Introduction
Despite being the most valuable brand name in global sport, America has always been an elusive target for Manchester United – until now. As part of their American tour in July and August 2011, Manchester United needed to promote and support the tour as a way to begin engagement with the young American market (as well as leveraging the brand’s existing iconic status).
Strategy
America is an important market for the Manchester United brand, so - in promoting the tour – the club needed a strong look and feel that would convey an affinity with American audiences as well as engaging them in a longer-term dialogue. It was important that we communicated the elements of Manchester United and America without being too clichéd and turned a small budget into something altogether bigger and more engaging.
Below the line promotion
Having been tasked with creating a limited-edition poster to be distributed at each of the six tour venues, we presented four possible creative executions for the poster. All four routes were liked so much that it was agreed to produce all four as posters.
Viral/Marketing/Online Promotion
One particular poster execution – a stars and stripes flag made from United shirts – was so well liked that we were tasked with creating a viral video (linked via a QR code on the poster) as a way to further engage with the American audience. The one minute viral film (posted on YouTube and Vimeo) showed the flag - made entirely from 1000 United shirts - mystically coming to life by itself.
Results
The viral achieved well over 30,000 hits (over 4,000 coming in one afternoon alone) on both YouTube and Vimeo. Given the lack of seeding, all of this volume clearly came from pass-on distribution – a great endorsement for the video itself.
Reflecting on the commercial successes of the tour, United Chief Executive, David Gill commented “The world is very important to Manchester but America at the moment is particularly important…The commercial aspects of the tour have gone very well, we're very happy with it…it's a notable change even from last year”.
Gaining recognition and peer-to-peer distribution for a viral is hard – no matter how well-known your brand is. Without using Manchester United players or resorting to gratuitous nudity or swearing, we gained a substantial new engagement from a key audience in a core market. Manchester United now have a platform from which to build sustained dialogue and hopefully continued support over the forthcoming years. Watch out America – the Mancs are coming!