adidas was a leading partner of the FIFA Men’s World Cup, but when the tournament’s final matches approached, the brand opted to highlight female athletes with a trio of 121-foot by 95-foot murals carved in sand. It unveiled the portraits on the shores of Doha in Quatar, dubbed the “Beach Club Billboard,” to highlight its commitment to equity for female athletes and remind fans there’s “another half” to the sport. Event Marketer has the story.

The post Why adidas Chose to Highlight Female Athletes During the FIFA Men’s World Cup appeared first on Chief Marketer.

TurboTax is perceived by most consumers as a do-it-yourself tax service, while its live full-service product, which enlists experts to assist users with doing their taxes, is less familiar to the public. Associating TurboTax with the latter is the brand’s primary marketing focus this year, and it’s amplifying that message through campaigns timed to tentpole events during tax season, including the Super Bowl and, most recently, the NCAA March Madness tournaments.

For new filers who are also student athletes—some of whom profited off of the NCAA’s updated “Name, Image and Likeness” policy—the brand has a new pitch. “This is the first full year that student athletes can make money off of their name, image and likeness,” Cathleen Ryan, SVP of Marketing at Intuit TurboTax, told Chief Marketer this week. “It’s a new reality for them. It just didn’t exist before.”

“Some of them are making a whole lot of money, and some of them are making a few hundred dollars here and there,” she added. “But either way, those NIL deals create tax implications. And it’s not just for the students. In many cases, the parents need to rethink their tax strategy as well.” Following is our conversation with Ryan about TurboTax’s March Madness campaign, how the brand is reaching Gen Z audiences on colleges campuses and through social media, new market opportunities, and more.

Chief Marketer: How is the messaging of the NCAA campaign different from previous years?

Cathleen Ryan, SVP of Marketing, Intuit TurboTax: We’ve been an advertiser in and around March Madness for years, but this is the first time we’re taking a collective approach to college athletes and students, inclusive of the NCAA partnership. But much beyond that, we’re going bigger with activating in new spaces, specifically where Gen Z and college students are natively, both physically and digitally.

Our entire program is rooted in education and empowering young adults who are just figuring out how to do life on their own, and providing them with the tools and resources they need to file their taxes with confidence, and know that they’re getting every possible dollar they deserve on their return. The NCAA sponsorship is a part of that, but we have college ambassador programs, a really big activation, and working with Influencer the platform that supports young student athletes.

CM: How are you incorporating the NCAA’s Name, Image, Likeness policy? That’s new for you, right?

CR: This is the first full year that student athletes can make money off of their name, image and likeness. Some of them are making a whole lot of money, and some of them are making a few hundred dollars here and there. But either way, those NIL deals create tax implications. And not just for the students, but for the parents. The big reason we’re so active in this space is that they need to be educated on what it means for their taxes and where to get help. And in many cases the parents need to rethink their tax strategy as well.

Student athletes are especially busy, given classes, practices and games. The last thing they want to talk or think about is doing their taxes. For us, it’s all about bringing help and resources directly to them, whether that’s on campus, working in partnership with the NCAA or with influencers. And then we have five or so individual university relationships where we’re reaching out through athletic departments, through student groups, et cetera, to ensure that the help and support is there. NIL is a new reality for student athletes. It just didn’t exist before. We want to make sure that they have the education and tools available to them so they’re not surprised at tax time.

 

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CM: Beyond the messaging of this campaign, what are the strategic marketing goals?

CR: We are looking to market full funnel through this effort, so everything from awareness, consideration, trial and purchase, ideally. We’ve experimented with a number of on-campus activations where students and student athletes can engage with our tax experts, ask questions and get expert answers. We’re providing a ton of content and resources for NIL athletes who need to do things like estimate their expenses, learn how to track expenses, things like that. It’s both awareness and consideration, but also engagement and education.

CM: Beyond this campaign, what are the other ways are you marketing to Gen Z?

CR: In addition to the NIL and influencer campaigns, we’re very active in the media channels and spaces with high Gen Z concentration. So, lots of TikTok, Twitter and social media in general. Media consumption has changed, so there’s streaming, OTT, Netflix. We were one of the first partners to sign on with Netflix ad-supported. We’re thinking about all the places and spaces where Gen Z spends their time, and where we can have a conversation, engage and hopefully entertain, too.

CM: In your research, have you noticed anything different about how younger consumers approach finance and taxes today?

CR: We have done some unique research around Gen Z—and they’re even less likely to want to talk about money and finances than previous generations. Unfortunately, it’s just a part of our culture. But where we can really make a difference is allowing people access to experts and tools, where they can find answers that they’re maybe not comfortable getting from friends or family.

One of the interesting things that we’ve seen with Gen Z in particular is a new way of working and living your life that is different than previous generations. You see a lot of side hustles or side jobs, and an entrepreneurial spirit. And that has tax implications. So it’s important for us, as TurboTax, to ensure that this generation understands the opportunities in and the implications of how they’re making a living, which does look materially different than previous generations.

CM: Where are you looking for growth and new markets this year?

CR: Ultimately, we want people to understand that TurboTax has a full suite of offerings. We have calcified brand perceptions of TurboTax as a DIY software product. But the reality is we are so much more than that. We have a growing full service business, where in a few easy clicks you can share your documents with a tax expert and they will prepare and file your return for you. We have an assisted product where you prepare your taxes with the help of an expert and it even includes a final review of your return, if you want that extra level of confidence before you hit the file button.

When you think about who that applies to, it applies to everyone. There is a huge opportunity, certainly for new-to-the-category filers such as student athletes, but also people that are overpaying a legacy tax pro who maybe doesn’t have the breadth of experience that TurboTax has. As an example, we prepare hundreds of thousands of returns with crypto expenses, gains and losses in them every year. Your local person down the street maybe has seen one of those. We’ve seen it all, and the expertise that comes with that ensures you get your best outcome. That’s the piece that we’re trying to get out in market this year: Come to TurboTax and don’t do your taxes. Let one of our experts do them for you. We are so much more than DIY and have been for years, but we need to get that message out there.

The post Brands on Fire: TurboTax Marketing SVP on Courting Student Athletes During March Madness appeared first on Chief Marketer.

The detrimental effects caused by years of pandemic-related quarantines and subsequent social isolation—a phenomenon experienced in solitude and yet shared globally—has shed new light on the importance of mental health and wellness practices. And naturally, that cultural shift has permeated marketing campaigns, even in cases where a brand’s connection to mental health issues isn’t endemic.

Among them is LG’s video series “Game 4 Good,” a partnership with NCAA’s March Madness college basketball tournament that elevates and supports the work of four student athletes committed to mental health and wellness causes.

“During the pandemic, we saw that there was an increased need for mental health support and awareness among college students, but especially among college student athletes,” according to Jeannie Lee, Director of Corporate Brand Marketing at LG Electronics. “One of the things that’s really important for us, as we work around mental health, wellness and mindfulness, is that LG doesn’t ever come to the table as an expert on mental health, per se.”

The goal, rather, is to help the athletes tell their own stories. “What we can do,” she continued, “is use our resources to provide space for dialogues to happen, to provide a platform for various initiatives that can help break down some of the stigma around mental health.” Following is an excerpt of our conversation with Lee about the Game 4 Good series, its connection to LG’s broader “Love the Game” platform, and how the brand is tapping new channels to spread the word.

Chief Marketer: How did the idea for the Game 4 Good series come about?

Jeannie Lee, Director of Corporate Brand Marketing at LG: Game 4 Good is something we launched specifically for March Madness, and “Love the Game” is our partnership as a whole. That can be interpreted in various ways, whether it’s from the student athlete perspective, the communities, the teams or fans’ love of the game. We wanted to show up in a way that was consistent with some of the other work that we were doing.

We partnered with some of the student athletes playing in the March Madness tournaments to highlight the importance of mental health and wellness from their own perspective, so that they can share their work around it as well as be a voice among their peers. One of the things that’s really important for us, as we work around mental health, wellness and mindfulness, is that LG doesn’t ever come to the table as an expert on mental health, per se. What we can do is use our resources to provide space for dialogues to happen, to provide a platform for various initiatives that can help break down some of the stigma around mental health.

CM: How did you choose the student athletes?

JL: They have already been active their support and raising awareness for mental health. It was important for us to partner with student athletes who are already doing the work in this space so that we can bring an authentic voice. Part of that is they’re helping us provide a message of support for their teammates and their peers who are competing during this time of intense pressure. We worked with them to select four charities so that we can make donations and help them do more of the work that they’re doing in this space.

CM: How long has LG been working on health and wellness programs?

JL: It’s not something new for LG. Our previous CSR initiative was called “Experience Happiness,” and it was around mental health wellness, the science of happiness and how to tap into that. It was focused on a younger audience—high school and middle school students. That initiative exceeded the goals that it set out to do, so we connected all the different dots and refocused. During the pandemic, we saw that there was an increased need for mental health support and awareness among college students, but especially among college student athletes. So that’s where we’ve shifted our focus.

CM: How does experiential factor into the program?

JL: Experiential is a big part of the NCAA partnership, because March Madness and the Final Four are tentpole events. We will be activating at the Final Four, both men’s and women’s. It will highlight some of our home entertainment and appliance products and initiatives. Another part of the experiential marketing during Final Four is an extension of Game 4 Good. We’ll be doing an episode of our “Transparent Conversations” podcast with the student athletes. It’s a live-to-tape podcast hosted by Prim Siripipat, a former D1 Duke tennis player and former sports reporter with ESPN. She’s very active in the sports world, but her focus now is also around athlete mental health. We launched it last year during the fall, and its goal is similar. LG doesn’t necessarily want to come across as an expert in mental health, but what we can do is power platforms that allow for dialogues to happen and increase awareness.

CM: What other marketing channels are you tapping for this partnership?

JL: It’s provided a way for us to do things in new channels. We’re partnering with the NCAA and Warner Brothers Discovery Sports on creating a NCAA Championships channel available exclusively on LG Smart TVs. We launched an original content series called “The Rivalries.” Fans get really passionate about rivalries, even people who aren’t necessarily diehard sports fans. A lot of people know the big sports ones, like Duke and UNC or UCLA and USC, but there’s also a lot of excitement and intensity around unknown rivalries. This content series highlights those in the Division 2 and Division 3 schools. So we’re trying to get into new territories, with podcasts and original content. That’s something that’s new for us and it’s working well.

The post LG’s March Madness ‘Game 4 Good’ Series Elevates Athletes’ Conversations on Mental Health appeared first on Chief Marketer.

An ad campaign from insurance company Aflac earlier this month illustrated how a recent shift in its marketing plans is taking shape: To conserve the additional media dollars that are required to target consumers in a fragmented digital media space, the brand has moved creative budgets in-house. AdExchanger explores how Aflac now uses its internal content studio to supplement creative and produce campaigns more efficiently.

The post How Aflac’s March Madness Campaign Leveraged In-House Creative and Channel Diversification appeared first on Chief Marketer.

Grassroots marketing is all about getting “brand in hand, in the context that makes sense,” Mark Kirkham, SVP and CMO of PepsiCo International Beverages, told Chief Marketer this week. But in sports marketing, including the work he’s doing for Gatorade’s 5V5 international girls soccer tournament, there is the potential to create a personalized, formative experience.

“It’s about starting young, working your way up, and providing both education and opportunity along the way,” he says. “Generically, some people just think grassroots is about sampling, or the lowest-level activation. But actually, grassroots should be seen as the base on which you build your funnel. It’s the base in which you create experiences. For some consumers, it’s the first time they interact with your brand or your product. That moment of truth is really important.”

Following is our conversation with Kirkham about recent campaigns for Gatorade and 7UP; the challenges facing global marketers today; how to achieve balance between global scale and local relevance; and the intricacies of restaging an iconic brand—in this case 7UP—through its new visual identity.

Chief Marketer: What are some of the challenges you face as a global marketer specifically?

Mark Kirkham, SVP and CMO of PepsiCo International Beverages: When you work in international, your portfolio is much more diverse. So, how do you build consistent brands that are locally relevant? One of the biggest challenges any global marketer has is finding that perfect balance between globally-scaled brands and locally-relevant brands and locally-relevant culture.

A best practice is putting the consumer at the center of it, and understanding that the consumer is different. There are also our universal truths, and they are what bind brands together, particularly as you think about how we bring the brand tone, expression and ethos to life. You really need to anchor it in something that’s universal. But locally, we’ll have nuances. In the past, there was more of a top-down approach to brand building when it came to global or international. Different cultures are a bit more homogeneous [today] because we have access to learn about different cultures and category dynamics. It requires marketers to think a little bit differently.

It requires us to think about how to be truly be scalable and true to what the brand stands for, but also be authentic and relevant at a local level, whether it’s talent or situation, occasion or cultural behaviors. All of those things have to come into play. You have to be comfortable with the fact that a truly global consumer isn’t one consumer. It’s actually lots of different consumers with a shared belief, a shared need, and ultimately being served by great global brands.

CM: Let’s talk about your Gatorade soccer initiative, 5V5. In 2022, the tournament for 14- to 16-year-olds was tied to the UEFA Women’s Champions League and was all-women for the first time. What was the strategy behind that choice?

MK: It’s been 26 years since Gatorade featured a female soccer player, in a Gatorade ad in 1997 featuring Mia Hamm in a Michael Jordan spot in the U.S. This was way before the momentum that came out of the World Cup in the U.S. around the women’s game. Gatorade was built in the U.S. and has expanded internationally over the last 20 or so years. The sport may be different, but the brand is the same. The focus on athletes is the same. But some of the things the U.S. may have done domestically have become more authentic to the world of sport and the world of brands.

And that is the women’s game. Gatorade 5V5 is an example. Gatorade outside the U.S. has been very focused on soccer for decades, as has been the case with Pepsi and others, because globally soccer is one of the biggest sports in the world, if not the biggest. The success of the U.S. women’s team and the investment being made in women’s football and women’s sports internationally has created this opportunity for brands to celebrate that.

The 5V5 program started out as a male-only program in many markets, but we have taken it to a whole different level. We’ve anchored it in our Champions League partnership, which also includes the Women’s Champions League. The last time we had a large-scale event pre-Covid, we had over 250 kids go to the UCL final and 56,000 kids involved in the program. And half of them were women’s teams. With 5V5, we extend our grassroots football programming and our passion for sport and ensure that we’re reinforcing that it’s an equal game.

CM: What are the other aspects of the campaign that surround the 5V5 tournament itself?

MK: The thing about 5V5, and any grassroots sport program, is that you’re going to have to reach consumers differently. We do a lot with social, particularly now with TikTok, and other platforms like Facebook prior to that. We recruit the players through general messaging, but we also leverage a lot of our sponsored athletes as well as the club partnerships we have. We are using talent and partnerships not just for traditional sponsorship and awareness, but actually recruitment, almost as ambassadors to get people involved in sport. And that’s something we’ve done for years. Brands that play in this space have to use talented athletes not just as ambassadors, but also as advocates and influencers to get people active into sport.

CM: How are you defining a grassroots marketing campaign? Do you have any best practices?

MK: Grassroots as a generic word is all about getting brand in hand, and in the context where it makes sense. So whether you’re sampling potato chips or soft drinks, or actually in our case Gatorade, trying to bring the benefits of a Gatorade for hydration and athletic performance onto a pitch or a sideline, the base principle is you’ve got to find a way to authentically and relevantly put your product into their hands. When you think about formative experience in sport, it’s a very different thing. It’s about starting young, working your way up, and providing both education and opportunity along the way. So for marketers thinking about grassroots, generically some people just think it’s about sampling, or the lowest-level activation.

But actually, grassroots should be seen as the base on which you build your funnel. It’s the base on which you create experiences. For some consumers, it’s the first time they interact with your brand or your product. That moment of truth is really important. And if you do it in a super authentic way, tied to something someone’s passionate about, you can actually create a fan for life. Grassroots is about branding and sampling—all of those table stakes—but it’s actually about the experience. And in sport, the experience is everything.

Grassroots is in many ways about a personal experience. It’s about a chance to try something new in some cases, but it’s also a chance for brands to reaffirm their role in a consumer’s life, or in the case of sport, it’s almost part of that formative experience, from being a young athlete to ultimately being a competitive and maybe a professional athlete in some cases.

CM: That’s a great point. Personally, my first memories of Gatorade were from when I played soccer as a kid.

MK: I’ll just build on that: I grew up in the U.S., and when I was a kid, if I didn’t show up on the pitch or on the sidelines or at practice with a Gatorade, I felt like I wasn’t like wearing my cleats, or I wasn’t prepared for the game. In other parts of the world, that behavior that was endemic to the sports drink market in the U.S. didn’t exist. So at the same time, we also have to educate people about the importance of hydration and the role that products like Gatorade play. That’s why we use the GSSI, the Gatorade Sports Science Institute. We actually bring some of our GSSI scientists and PhDs to our 5V5 program to help them understand the importance of nutrition and hydration.

So not only are they there to participate in a tournament, but they’re actually [learning] valuable lessons on young athletes. It’s different for sport; it’s all about the experience. And like you said, when you first experience certain brands at certain times in your life, it actually leaves a mark. And our goal is to leave a mark that has meaning.

CM: Switching gears a bit, let’s talk about the 7UP rebrand you just launched, which is the first in seven years.

MK: We operate 7UP in about a hundred markets around the world, and this is an iconic brand for so many people. So when you restage your brand, you’ve got to be really thoughtful. I’d go as far as to say careful. Because it’s not just about design and aesthetic and packaging. It’s about what a visual identity means to an individual and how they’ve grown up with it.

For 7UP, this was a really important moment, because brands that have stature and really rich, deep roots with their fans as well as in culture need to have certain things that stay the same—but you also need to grow and evolve. This rebrand was about upliftment, so we spent a lot of time and thought about what makes 7UP great. You can talk about product characteristics, like bubbles and amazing lemon-lime flavor, but actually it’s that feeling of, physically and emotionally, being uplifted when you have a refreshing drink.

Then we worked with our design team and took inspiration from the existing category, but also looking other categories. What are the visual cues that can take you to an uplifted place? We’ve done that through design aesthetic, through color, through broader imagery. If you look at the packaging itself, it feels more modern. It brings to life movement, upward motion and ultimately upliftment visually. But at the same time, it’s still got that iconic 7 and that red UP, which will let anyone—old or young—look at that and say, that’s their 7UP.

In our category, it’s about bringing new users in and also making the existing users feel really excited about what we’re doing with the brand. That’s at the core. The more iconic the brand, the more important it is to actually look at your consumer and understand its role in different markets—and not lose the essence.

CM: How are you communicating the rebrand to the public?

MK: We’re going to continue to leverage digital as a major channel. We’re using our visual identity to refresh the visual experience. Sometimes over time, your packaging, graphics, identity—people just get used to it, and it becomes commonplace. And the moment you bring something new and different, it actually changes perception. So, bringing that visual identity through life, through digital, through out-of-home home, through campaigns, is going to be really important. And then the tone and the manner in which that will come across. We’re going to be in over 76 markets this year with this rebrand, and that’s going to come to life in locally-relevant ways, and moments where you’re uplifted amongst friends and family.

CM: In terms of marketing trends, what are you keeping an eye on this year? What should other marketers be paying attention to?

MK: First and foremost, you should always be looking at your consumer. I would warn all of us not to get too focused on shiny objects, and this includes technologies and other trends like that. That being said, if you can see how our consumers are evolving through new technologies and new tools, you [can] make sure you’re relevant. The role of technology, the role of Web3, the role of AI—it matters. The bigger question is, what do you do with it? The role of technology is enabling more personalized relationships with consumers where they’re having an impact on your brand and guiding you on how to tell your story and how to bring them into it.

I’m not a big fan of the word metaverse, because I don’t think anyone can really tell you what it is. I am a fan of how people embracing the technology will change how brands engage consumers. So whether it’s putting your brand into a gaming environment or a ROBLOX environment or a streaming environment that’s got augmented reality, it’s the evolution of the media that we had 20, 30 years ago, but in an entirely new context. Ultimately, it’s just a new way of marketing. It gives you data and it gives you the ability to do transactions of commerce.

And I think that at the end of the day, AI can make us smarter. It can make us more creative and it can make us challenge ourselves, because data is now at the point where it can help us almost predict or respond to things that are happening in real life. And as marketers, we need to see that as just one other input into the creative process. The risk is that people see it as the creative process. You’ve seen examples of brands who have used ChatGPT to tell their own stories. It’s amazing. But what that technology can’t do is bring the emotive heart, soul and the overall purpose of a brand to life.

The post Marketers on Fire: Mark Kirkham, SVP and CMO of PepsiCo International Beverages appeared first on Chief Marketer.

A plethora of brands leveraged in-person fan engagement during the days surrounding Super Bowl 57, from sponsored mini-festivals to hotel takeovers to surprise-and-delight stunts like a passenger-filled cucumber-shaped blimp and a 44-foot-tall LED-clad cactus. Check out Event Marketer‘s roundup of brand experiences from Anheuser-Busch, Barstool Sports, Hendrick’s Gin, Subway, Marriott and others.

The post 13 Experiential Brand Activations on the Ground at Super Bowl 57 appeared first on Chief Marketer.

KFC Canada built the first-ever winterized basketball court to capitalize on the sport’s growing popularity within the country—complete with pre-warmed basketballs, a nonslip-fabric court and regulation-size replicas of the brand’s iconic chicken buckets. Check out how the experience went down, according to coverage in Event Marketer.

The post How KFC Canada Courted Basketball Fans With a Winter-Friendly Activation appeared first on Chief Marketer.

The USAA, a financial services association for the military community, celebrated its 100^th anniversary at the most recent Army-Navy football game with a fan-friendly look back at the game’s 123-year history, including personalized engagements, interactive tech, artifacts and memorabilia, and more. Here’s how the activation’s myriad touchpoints enhanced the game-day experience, according to coverage in Event Marketer.

The post USAA Celebrates 100 Years With Interactive Army-Navy Activation on Game Day appeared first on Chief Marketer.

The run-up to the FIFA World Cup, which kicks off in late November, has already inspired global sponsorship programs and soccer-themed marketing initiatives. Take Budweiser’s ad campaign, which features international players walking onto the field, a marching band, rabid fans and, naturally, bottles of Bud. But for this tourney, the AB InBev brand has added a QR code to the spot to entice consumers to purchase a limited-edition beer on its website. Here’s how Budweiser’s direct-to-consumer play is collecting first-party data while also driving sales, according to a piece in AdExchanger.

The post How Budweiser’s World Cup Campaign Supports First-Party Data Collection appeared first on Chief Marketer.

After sponsoring the US Open for 17 straight years, Grey Goose has learned a thing or two about sports sponsorships. Each year, tennis fans sip Grey Goose’s signature cocktail, the Honey Deuce, which serves as an anchor for its sponsorship activations and hospitality experiences at the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in New York. Here is how the program has evolved over time, the ways in which the brand engages consumers and how this year’s strategy embraced a hybrid approach, according to an executive Q&A with Aleco Azqueta, VP of Marketing at Grey Goose, in Event Marketer.

On the US Open as a platform to engage consumers:  

“For the first decade or so, our primary avenue to engage consumers was on-site at the stadium. Over the years, however, we’ve been able to expand our reach and meet fans at several different touchpoints, including on-premise, e-commerce and social media,” Azqueta says. The brand partners with local bars to feature the cocktail during the Open and hosts watch parties for those fans unable to make it for the games live in New York.

On keeping Grey Goose experiences fresh:

In 2018, it introduced the Frozen Honey Deuce to help fans cool off during hot matches, and the next year it released a limited-edition US Open bottle with the USTA. In 2020 it launched a Honey Deuce Cocktail Kit for fans at home. “Further, to expand our digital ecosystem, we continue to tap our influencer partners to share their US Open Honey Deuce experiences in new and exciting ways, and find new ways to amplify it all on social.”

On this year’s hybrid approach:

Grey Goose once again served the Honey Deuce at food stands across the stadium, but it also offered an enhanced cocktail kit with all the ingredients this time—including vodka, lemonade, raspberry liqueur and honeydew melon—along with a commemorative cup. “Even though the stadium was again operating at full capacity, we knew not all consumers were willing or able to attend in-person, so we wanted to ensure that there were still options for those watching from home,” he says.

For the full Q&A with Azqueta, read on in Event Marketer.

The post How Grey Goose Has Leveraged its US Open Sponsorship to Connect With Consumers appeared first on Chief Marketer.