Mid-January 2020 saw Under Armour leverage its celebrity endorser athletes for global campaign which seeks to ‘re-centre’ the global brand.
After years of prioritising promoting its products and technology, Under Armour is re-investing in its central brand with a new global ‘The Only Way Is Through’ platform with the objective of realigning the sportswear company as a brand that genuinely understands athletes’ drive to push limits and to break “through” pain and mental barriers.
The new strategy was unveiled by founder and executive chairman Kevin Plank at the National Retail Federation’s ‘Big Show’ in early January which linked to a major pre-launch PR push.
Created in-house, the initiative spans broadcast TV commercials, long-form film, a social series, podcasts, media partnerships, OOH, OTT work, experiential activity and influencer content.
The creative features an impressive team of athlete endorsers – including basketball MVP Stephen Curry, swimming legend Michael Phelps, Olympic gold medalist Kelley O’Hara, NFL legend Tom Brady and volleyball world champion Zhu Ting – who all appear in their natural, blood-pumping environments and show the innder fire that drives their work ethic in the campaign’s rapid-cut hero film.
The spearhead’s spot message is clear: ‘getting better isn’t easy and there are no shortcuts, no cheat codes and no quick fixes. It’s only work.’
“Listen, you’re more than your successes, you’re more than your failures – you’re the work,” a voiceover says during a 90-second anthem spot.
Linked by the #TheOnlyWayIsThrough hashtag, the hero ad (which debuted online and on US broadcast networks and which will also air on Fox sports streaming sites during the 2 February Super Bowl) was immediately followed by a rich vein of content across all of the brand’s channels and platforms.
Getting better isn’t easy. There are no shortcuts. No cheat codes. No quick fixes. It’s only work. #TheOnlyWayIsThrough pic.twitter.com/GKCJq8Sczu
— Under Armour (@UnderArmour) January 14, 2020
It was supported by plenty of amplification from the brand’s athlete ambassador stable on their own personal channel – such as Lindsey Vonn and Joel Embiid.
Nothing in life is easy,especially my last season. Trying to workout and prepare for my final season with a town LCL and 3 major fractures,but I always found a way through! I never stopped working. Never stopped trying.Believe in your goal, mission, path #theonlywayoutisthrough pic.twitter.com/IQvAHBRqTZ
— lindsey vonn (@lindseyvonn) January 14, 2020
#UAEmbiid1 @underarmour the only way is through pic.twitter.com/VKyJegsgMj
— Joel Embiid (@JoelEmbiid) January 14, 2020
The campaign will build and evolve through the year as various elements – such as this motivational personal letter from Michael Phelps – roll out.
Indeed, the new campaign marks the start of a fresh 360-degree marketing strategy which will see Under Armour market itself across every channel – from upper-funnel marketing to sports moments marketing (where it athletes show up) – to ensure it is increasing consideration amongst consumers.
Under Armour’s reports that it has put major investment behind ‘The Only Way and has flown its teams around the world to capture its roster of athletes in their natural environments and is now executing a broad and deep media plan.
As the campaign evolves it will include Out-Of-Home and OTT streaming buys and the brand is also trialing new formats and strands as it seeks to get consumers engaging more deeply with its athlete ambassadors and thus also with the brand.
The fresh formats and platforms include Under Armour’s first podcast series with iHeartRadio which is designed to act as a platform for elite athletes to tell stories about their training regimes.
Launching as an eight-partner, the podcast series is hosted by interviewer Call Fussman and the aim is to attract a ‘captive audience’ which will allow the brand to experiment with long-form storytelling for the first time.
Thus there is also a set of longer format video storytelling on YouTube.
Under Armour also brokered a deal with The Players’ Tribune which will see its star endorsers write about their sporting experiences.
The sportswear brand is also ramping up its investment in experiential initiatives in order to offer consumers better access to its athletes, trainers, grassroots and collegiate partners with a major city based focus in global centres such as New York, London and Shanghai.
The initiative was developed in-house under the guidance of chief marketing officer Alessandro de Pestel and vice-president of global brand creative Brian Boring.
Under Armour believes it was important to build the brand campaign internally to maximise its authenticity and to re-centre the brand around an emotional focal point which was genuine.
The company’s in-house agency is growing again and returning to the marketing forefront after period during which Under Armour favoured working with various creative agencies for the past decade.
Under Armour’s media division worked with Digitas North America and Spark on media buying.
“In the last few years we’ve thrown a lot of different campaigns out there and we’re thrown a lot of different messaging out into the marketplace,” explained Boring.
“A lot of it was product focused and a lot of it was category focused, and we didn’t really have one centralized theme that all of our athletes and out brand could rally around. That’s something we’d done really well in the past and we wanted to get back to that. We wanted to make sure we had one central idea that all of our storytelling could ladder off of and just get back to what makes us really strong.”
So the new approach sees Under Armour place its commitment to elite, high performance athletes at the core of its brand and it campaigns – rather than putting its products, technical innovations and fashion trends in the spotlight.
Comment:
The objective behind this new brand platform is to position Under Armour as a real leader in the competitive athletic space and to help drive sales (despite the company being under investigation for improper business practices by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Justice Department over its accounting practices).
“We want to be a really quiet company and a really loud brand,” said Plank at NRF’s Big Show. “For the past three years we’ve been in the engine room rebuilding the company and the new ad campaign embraces a customer who “needs a dream,” regardless of gender or age, and not just another capable athleticwear or footwear manufacturer.
Under Armour is the third-largest athletic brand in the USA (behind Nike and Adidas), but since its early impressive years of growth it has more recently found it challenging to appeal to new customers.
Perhaps because it lacked the kind of strong brand identity its bigger two rivals have?
We can’t help but feel that the message isn’t that dissimilar from its 2018 ‘Will Finds A Way’ brand refresh fronted by Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson who was positioned as a motivator to the masses (see case study).
Links:
Under Armour
https://www.youtube.com/user/underarmour
https://twitter.com/UnderArmour
https://www.facebook.com/UnderArmou
https://www.instagram.com/underarmour
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