It’s January, and living in Tampa that means in less than a week we’ll be hosting the College Football National Playoff game. Although I personally won’t be there, I will be able to hear the roar from the nearby stadium. I’ve watched them build even larger screens and spruce up for most of 2016, all to be ready to host a great game of college football. As I’ve watched the final preparations underway, it’s gotten me thinking about the marketing aspects of football. How can marketers use this game, and the quickly approaching Super Bowl game, to our advantage?
Targeting Sports Fans and Millennials
While the Super Bowl is famous for its advertising, those ads are also famously expensive. Luckily for the rest of us who aren’t ready to purchase million-dollar ads, there’s data. Nearly half of marketers in a Forbes survey agreed that there are a number of tangible benefits as a result of data-driven marketing.
There are lots of different options you can choose from when trying to identify sports fans for your targeted campaigns throughout major events like the Super Bowl or the college football championship game. For example, identifying college students, education levels or recent college graduates can give you a group to target your audience for the College Football National Playoff. Capturing younger Millennials, who are very brand loyal, while they are still college age is a great way to secure future customers.
Similarly, you could get a list of consumers who are interested in sports (available in multiple leading national databases offered on AccuLeads) to target sports-lovers during the Playoffs, Super Bowl and other upcoming sporting events.
Using Digital Advertising for Major Sporting Events
Did you know that 84% of smartphone and tablet owners say that they use their devices while watching TV at the same time? People you’re trying to reach with marketing messages are using their phones to search for information about what they’re watching. One of the other most popular activities is social watching: about one million Americans are on social channels sharing reactions on Facebook, Twitter and other platforms.
What this means for you is that your audience is online, searching for further information, reacting to what they’re seeing – and in prime position for you to place targeted ads!
When website visitors land on your page, they may or may not choose to make a purchase right then. However, it’s been shown that when you retarget ads at those same visitors you’re much more likely to get a conversion. As visitors during major sporting events find your website, make sure you’re ready to reach them. Digital retargeting is an easy way to increase your purchases from website visitors.
Another way that digital retargeting can be used is by directly reaching those in the venue. Here in Tampa, the college playoffs will be hosted at Raymond James Stadium. If you were to decide you want to, you can display ads to any sports fans who visit the stadium. After the game is over, you can also continue targeting this same audience with your marketing messages.
Last, but certainly not least, you can reach all those folks who are firing up their phones to react on social media by using social advertising. Your prospects are already on social channels while they’re watching major sporting events, so why not market to them right where they are? Using social media advertising can give a great boost to your brand awareness during sporting events.
What strategies are you using to reach consumers during major sporting events in 2017? Let us know!