Sports equipment and apparel retailer Sport Chek has launched a new digital advertising campaign that features elite soccer players performing feats of fancy footwork.
The campaign, designed with the help of Montreal-based agency Sid Lee, includes several online videos of varying lengths. The videos were shot in downtown Toronto on Monday as a series of small-scale flash mobs. Soccer players performing tricks interacted with passersby, some of whom demonstrated skills equal to the players.
Short videos of the event are available now on sites such as YouTube and Yahoo. A special “making-of” video will also be available on the Sport Chek Facebook page. These videos will also be part of a larger digital media buy, which will roll-out over the coming weeks.
Duncan Fulton, chief marketing officer at Sport Chek, said the objective of the campaign is to present the retailer as a prime source of apparel and equipment for spring activity. He also said the campaign fits in with Sport Chek’s longer-term brand positioning goals.
“Overall, Sport Chek is evolving to a brand position of providing the ‘inspiration for a better you,’” Fulton wrote in an e-mail.
The online campaign also exemplifies a shift in strategic direction, articulated by Fulton in a November, 2011 Marketing article, that has seen Sport Chek place greater emphasis on digital as a primary marketing channel.
“We started breaking the mould late last year when we pulled holiday TV advertising in favour of digital marketing,” said Fulton in his e-mail today. “Our spring ‘soccer mob’ online advertising is another example of trying something new.
“Instead of a half-million-dollar production and a few million in TV buys, we shot an inspiring spring ‘TV’ ad for less than $40,000 and plan to run it exclusively online.”
Fulton said Sport Chek was also planning to move toward a strategy of using everyday Canadians and Canadian locations for commercial shoots, as opposed to professional models and non-Canadian locales.
