Illegal Petes Music: Illegal Pete's announces Rocky Mountain Roller Girl / PBR Pint Glass / Kickoff Party on May 11th
Illegal Pete’s has partnered with PBR to produce a one of a kind Pint Glass for the Rocky Mountain Roller Girls. The limited edition (limited to 500 glasses) will be sold at Illegal Pete’s for $5 and that purchase will include a 16 ounce PBR. Half of the proceeds from the sale of the glasses…
Kraft Mac & Cheese came up with this stunt to get people to like their facebook page. I’m all about creating a connection with your audience but how does this create a return on investment? Sometimes I think people just do stuff because they think it’s sound new and interesting without thinking about how it’s actually going to benefit the company…
Whether your goal is to galvanize public awareness around an important social issue or showcase new spring denim colors, aim to deliver relevant, sharable content for your customer across multiple touch points that connect to their life moments.
That is the most succinct advice you can give about brand strategy. The goal isn’t to get them to “like” you but to become part of their lives so that when they think about your brand they identify it as part of themselves.
Marketing Roller Derby Teams
Another unique challenge of marketing for Roller Derby is the unique league structure that doesn’t exist in many other professional (or even semi-pro) sports.
Most leagues not only have an all-star roster that plays other leagues but also home teams that play within the league (and sometimes against other league’s home teams).
The challenge I’ve come across is explaining this to the new fan. “Well see this is two teams and they are on the same league…” “Why are they playing each other then?”
Some leagues have come up with creative solutions for this. Nashville Rollergirls simply does not have home teams. This stance means that they definitely have to do a bit more work to play bouts but that it’s always clear who the fans should be rooting for. Gotham actually has both their home teams and all-star team but brands each home team as one of the many Burroughs of the city (Bronx Gridlock, Queens of Pain, etc).
In the end it’s definitely all about making sure each team has an identity that fans can get behind.
This is Roller Derby - Texas Rollergirls
Love, love, love this campaign for Texas. It has all of the essentials that my marketing research survey suggested would attract more fans.
- A better understanding of the game.
- Player connection to the fans.
Actually, it has an additional “get people in the door” extra - the $5 off student discount too.
Which makes me love it even more.
So not only is it explaining to people what roller derby is in general, they will be looking for Sadie at the game and, at the very least, can follow her during the bout.
Denver tops the young adults city growth chart
Heads up Denver, it looks like anyone 25-34 believes that Denver is the place to find a job or just be one of the cool unemployed.
I’m actually surprised because you’d think that people would go where the jobs are not where they think is the coolest.
Denver, the new hipster capital.
Supercuts is jumping on the [branding with bands] bandwagon with “Rock the Cut,” a pun-riddled integrated push by ad agency Element 79 that likens the hair-salon chain’s stylists to aspiring rock stars—or something.
Or something is right. So the concept is that if you get your haircut at Supercut’s you’ll be a rockstar? That’s a bit of a stretch, and pretty generic as well.
I wish I could have been in this meeting just to tell them “no. really? that’s what Supercuts thinks their image is? no. stop it right now.”
Supercuts is the value store of hair salons, the idea that they could appeal to new customers with this campaign is slightly ridiculous. Not to mention it’s not doing anything to affirm current customers that they appreciate them.
A better concept would have been to go documentary stye; use the bands talking about how hard it is on the road and all the penny pinching they have to do. Indie bands are all on a budget, but want to look good - where do they go? Supercuts. The campaign could have used this indie rock cool leverage and added a bit of reality to it to make it work for them.
Chipotle's win - win with new merchandise
Reason’s why this is so smart:
- It’s completely in line with their brand personality that they are environmentally friendly
- It’s actually environmentally friendly
- It makes them money (for charity)
Kotex created gifts for inspiring women on pinterest. Pretty clever branding for a hard to market object. Although I debate how many conversions they will get from it, they definitely made everyone smile at the thought that went into it.
How do you market a new product? Awareness vs Branding
It’s so hard to market something that people don’t really understand. There is so much complexity to it that there’s even a theory called “Diffusion of Innovation” (a really great read if you are interested).
The short version is when a product is so new, you have to first increase awareness by explaining it over and over again until people go “Ohhhh. I get it! How cool!” and start to buy in. But in practice it gets a lot more complicated.
I’m currently a marketing volunteer for Rocky Mountain Rollergirls. They are one of the best roller derby leagues in the world and located in one of the most sports enthusiastic cities in the country (Denver is one of only 13 cities that can claim four major professional sports franchises). Yet we have seen a decrease in attendance over the last couple of years… what gives?
Did you know that there are 22 roller derby leagues in the state of Colorado? This is actually one of the problems. The low barrier to entry for roller derby mixed with the fact that people create a league for the skaters (not for the fans or profit) has created a unique circumstance that is hard to translate into ordinary marketing practices. What do you do when people don’t know what roller derby is yet can go see it anywhere? How do you get them to come to your game instead of one of the newer leagues?
