Netnography study on adidas adizero

primeBy M. Adil Khan

MBA Candidate, Class of 2011Schulich School of Business, York University

Lightest boots ever made – 145 grams

Builds on the original adizero series (165 grams)

Strong competitor to SuperFly II (210 grams) and V1.10 SL (150 grams)

Why adizero prime?

www.soccerbible.com◦approximately 140 comments

www.footy-boots.com◦approximately 40 comments

Qualitative Analysis of comments in communities

Majority: Casual players who were more interested in the look and feel of the product, found the product expensive

Minority: Professional/Semi professional players who ranked the performance of the product before talking about the look.

Segments

Common themes in conversations

Weight Colors

Celebrity footballers Price

Strongest competitors (Superfly II and V1.10 SL)

Confusion over pricing…

Even though the reviews corrected the price, many users continued to judge the boot by $400 price tag (correct price - $299)

Ability to identify an adizero prime?

The need to separate the primes from regular adizero through colorway◦ Since adizero primes cost $150 extra, many users felt

they should be easily identifiable and exclusive

The pragmatists in communities…

Although most users complained about the exorbitant price, few users accepted it

Community members barely discussed about the performance attributes◦ Belief that the boots guaranteed superior performance

based on the original adizero

As the original adizero seemed affordable at $150, most members disliked the price of primes but acknowledged the exclusivity factor

Pricing $100 lesser than Superfly II made it desirable boot in the elite category

Insights

Exclusive colorways for adizero prime as better justification for high price

original adizero adizero prime

Better co-ordination with online communities to build relationship with fans (Review on soccerreviews.com still shows $399 price) http://tinyurl.com/6evp6db

Recommendations

Considering the original adizeros were the lightest cleats ever produced and launched just before the World Cup ‘10, should adidas have priced it at more than $199 price tag?

With a narrow gap (8 months) between original adizeros and primes, would it have been easier to justify the $299 price for the primes?

Thoughts

M. Adil Khan

◦ http://curiousadil.blogspot.com/2011/05/adidas-f50-adizero-prime-netnography.html

◦@M_Adl_Khan09

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