Marble: The official cheese of Kliff's Notes

Are you going to go out and buy a block of marble cheese now that you know it is the "Official Cheese" of the world-famous Kliff's Notes blog???

No? Well...shit. Good thing the cheese people aren't paying me then I guess.

This blog post is based on me walking into my local Subway and noticing on the door that Subway is now the "Official Sandwich of the BC Lions". I almost turned around and left, more because I dislike the CFL and the BC Lions than the sandwich shop itself. But do sponsorship dollars, like Subway no doubt had to spend to get this lofty title, spent on these type of sponsorships really work? Will I ultimately buy Gillette deodorant because it is the "Deodorant of the NHL"? Nope, not a chance.

Now there are obviously other parts to these sponsorship deals - exclusive mention on team/league websites, programming, etc. - but the whole "Official so and so" seems like such a joke way to explain things. Sponsorship that is more directly related to the sport/league/event makes sense to me, ie. "Blackberry, the official way to act like your working when really your sitting on your ass eating cheetos" or "Depends, the official diaper of long bowling" works fine for me. But the official sandwich of a football team? Nope, I just don't care.

Bragging

With the Olympics in Canada this year many of the nation's businesses, big and small, helped fundraise and donate money to our athlete's with hopes of helping them make it to the podium. This marketing/communication tactic is great because it works for everyone, consumers feel warm and fuzzy about a company that coordinates a fundraiser like that, the athlete gets funding, and the sponsor gets good, positive exposure.

But is there a need to brag about all you've done for these people? It's not the quote-unquote "canadian way", and it certainly takes away some of the good will of what you've done. Take a look at this Shaw website and definately have a play of their advertisement.

Here are my problems with it:

1. Shaw is asking for donations for the athletes, which people have gratefully done, and then Shaw spins it to sound as if they have given it themselves (maybe they have given a large chunk themselves, but the numbers they advertise on their cheesy "we are the world" type ad match up with those of their ticker on the page)


2. It's all about them. "their" company and what "they" have done for the athletes. The oldest team sport saying in the world has got to be "There's no 'I' in Team", well clearly Shaw forgot about that


3. The tone of the tv spot is just way too over-the-top cheesy. I saw it on television the other day and laughed out loud. It doesn't make one feel patriotic, it makes one embarassed to be a Shaw subscriber. Trying to copy the "we are the world" style for a patriotic commercial is just shoddy.

It's great that companies like Shaw support our athletes and help raise donations towards a relevant cause, but don't brag about it. People know you have been helping athletes, thats why they are donating. They know you have been putting in the effort, so don't act like a 10 year old kid that needs recognition. Are you going to throw a tantrum if we don't acknowledge you? You don't see Molson Canadian bragging about all the money they raised.

How long can you make sex sell?

I've never really liked the Go Daddy.com commercials that use sexy female celebrities to encourage people to go to their website and check out a "exposed" video of the celeb making it seem like they will be exposing themselves. Go Daddy's business is selling domain names to people so I can only assume that they feel people hoping for a naked Danica Patrick will then feel inclined to purchase a random domain name.



They have been using this tactic for quite a while and I wonder how much longer it can really work? Does it really work for their business, sure they probably get a lot of views on youtube and from viral views but I question whether all the money they spend on celebrity sponsorships and production/placement of these commercials will really result in enough $10/year domain name sales. Here is another Go Daddy commercial that I feel had better messaging.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4JHGCd_9U5E

Second Chance Sponsorships provide big return

It seems like a lot of the sponsorships of conferences or events or athletes don't provide a tonne of value to a company. That being said these sponsorships are important to the party that is being sponsored otherwise they would not be able to do what they do. But is it really a good use of your company's valuable marketing dollars, especially in these penny-pinching times?

Here are a couple of sponsorships that i've seen recently that were clearly a well thought out, strategic use of their money to create goodwill among their customers.

The Keg Restaurant - Celebration of Light

Each year, Vancouver has a fireworks competition that brings teams from around the world to the city to compete and provides 4 nights of free entertainment for locals while at the same time keeping restaurants, bars, and shops in the downtown area packed with people. Over the years the event has had trouble finding sponsors and entering this year they were a sponsor short of being able to put the show on. It was announced as being cancelled. Well within a short period of time of this announcement The Keg Restaurant (a canadian steakhouse chain) stepped up to the plate and contributed what i'm sure is not a huge chunk of their advertising dollars. The event was back on, all because of the Keg. So what happens? They get countless value out of the blogs/media coverage of their sponsorship that easily makes the amount of their sponsorship seem minimal.

Here's one such blog that published the event http://vancitybuzz.blogspot.com/2009/03/2009-celebration-of-light-vancouver.html


Vancouver Canucks playoff games in HD - Save-on-Foods

Being a Canadian city, Vancouver has some of the most passionate hockey fans in the world (if not the most passionate ie. i'm one of said fans). This year they are in the playoffs after missing last year and the city is buzzing with excitement. The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) is a public television network that has first rights to air canadian teams playoff games. They aired the first game from Vancouver in High Definition and it was found out after that games 3 and 4 to be played in St. Louis would not be televised in HD due to the extra cost associated with it $100,000. They had just gone through some rounds of layoffs and felt they could not justify the cost (weak excuse). Cue Save-on-Foods, a lower mainland based supermarket chain, who jumped in and basically said "$100,000??? That's it. We'll pay for you to have HD for our consumers." Boom! Now not everyone in the province has HD but even those without are going to be happy with Save-On for stepping up to the plate. This was a great sponsorship move and got buzz all over the radios and television stations throughout the province.

So maybe a sponsorship investment isn't the worst thing in the world for your company. Especially if it is for something that has a passionate following. Your generosity will fuel a lot of goodwill with those followers and they are quite likely to be pleased enough to spread the word to their network......especially if that something was on the verge of going kaput.