Mercedes Boosts German Team Spirit With Euro 16 #ViveLaMannschaft Work

Mercedes is activating is sponsorship of the German national football team at UEFA Euro 2016 through its multi-platform, multi-phase ‘Vive La Mannschaft’ campaign celebrating team spirit.

The multi-phase campaign, linked under the #ViveLaMannschaft hashtag, blends the auto giant’s upmarket positioning with a touch of Franco-German and at its core aims to bring German fans closer to its team, the players, the brand and some of its new, event specific ‘The Score’ models (including the new CLA and CLA Shooting Brake, plus the A, B ,GLA and V- class all with the composite logo DFB / Mercedes- Benzs on the side doors and the four stars of world champion).

‘Our national team is a model of performance, teamwork and mutual respect,’ explains Mercedes-Benz marketing VP Jens Thiemer.

‘They [the team] are the ideal ambassador for our summer models, SCORE !, on the grass and on the road.’

The Euro 2016 focused initiative, which translates literally as ‘Long Live The Team’, is being developed in harness with the brand’s core agency Antoni and first launched a full three months before the tournament kicked off.

The first creative in the campaign rolled out in early February with an initial TV and online spot that racked up more than 1m YouTube views and which introduces ‘die Score’ special models.

This was followed by the next phase of the initiative which launched in mid/late March promoting the campaign’s ‘One team, one goal , one motto: Vive La Team #1’ tagline with two further spots called ‘Vive La Mannschaf” #1’

and Vive La Mannschaft” #2,

as well as the ticket giveaway campaign strand ‘Vive La Mannschaft – Ticketjagd zum Länderspiel in Berlin’.

This phase was further supported by an explanatory, documentary-style ‘Making Of’ online film.

as well as social support across the auto outfit’s own channels – including Instagram.

Das Länderspieljahr 2016 beginnt. Große Aufgaben fordern eine besondere Mentalität: Zuversicht, Respekt und Zusammenhalt! Kurz gesagt: #ViveLaMannschaft #Gündogan #Hummels #Schweinsteiger #Neuer #Boateng #Özil #Kroos #DieMannschaft #DFB #DFBteam

A photo posted by Mercedes-Benz Fußball (@mercedesbenzfussball) on Mar 21, 2016 at 10:47am PDT

In late May, as the tournament drew nearer to kick-off, the brand’s next campaign phase ignited with creative spanning images of cars, players, cityscapes and stadiums to symbolize both the journey to France but the travel experience that every driver can enjoy when driving a Mercedes-Benz.

This phase was timed to leverage interest in and around the German squad announcement for the tournament, a further core phase was launched led by a 65-second 360° TV commercial,

backed by a 15-second cut-down

(which generated 500,000-plus YouTube views between them).

This strand was supported by a matching set of social media assets,

Auf dem Rasen, auf der Tribüne, vor den Bildschirmen: Hand aufs Herz und gemeinsam zum Titel! #ViveLaMannschaft https://t.co/GqxWQPWSxT

— MercedesBenzFußball (@mbfussball) May 27, 2016

Kroos' zentrale Rolle, Özils Läufe & die falsche 9: Entscheidende Faktoren von #GERHUN: https://t.co/zDpaXS1OrD pic.twitter.com/Tua6pv3fbW

— MercedesBenzFußball (@mbfussball) June 5, 2016

which also included squad GIFs

DFB-Stars im "Ohne-Worte"-Interview. Teil 1: "Wie seht ihr aus, wenn ihr Mitspielern einen Beinschuss verpasst?" pic.twitter.com/gjqp2e2XRY

— MercedesBenzFußball (@mbfussball) June 6, 2016

and individual player content pieces for stars of the team’s France-bound squad such as Jerome Boateng, Sami Khedira, Toni Kroos, İlkay Gündoğan, Mesut Ozil, Bastian Schweinsteiger and Manuel Neuer – who all feature in different Mercedes models in various campaign creative executions.

Das Team steht im Mittelpunkt! Wahre Worte von Kapitän @BSchweinsteiger. #ViveLaMannschaft pic.twitter.com/On1B6g9vUZ

— MercedesBenzFußball (@mbfussball) June 7, 2016

Auf dem Platz steht jeder für seinen Nebenmann ein! @JB17Official über erfolgreiche Teams. #ViveLaMannschaft pic.twitter.com/WQSJKcqMOw

— MercedesBenzFußball (@mbfussball) June 5, 2016

This wave of work was further supported by radio spots and an animation on social networks.

As the tournament evolves additional activation elements are being deployed from a brackets-style wallchart to on-pitch social media reactive assets.

Guten Morgen, liebe Tabellenführer! #GERUKR #ViveLaMannschaft pic.twitter.com/hP5GmFA18e

— MercedesBenzFußball (@mbfussball) June 13, 2016

Comment

The premium car brand is the top tier partner of the Deutscher Fußball-Bund (DFB) and has a long track record as a team partner as it first signed up as a supporter of the German FA in 1990

This Euro 2016 push follows in the footsteps of the upmarket car brand’s last series of DFB sponsorship spots activating the auto brand’s German national team partnership following its Brazil 2014 World Cup win.

This previous work spanned a December 2012 campaign built around the final’s winning goal scorer Mario Götze called ‘Portrait of a Fighter’ (which also generated 1m YouTube views),

and the star player’s ongoing brand ambassador activity such as fronting the launch marketing for the CLA 45 AMG in May 2013.

Links

Mercedes-Benz Football Web:

http://mercedes-benz-fussball.de

Mercedes-Benz Football YouTube:

http://youtube.com/mercedesbenzfussball

Mercedes-Benz Football Instagram:

http://instagram.com/mercedesbenzfuss…

Mercedes-Benz Football Twitter:

http://twitter.com/mbfussball

Mercedes-Benz Score Models:
http://benz.me/score04

Antoni Web:

http://www.antoni.de/