Marketing Shots – Man U, AFL, Detroit Lions and Fitness First Update

This not one of my traditional posts where I try and encourage comments and discussion but I have a few little “Marketing Shots” that I wanted to share with you …

EPL Ambush Marketing Opportunity

I was watching the Man U vs Arsenal game at Old Trafford on the weekend. Have you seen the plush seats that the subs, coaching staff et al get to sit on? They are basically leather car racing seats. Nice big red ones with Man U logo and the Audi logo on it. Sneaky thing is that they also make the visiting team sit on the Man U/Audi branded red seats as well. Bet Wenger, Benetiz and co hate that!

So why don’t the opposition take their own club branded covers to slip over the top. Bet that would piss off Man U! They’d probably get in trouble but geez it would be funny and the visiting club’s sponsor would get heaps of publicity (and probably a round of applause from everyone that hates Man U).

Noel Gallagher would probably be impressed by this tactic. Gallagher said, after the Arabs bought Man City, that “Every time a Manchester United supporter fills up their car with petrol, they put a little more into Manchester City's transfer budget”.

The AFL Thinks I Shouldn’t Miss a Game of NRL

I was looking up the broadcast guide the other day for the AFL and a banner ad for Foxtel IQ was running at the top of the page. Here are two screen shots of the dynamic banner ad. Anything strike you as odd?

I would have at least thought the AFL would think its own product was more unmissable than a rival codes.

Over Paid Graphic Designers

Saw this snippet in the SMH the other week … talk about crazy!

Fitness First Case Study Update

Thanks to Hayley_Gleeson, poptrashmusic (do you have a link?), James Duthie, Hayley_Gleeson (again :), Matt Moore, Zac Martin (barely) and Rowan Wilde who all provided great comments, and very lengthy ones at that on my post about Fitness First and Can You Force Word of Mouth. It looks like it is a great way to get you all involved rather than the deliver a “sermon from the mount” which might not leave much room for you guys to add yours smarts to.

No word from Fitness First yet so they either don’t monitor this space or don’t care. Anyway, I am going to make sure they have seen all your comments as they are very insightful and they might just learn a thing or two.

The only thing I want to add is that they should put the power of recommendation more in the member’s hand. They present themselves as a polished brand, and even go to great lengths and cost to create a flashy magazine, but they don’t even email me with updates, newsletters, offers etc.

It doesn’t take much to promote the refer a friend scheme (with all your comments taken on board) through email and provide me with the ability to send it on to people who I think might be interested who could then contact Fitness First if they wanted. It would certainly get the relationship off on the right foot.

Plus, with the technology available today (e.g. www.emma.com which I use at work) they could track which members were forwarding on their emails and to who.

Thanks also to Mumbrella who provide some link love for the Fitness First post.