France’s young midfield superstar Paul Pogba sits at the centre of the impressive line-up up player ambassadors fronting official UEFA partner Adidas’ Euro 2016 activation.
Pogba’s unique style and strength of personality sees the host country’s most talked about player take the lead role amongst a galaxy of Adidas athlete ambassadors.
The official sportswear sponsor’s tournament work operates under the umbrella of the ongoing ‘First Never Follows’ big idea – which celebrates bold individuals with world-class talent.
The pre-tournament central video in an initiative focusing on individual skills and style is shot in real, everyday setting devoid of effects, bells and whistles to focus on the player personalities is led by a star trio of Pogba, Ozil and Suarez.
On pitch skills blend of personal players’ style off the pitch (from general swagger, to dance moves and haircuts) in a commercial tied together by an enthusiastic football fan filmed in front of his home
Posted on 20 May, the creative drives viewers online to the http://adidas.com/football site and to social channels through the #FirstNeverFollows hashtag.
The spot was amplified socially across all Adidas channels.
Imagine always being first. #FirstNeverFollowshttps://t.co/MfKYCPXe7k
— adidasfootball (@adidasfootball) May 20, 2016
Then, on the eve of the tournament itself, Adidas rolled out a central supporting pillar to the core commercial in the form of a Pogba-specific spot.
Featuring the player himself, it sees two youngsters playing football in the streets enthusiastically discussing Pogba’s trademark style, skills, celebrations, haircuts and, of course, boots (the French midfielder wears the new chrome coloured Ace 16+ PureControl).
This thread also spans trending goal celebrations and a bespoke player hashtag – #pogboom.
The aim is to portray how Pogba inspires young fans around the world and to drive home the Adidas marketing message that it’s not what you do, but how you do it that matters.
This strand includes plenty of digital and social support.
It's not what you do.
It's how you do it.@paulpogba never follows.#ACE16 #FirstNeverFollowshttps://t.co/NUSX9MoXc5— adidasfootball (@adidasfootball) June 9, 2016
‘I always aim to be a leader – by being the first in everything I do – on and off the pitch,’ says 23-year-old Pogba when discussing the campaign.
‘From being the first to try new skills to the first to showcase a fresh new style, being first is what inspires me and drives me to create moments that everyone remembers.’
Pogba, of course, isn’t the only player ambassador with his own creative. Adidas is rolling out start-specific spots and assets timed to coincide with relevant and important games.
So while the Pogba work launched around host nation France’s first game on 10 June, fellow Adidas star endorser Deli Ali was posted to coincide with Eng;land’s first match on 11 June,
and a Gareth Bale fronted a film that rolled out to leverage interest in the Wales v England game on 16 June.
Despite the increased focus on players, 16 June saw Adidas release a First Never Follows film focusing on the German national team – to leverage the Germany/Poland match.
The spot’s narrative story follows young German street footballers and their dream of one day playing for their country and mixes real game footage and ad-shot edits focusing on several current stars in various alternative guises.
For example, defender Mats Hummels is a bouncer keeping opposition attacks at bay, keeper Manuel Neuer wears a superman suit to show his ‘no fear’ attitude, playmaker Mesut Ozil hands out sweets to represent his creative, assist-led style of play, while forward Thomas Mueller issues the ad’s rallying cry – Stop dreaming. Start doing.
While prior to the France/Portugal final itself, on 10 July Adidas unveiled a giant ‘First Never Follows’ projection on to the façade of the Arc de Triomphe featuring legendary French midfielder Zinédine Zidane and new French side star Paul Pogba.
The projection onto one of the world’s most recognisable landmarks shows the face of Zidane with the accompanying words: ‘Écrire Sa Propre Histoire’ meaning ‘Write Your Own History’ and the projection then shows the faces of Zinédine Zidane and Paul Pogba together, before the message ends with the face of Pogba and the line ‘First Never Follows’.
Legends never follow.
Time for @paulpogba to write his name in history. #FirstNeverFollows pic.twitter.com/UTEZFhNT8e— adidasfootball (@adidasfootball) July 10, 2016
Following Portugal’s victory, the tournament’s official sporstwear partner adidas marked the team’s win with social content assets focusing on adidas player endorsers in the Portuguese team – including young midfielder Renato Sanches.
First Never Follows. @renatosanches35, @luisnani and @joaomoutinho: #EURO2016 Champions.#FirstNeverFollows pic.twitter.com/as2ylx7RBE
— adidasfootball (@adidasfootball) July 10, 2016
Despite both finalists teams being Nike kit partners and its fierce rival activating around Portugal’s win too.
Running beneath these strands are a set of boot-specific marketing pillars promoting Adidas’ new three-strong Mercury Pack chrome boot range.
(According to the brand designers, the chrome look is ‘inspired by the trophies the players are chasing this summer at Euro 2016 and Copa America).
This also runs under the #FirstNeverFollows campaign and consists of the ACE, X and Messi boot and each is fronted by one particular player endorser on the Adidas roster Pogba, Ozil, Suarez, Bale and Leo Messi.
Each boot is marketed around the skill set of Adidas’ top ambassadors:
The X16+ Purechaos is designed to deliver traction and stability for high-speed movements – it features a red colour sscheme and the work is fronted by Real Madrid and Wales forward Gareth Bale (known for his explosive pace).
The Ace 16+ Purecontrol offers a surface intended to assist ball control, comes in a green scheme and is fronted by France and Juventus’ Paul Pogba.
The Messi 16.1 boot features blue colouring and has been created to enhance Messi’s blend of speed and agility.
Adidas Football also celebrated Mercury Pack at an exclusive branded event in the heart of Paris on 14 June at at Cité de la Mode. This was attended by hundreds of Parisian influencers and trendsetters from all over the world who were treated to an exclusive DJ set by Agoria and a screening of the Belgium vs Italy match.
The rooftop location itself was decorated with “mercury” statues, designed to embody the fluidity of the pack.
‘Every player dreams about lifting trophies and creating a legacy for themselves. We wanted to create a range of boots that pays homage to that dream; that desire and ambition to be the best and to be first, not second,’ outlines Adidas vice president of design, Sam Handy.
The official supplier’s activity around the tournament also includes its Euro 2016 ‘Beau Jeu’ (‘beautiful game’) ball campaign which actuallt launched in late 2015 alongside a set of the brand’s official team kits with the #BeTheDifference hashtag in a week-long promotional programme.
At the centre of this week’s work was the ball launch – which began when Adidas ambassador Zinedine Zidane revealed the official Beau Jeu Euro 2016 ball to his 3.3 million Instagram followers.
The spearhead event itself saw Zidane joined by other stars like Xavi as well as teams of youngsters playing in new kits with the new balls on a branded pitch.
Indeed, this launch saw a neatly tiered November timeline to drive a week’s worth of social promotions across its own accounts to support the launch event itself.
9 November
A series of @adidasfootball tweets promoted Belgium, Northern Ireland, Denmark, Sweden, Bosnia & Herzeogovina and Germany home kit launches (and the German squad unveiled its new kit at Urban football centre ‘The Base’ in Berlin where rapper Carlo Waibel aka Cro performed on stage with players Lukas Podolski and Emre Can.
Am 9.11. in The BASE Berlin: @thisiscro x @DFB_team! Dein Ticket: https://t.co/oz6kWJltAd. #BeTheDifferencehttps://t.co/Z2Q0hliDdj
— adidasfussball (@adidasfussball) November 3, 2015
10 November
Spain and Russia home kits released.
Team Messi release social video of the Argentine juggling an orange along with #BeTheDifference hashtag driving 1,900 retweets in 72 hours.
11 November
Wales and Russia home kits unveiled (Spanish keeper and captain Iker Casillas posts a viral selfie with the squad in their new kit leading to more than 2,250 retweets).
Nueva equipación, nuevos retos. Preparados para defender lo nuestro. ¿La quieres? #BeTheDifference pic.twitter.com/NQdVd705mI
— Iker Casillas (@CasillasWorld) November 10, 2015
12 November
Wales, Bosnia, Northern Ireland, Sweden, Russia, Germany, Belgium and Spain away kits are launched.
The Germany team promotes a new reversible away kit at an Adidas event in Paris – the shirt turns into a training kit once folded inside out (the ‘Our pitch Our rules’ video of the German squad is posted on the Adidas Football YouTube channel and watched by more than 33,000 fans within 48 hours.
13 November
Spain, Germany, Northern Ireland, Belgium, Wales and Bosnia debut their new kits during international fixtures.
While other ongoing Adidas football campaigns running in parallel such as Adidas Gamedayplus 2015/16,
and Team Messi’s ‘Greatness – Episode 7’
In a further tournament innovation, 20 June saw adidas launch a new official Euro 2016 ball: the Fracas has been designed and deployed specifically as the Official Match Ball of the knock-out phase of France 2016.
The name, which in French translates as ‘clamour’, was chosen by some of the stars from the Parisian cultural scenes (from music, design and fashion) and aims to encapsulate the drama, unpredictability and excitement associated with knock-out football.
In contrast to the design of the ‘Beau Jeu’ ball – which aimed to reflect the tactical approaches adopted to the knock-out stages.
The ball was promoted with a launch event in Paris, plus a flagship film,
as well as via digital and social assets, plus in-store work.
‘The history of Adidas as a strong partner of UEFA goes back more than three decades and will continue to be an important pillar in our strategy to expand our global market leadership in football in the future,’ stated Adidas Group CEO Herbert Hainer.
Adidas has supplied the ball for the competition since 1984 and its UEFA partnership signed in 2009 saw it ensure official status to Euro 2012 and Euro 2016 and all other UEFA international competitions between 2010 and 2016 – including the European Under-21 Championship (2011, 2013, 2015 and 2017) and the European Women’s Championship (2013 and 2017).
This sees Adidas supply match balls and equip all staff, officials, referees, volunteers and ball-kids for all international team competitions in Europe during the period
As well as the player-led boots marketing, Adidas is also supplying nine of the 24 teams in Euro 2016 (Nike six, Puma five and wear Adidas kits, with Umbro, Joma, Macron and Errea also having single team deals in place) and the official match ball – ensuring a strong presence on what is a huge stage.
While you can make figures dance on tables when it comes to major sports properties, some estimates suggest that as many as 8.5bn will watch Euro 2016 on TV (ah hem – the world’s population is only 7.4bn)
Whichever way you look at it the tournament is a crucial part of Adidas’ global marketing mix.
The opportunity to leverage its rights to get closer to its huge audience is important to the German giant (especially considering its ongoing titanic struggle with rival Nike, fellow German competitor Puma and fast growing upstart Under Armour).
Comment
Does Adidas’ work look to be matching the popularity of fierce rival Nike’s hugely successful flagship ad staring Cristiano Ronaldo (see case study)?
Well, that depends on which set of statistics you look at.
While adidas doesn’t have a single blockbuster spot that comes anywhere close to Nike’s core commercial (its core ‘First Never Follow’s spot’ has racked up just 1.5m YouTube views compared to Nike’s 27m), the Adidas’ approach is taking a different approach – one more based around rolling out a tidal wave of real-time, responsive social and digital content pieces throughout the entire tournament.
These assets are attuned to the on-the-field action and aim to engage with different markets according to who is playing when.
Indeed, this campaign simply feels very ‘2016’ and well suited to ongoing social media conversation and tightly directed at the viewers through the whole tournament
Before the tournament kicked off, Adidas’ football’s 2.9m Twitter followers are easily outnumbered by Nike’s 4.6m and the gap is bigger on Facebook where Nike Football’s page boasts 42.2m followers compared to Adidas’ 21.8m.
But size isn’t everything (as Messi himself proves so wonderfully).
It is Adidas who currently boast greater engagement across Facebook, and, furthermore, Adidas’ social following has grown twice as fast as that of Nike in 2016 to date – with its higher engagement rates driven by its high level of video content (compared to Nike’s fewer photo-dominated postings).
The tournament activation programme is just part of Adidas 31% increase in total marketing spend in 2015/16 as it aims to fight against increasing competition and drive ‘long-term brand desire’.
This push will continue through Euro 2016 and on to the Rio Olympics in August as it aims to maximise ‘global brand buzz’ and close the gap with close rival Nike.
Indeed, Adidas estimates both sales and profits to both increase by between 10% and 12% for 2016 (in 2015 sales rose 10%).
‘2015 was a very successful year for the Adidas Group. We reached all of our major financial goals and exceeded our initial top- and bottom-line targets,’ said Adidas’ CEO Herbert Hainer earlier in 2016.
‘Our 2015 performance is a picture-perfect example of a successful comeback in sport. As a Group, today we are stronger and in better shape than ever before.’
‘2016 will be another successful stage in our race to becoming the best sports company in the world and achieving the Group’s long-term financial ambition. Our brands are benefiting from the ever-increasing relevance of sport in the lives of people around the globe,’ Hainer added.
‘Our products are in high demand with consumers in every part of the world. Our order books are full across all major performance and lifestyle categories. And our brands are set to shine at this year’s major sporting events. This gives us every confidence that we will again grow the top and bottom line at a double-digit rate this year.’
Links
Adidas Football Web:
http://www.adidas.co.uk/football
Adidas Football Twitter:
https://twitter.com/adidasfootball
Adidas Football YouTube:
https://www.youtube.com/user/adidasfootballtv
Adidas Football Google+:
https://plus.google.com/u/1/+adidasFootball/posts
Adidas Football Tumbrl:
http://adidasfootball.tumblr.com/
Euro 2016:
Euro 2016 Twitter:
Euro 2016 Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/uefaeuro
Euro 2016 YouTube:
https://www.youtube.com/UEFA.tv
Euro 2016 Instagram:
https://www.instagram.com/uefaeuro/
Euro 2016 Vine:
UEFA:
