Reebok 2012 Annual Report Download - page 102

adidas Group
/
2012 Annual Report
Group Management Report – Our Group
80
2012
Global Brands Strategy
/
02.3
/
For example, at adidas, we focus our R&D efforts on advanced
cushioning solutions, lightweight and digital sports technologies as well
as sustainable product innovation to ensure we continuously improve
the consumer’s experience with our products. At Reebok, the innovation
focus is on fitness, where the priority is creating products that enhance
and improve the consumer’s fitness activities and help them reach – or
exceed – their fitness goals
/
SEE RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT, P. 105.
By creating inspiring product and brand experiences, adidas and Reebok
strive to enhance their positions as premium brands. This, in turn, is
an important catalyst for sustaining and improving the brands’ gross
margins, making continuous innovation an important enabler for future
profitability improvements.
Marketing and communication leadership
To be competitive in the sporting goods industry, brands must have a
clear profile towards their target consumer. To achieve this, adidas
and Reebok are focused on creating inspirational and innovative brand
marketing campaigns and developing communication techniques that
strengthen their positioning, build brand equity and thus support the
achievement of the Group’s commercial goals.
A key tenet of our marketing and communication strategy is to harness
the emotion of sport and the benefits of a sporting lifestyle across all
communication channels. Both adidas and Reebok regularly bring new
global marketing concepts to life, which can be easily leveraged to create
simple and powerful brand messages and support an array of product
offerings.
In addition, Global Brands also endeavours to ensure all of its brands
are at the forefront of new communication techniques, particularly
as the information flow becomes faster and faster. To increase the
pace and relevance of our brands’ communication with the consumer,
digital marketing now acts as a backbone for all brand marketing
activities. Whether through in-store or online customisation platforms,
digital social networks, mobile apps or digital broadcast mediums,
these methods are providing a new scope of consumer experience in
a real-time and cost-efficient way. With consumers spending more
time online, the adidas and Reebok digital strategies allow the brands
to move from campaign-based communication to developing deeper
relationships with their respective target audience. In addition to adding
significant value to all our communication efforts, our digital marketing
and social interaction with consumers also provide the brands with
accessible insights, learnings and measurable results, which in turn can
be utilised to drive long-term brand equity.
In 2012, adidas celebrated the breadth and depth of the brand across
sports, street and style through several brand campaigns. These
campaigns focused on increasing engagement with our core audience
by leveraging multiple digital platforms, including the launch of the
new adidas.com “go all in” platform, providing new levels of access
to our products, athletes, celebrities and events. The ClimaCool and
Predator Lethal Zones campaigns alone reached over 330 million
consumers worldwide. In 2013, adidas will further leverage its brand
assets, product initiatives and major sporting events locally, globally and
across categories, with the goal of engaging in deeper conversations
with its key audience, both online and offline. Innovation messaging is
a key priority for the brand in 2013, and it will focus on using innovative
ways to continue those deeper conversations, amplifying the product
innovations that will be showcased throughout the year while taking the
brand experience to the next level.
In 2012, Reebok launched one of its largest integrated marketing
campaigns in recent years: “The Sport of Fitness Has Arrived”. This
multi-touchpoint campaign leveraged traditional media such as TV, print
and in-store, but carried an even higher emphasis on digital and social
media elements, including a re-launched Reebok.com site, as well as a
number of impactful grassroots activities. Through the lens of the fitness
movement – CrossFit – Reebok introduced consumers around the world
to a new way of approaching fitness, making Reebok’s passion for fitness
apparent to all who engaged with the brand. The goal of the campaign
was to highlight to consumers the fun, passion and camaraderie that
fitness can deliver, showcasing that everything they love about sport can
be found in fitness.
In 2013, Reebok will speak with a united voice for all its Fitness
categories and Classics. The global campaign “Live With Fire” aims to
inspire people to join the community of movement and demonstrates the
positive impact being fit can have on people’s lives.
Activation and validation via a relevant set of
promotion partnerships
The utilisation of promotion partners such as federations, teams,
leagues, events and individuals is an important part of endorsing
brand positioning, and an area to which the Group dedicates
significant resources. This not only serves as a vehicle to showcase the
credentials of adidas and Reebok products in the performance arena,
it also facilitates the extension of the adidas and Reebok brands in
the sports-inspired lifestyle market. Both adidas and Reebok follow a
partnership strategy geared to best reflect their respective positioning
in the market.