FIBA ASSIST MAGAZINE | 05 2003 | PAGE 51

SPORT MARKETING AND MANAGEMENT

THE ROLE OF ADVERTISING IN STRATEGIC BRANDCOMMUNICATIONS

Jay Gladden is Associate Professor atthe Department of Sport Management, atthe University of Massachusetts-Amherst. This excerpt is taken from thebook “Sport Promotion and SalesManagement”, Irwin-Sutton-McCarthy,Human Kinetics.

PREGAME INTRODUCTIONIn addition to enhancing or reinforcing animage of the sport organization in theminds of consumers, advertising canserve to support the sales effort. As youmay be already aware, there are manyways an organization can advertise itsproduct to the consumers. The trick is tomaximize the efficiency of the adverti-sing effort. However, before the sportorganization considers where it willadvertise, it must consider how it willadvertise. That is, the organization mustfirst determine what images or associa-tions it wants to create or reinforce. Withrespect to making this decision, we wantto highlight the importance of maintai-ning a strategic focus toward creatingpositive feelings or capitalizing on positi-ve feelings that a consumer has about aparticular sport organization. These posi-tive feelings are also referred as brandassociations. Once the organizationdecides what its message will be, it mustbe consistent in communicating thatmessage throughout the many differentmedia through which it can be advertised

- this is commonly referred to as strate-gic brand communications. The adverti-sing effort should seek to communicatereasons why consumers should spendtheir money on the sport product over thelong term.

ADVERTISINGAccording to authors Mullin, Hardy, andSutton, advertising is “ any paid non per-sonal (not directed to the individuals),clearly sponsored message conveyedthrough the media”.When the NHL [National Hockey League]promotes professional hockey as “TheCoolest Game on Earth” on national tele-vision, this is advertising. Similarly, whenthe Pittsburgh Pirates [Major BaseballLeague team] purchase advertising inthe Pittsburgh Post - Gazette to spurticket sales under “You Gotta See’Em”tag line, this is advertising. However,when we think about advertising, weneed to consider the term “media” froma broad perspective. It includes commonmass media sources such as television,radio, newspapers, and magazines. Italso includes outdoor advertising (bill-boards and transit vehicles), direct mail,and of ever-increasing importance, theInternet.Advertisers are those organizations (pri-vate or public sector) that invest resour-ces in purchasing time or space in thevarious forms of media just mentioned.

Defined, advertising management is“heavily focused on the analysis, plan-ning, control, and decision-making activi-ties of...the advertiser.” Among otherthings, advertising management requiresa situational analysis, performance-dri-ven objectives, and a clear picture of themarket targeted for an advertisement, allbefore a campaign is created.

MAKING AN IMPACTAdvertising is communication from theadvertiser targeted to the consumer.First, the advertiser (or sender) creates amessage that is sent through a mediumtoward the consumer (the receiver).However, before that message reachesthe receiver, it usually encounters“noise”. Noise (also referred as “clut-ter”) is anything that competes with anadvertising message for the receiver’sattention. Did you realize that in an ave-rage day, you are exposed to 3000 adver-tising messages? This is clutter. Thechallenge for the advertiser is to have itsmessage passed through the clutter andbe received by the consumer. Only thencan the receiver be affected by the mes-sage. Ultimately, the sender of an adver-tising message is typically trying toachieve six broad objectives. These rela-te to awareness, attributes, image, asso-ciation, group norms, and behavior.

▼ Awareness. First, the advertiser may

by Jay Gladden

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SPORT MARKETING AND MANAGEMENT

try to create awareness about his product. With the advent and growth of Internet, a number of Internet start-ups have attempted to use sport as a vehicle to create awareness for their sites.

▼ Attributes. Secondly, the advertiser may be trying to communicate information about the attributes or benefits offered by a product. Perhaps you remember the ESPN advertising campaign promoting the 2000 WNBA season. Under the tag line “They’re better than you”, the series of advertisements attempted to promote the high skill level of WNBAplayers by depicting them in situationsversus male recreational players. Thisseries of advertisements was consistent with the WNBA overall advertising theme “We Got Next,” which suggests the serious and competitive nature of women’s basketball.

▼ Image. A third focus of advertisers is to develop or change an image or personality. During the late 1990s, sagging attendance led the Chicago White Sox [Major League Baseball team] to revamp the makeup of its team from a team with some grumpy superstars to a team full of young talents. Accordingly, the White Sox changed their advertising to say: “These Kids Can Play,” thus suggesting even though the team was young, the players were still goingto work hard, hustle, and never quit.

▼ Association. Sponsorship is the perfect example of the fourth goal of advertising: to associate a brand with feelings and emotion.

▼ Group norms. A fifth goal of advertisers is to create group norms. Through Nike’s marketing of the swoosh logo in conjunction with the “Just Do It” advertising, apparel with the swoosh on it became very popularduring the mid-1990s.

▼ Behavior. Finally, advertisers seek to alter or affect behavior. Most specifically, this refers to causing someone to purchase a sport-relatedproduct.

The sixth goal of advertising, to precipita-te behavior, reinforces the most oftenoverlooked element of the advertising pro-

cess, feedback. It is important to recognize that adverti-sing is not a one-way communication.Rather, it is a two-way communicationprocess in which the receiver providesfeedback to the sender. This notion of two-way communication in the advertising pro-cess is important from two perspectives.First it suggests that sport advertisersshould expend resources to solicit com-munication from consumers regarding theeffectiveness of their ads.In addition, if we assume that advertisingis two-way communication, it becomesextremely important also to solicit infor-mation from consumers about their tastes,preferences, and interests so that theadvertising messages will have a betterchance of making it through noise andreaching the consumer.

THE IMPORTANCE OF A STRATEGIC FOCUSBreaking through the noise is becomingincreasingly difficult. As a result, morethan ever, a strategic approach to adverti-sing, which communicates with consu-mers on a number of different levels, isnecessary.Experts predict that marketing organiza-tions, channels, media, and consumerswill all ultimately create ongoing dialogue.Because it is increasingly possible tocreate dialogue with consumers, a majorfocus of advertising will be to forge anongoing relationship with consumers. Infact, a strategic advertising program canprovide the basis for creating such a rela-tionship.Thus, while the highly cluttered marketpla-ce has led to a multitude of offerings anddepersonalized the personal contactbetween the producer and the consumer,advertising can provide the means throu-gh which to foster interplay between theadvertiser and the consumer. In order tobe successful in such an endeavor, strate-gic brand communications is increasinglyneeded.

STRATEGIC BRAND COMMUNICATIONSMany teams develop a new advertisingstrategy every year. Think about your favo-rite team: Can you remember an advertise-ment it has utilized over the past fiveyears? If you can, that means the messagemade it through the noise and reachedyou. Ultimately it boils down to viewing adverti-sing not as advertising, but as a strategicbrand communications. Before definingstrategic brand communications, it isimportant to establish what “brand”means in the sport setting. A brand is a

name, symbol, or term that serves to diffe-rentiate one product from another. In sportsetting, Notre Dame [the Universityfamous for its American football team]represents a brand name that is clearlydifferentiated from other college sportsbrands. Similarly, the Brazilian nationalsoccer team represents a brand. The goalof any brand is to develop strong, unique,and favorable associations in consumers’minds with brand names. Such positive and favorable associationsare created by communication.From the sport consumer perspective, ateam is a bundle of attributes (such as theplayers and promotions) and benefits(such as providing people with a source ofidentification and pride). The team sportmanager must never forget this-it is hisrole to manage the sport entity accordin-gly. A very important component in suchmanagement is the communications thatthe team emits to the public. If you cannotremember the advertising of your favoriteteam, it is more than likely that your favo-rite team has not practiced strategicbrand communications.Because there are so many facets to thesport brand (players, stadium, tradition,the ability to provide family connections,even the owner in many cases), an effec-tive campaign will identify which elementsof the sport brand are important to thesport consumer and emphasize themthroughout all of its marketing communi-cations.This is strategic brand communications.Strategic brand communications is impor-tant for several reasons. First, strategicbrand communications considers allcustomer groups (and potential customergroups) that the brand is attempting toserve. Strategic brand communicationsplaces the consumer first and the entireorganization adapts to focus on suppor-ting the brand communications to reachthe consumer. With such a focus, the mes-sages are more cohesive, consistent, andstrategically driven than they would beotherwise. Finally, strategic brand communications isimportant because it is crucial to maintainthe same voice in advertising messagesover time.Because the sport product is attempting tocreate meaningful associations over time,it only makes sense for the advertisingabout the brand to consistently emphasizeand attempt to promote and foster thosekey associations. This consistent communication is oftenreferred as “one voice communications.”

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