour has done a great job of getting the lemony flavored drink more attached to a young and active crowd, and now they are trying to move it to young, active and more urban, demos that are reflective of the changing mosaic of the U.S. as a whole.
How to do that? Using rapper Lil Wayne and street skateboarder Paul Rodriguez to pull in another audience and further push the brand in geographic areas that are growing but the drink is still short of realizing its potential. The combo of a rapper and a Mexican skateboarder to go hand in glove with the other young stars in music and extreme sports already on the Dew bandwagon is a unique mix, and certainly one that is worth watching as the executions and promotions build across the summer when schools let out and kids in inner cities have even more free time to think and try a new beverage of choice.
