In addition to the national football team, the top domestic brands have come to make money.
Whale Merchant (ID: bizwhale) Original Author | Xiaojie
The highly anticipated 2022 Qatar World Cup has finally begun.
As one of the sports events with the greatest commercial value, brand marketing in the World Cup is even more fierce. The big investment of Chinese brands makes it a highlight and the biggest "financial". According to data from British research firm Global Data, Chinese companies have hit a new high in sponsorships in this World Cup.
For example, four companies, Wanda , Mengniu , Hisense , and vivo sponsored (about 10 billion yuan) for this World Cup, exceeding US$1.1 billion for US companies. These marketing measures such as
not only reflect the overseas ability of domestic brands, but also play a demonstration effect for domestic brands of the same category. How to use the third pole regional sponsorship to enhance brand potential has become a compulsory course in major brand strategies.
Food and beverages won the "first"
Affected by the epidemic, it is expected that the number of live viewers in the 2022 Qatar World Cup will be less than the last Russian World Cup. However, this has not affected Chinese companies' determination to continue to build a world brand with the help of this world's top football event.
This year's Qatar World Cup official sponsors, and Chinese companies account for 6 seats (there were 7 last year) : Wanda Group is a FIFA partner, Hisense Group , Mengniu Dairy, and vivo are FIFA World Cup sponsors, Yadi , BOSS direct recruitment are sponsors of FIFA World Cup Asia Pacific.
In addition to the six official World Cup sponsors, many food and beverage brands are taking advantage of the marketing.
For example, Yili . Although it is not among the official sponsors of this World Cup, it still joins hands with four football teams including the Argentine national team, the Portuguese national team, the Spanish national team, and the German national team. It also signed a contract with powerful star players such as C Ronaldo , Beckham, Wu Lei , and Benzema to form the Dream Team.
Yili launched the Yili Football Dream Team limited edition in Tmall flagship store , and also launched the first "horizontal package" milk. The packaging screen is the photos of endorsement stars Cristiano Ronaldo, Beckham and others.
And Yili also sells products in the form of blind boxes, so consumers can predict the results of the game. These strategies have inspired consumers to love and participate in the World Cup.
Secondly, Mengniu, who joined the sponsor camp for the second time after the 2018 World Cup in Russia, signed Messi and Mbappe as the brand spokesperson, released 12 World Cup historical series packaging, and launched the emotional promotional film "Youth is only a few World Cups".
During this year's "Double 11", Mengniu released its customized packaging products for the World Cup 32 online. It also launched a new "change" ice cream with team color matching as packaging to expand new consumer groups. During the World Cup, no matter which team scored a goal, Mengniu would give away 1,000 boxes of milk for free the next day, fully mobilizing consumers' sense of participation and interaction.
Mengniu's brand Daily Fresh Language is the official designated fresh milk for FIFA World Cup, and has launched the "Salute to Legend" World Cup benchmark number bottle. Mark the iconic number of the legendary World Cup star on the number bottle, and cleverly incorporate the "benchmark" jerseys of the arena in the bottle design, and use 7/9/10/11 to create a benchmark number bottle combination.
reflects the legendary story of the players represented by the bottle design, and also highlights the product's benchmark quality as a high-end fresh milk. In addition, Daily Xianyu has also made the benchmark number bottle into a collection of users.
In addition to traditional dairy products, drinking some beer is indispensable when watching the World Cup. This year, Qingdao Beer creates an immersive marketing experience for consumers through the integration of multiple channels. As early as October, Qingdao Beer launched football theme products such as lion head painting, dreadlocks singing cheering, and moxican flag shaking.In November, Qingdao Beer launched another football carnival party, which is the "watching party" of TSINGTAO 1903 Qingdao Beer Bar throughout the country.
You need to order "drink dishes" when drinking, so food brands are not willing to fall behind. Panpan Food first officially reached a strategic cooperation with the Argentine national football team in in September, playing the World Cup slogan "Fight together and win quickly!", and provided nutritional support for the Argentine national football team members in this World Cup.
In addition, Panpan Food has also made a customized World Cup outfit and launched Argentine Matte Tea flavored wheat-flavored chicken cubes, Panpan Leopard Fleet Energy Drink and other products, allowing Chinese fans to taste the rural flavor of Argentina when chasing the game in front of the TV.
Consumer electronics catching up with "fashionable"
As a "frequently visitor" of the World Cup, Hisense Group participated in the World Cup in Russia as early as 2018. Hisense also appeared in the 2020 European Cup and the 2022 Qatar World Cup. At the same time, Hisense's global popularity increased from 37% to 59%; overseas sales revenue increased from 19.6 billion yuan to 72.5 billion yuan, overseas revenue accounted for from less than 20% to 41.3%, and domestic brands accounted for more than 80%.
At this Qatar World Cup, although Hisense has launched several laser TV (short-focus projection) products, it still regards TV as the main product of the World Cup, and has joined hands with Haidilao to carry out hot pot and watch football activities in stores across the country.
TCL also launched a TV product equipped with new display technology, and repeated the combination strategy of sponsoring teams + star players in the last World Cup, and carried out offline football interactive flash in many places across the country.
Another frequent visitor of the World Cup - vivo, is also an electronic product brand. In 2017, vivo announced that it would become a 6-year global sponsorship cooperation with FIFA, becoming the only official sponsorship partner of the World Cup mobile phone industry.
In 2018, vivo launched the extraordinary version of the X21 Mobile World Cup. On September 26 this year, vivo released the folding flagship "vivo X Fold+" and became one of the world's official mobile phones in the 2022FIFA Qatar World Cup. This is after the 2017 Federation Cup , 2018 Russia World Cup , and 2021 Arab Cup, vivo has made another appearance on the world football stage.
Now vivo suddenly released three new phones, and the vivo X90 series has been officially released. As a new vivo mobile phone jointly established by the World Cup, it has quickly gained extremely high popularity, and their competitiveness is also very strong.
What is more noteworthy is that this year's hot-selling products are somewhat different from those in the past. Popular products are no longer just toys, jerseys, figures and other peripheral products. On the contrary, it is "football watching artifacts" such as VR all-in-one machines, projectors, and large-screen TVs, allowing fans to immerse themselves in the game at home.
According to relevant data, since August 2022, the sales data of projectors produced in my country in the Brazilian market have increased by 250%. Projectors launched by brands such as Tmall Magic Screen, , Xiaomi , and Nut have arranged World Cup-related slogans on the details page.
Dangbei Projection is a new brand sponsor of this World Cup. Since entering the projection field in 2019, it has been the top two brands of home smart projection in three years. Its products are more accepted among young people and new middle-class people. This time, Dangbei X3 is also the flagship projector of Dangbei projection, and it sponsors our "good brother" Serbian national team in this World Cup.
This made Dangbei's overseas trip process smoother, and while gaining more exposure in foreign markets, it avoided the fierce projector war in China.
According to Meituan data, three days before the World Cup, the number of product orders for platform projectors increased by 211% year-on-year, increased by 27% month-on-month, and the order volume of products such as audio and video conversion lines also increased by 225% and 115% year-on-year respectively. The sales of "watching the game" such as routers and WIFI signal enhancers also became popular simultaneously.
It can be seen that the World Cup once again made domestic food brands and electronic brands popular.
Internet platform traffic is "rolled" again
The popularity of the World Cup is also inseparable from the fuel of domestic video websites and Internet platforms. For example, the participation of Migu Video , Douyin , and Xiaohongshu.
First of all, as early as the 2018 World Cup, with the support of broadcasting rights, Migu once exceeded 12 million daily active users, with more than 10 million new users, and more than 30 million active users in the competition month, an increase of more than 90%.
However, with the end of the World Cup, the number of monthly active users of Migu suddenly dropped to less than 15 million in two months, and it was not until the opening of the 2021 Tokyo Olympics that it saw a significant increase again.
This time, Migushi added a new gameplay of the World Cup "Meta Universe" and invited many stars to participate in the "Dynamic Zone World Cup Music Festival·Miguhui". Let's wait and see how many high-net-worth users can be retained in the end.
Secondly, Douyin has seen Kuaishou have previously won the cooperative broadcast rights for large-scale competitions such as Winter Olympics , Tokyo Olympics, and CBA. This time, he spent 1 billion yuan to win the World Cup broadcasting rights and increase the investment in the sports track.
In order to ensure the professionalism of broadcasting, Douyin invited Sun Jihai, Xie Hui, Li Yi, Guan Zeyuan, and others as commentators. At the same time, Bai Yansong, Lu Han, , Nie Weiping, Pan Xiaoting, Su Xing , Wu Dajing, , Wu Lei, Xu Xin, and others as guests.
In order to allow hearing-impaired groups to better experience the charm of football, Douyin has launched the "Accessible Live Room" function while bringing full-time and 4K ultra-high-definition free live broadcasts. With the help of Volcano 's technical ability to simultaneously transmit , it provides low-latency event commentary subtitles.
However, a large number of users left messages saying that the broadcast and commentary of Migu Video are relatively more professional, and Douyin still has room for improvement.
Finally, Xiaohongshu, which is mainly female users, also joined the World Cup marketing war. A few months ago, Xiaohongshu invited star players such as Zidane, Mourinho , and Simeone to join Xiaohongshu, and also sponsored the Spanish and Belgian teams.
The reason why Xiaohongshu does this is because there are more female users in Xiaohongshu. The introduction of players and topics to the World Cup can attract male users to join and strengthen the platform's community attributes.
In terms of professionalism, Xiaohongshu is not as good as Migu Video, who has been engaged in sports events for a long time; in terms of financial strength, Xiaohongshu is not as generous as Douyin. But Xiaohongshu still wants to broaden the boundaries of the platform and launch activities such as casual watching football and drinking beer, betting and getting coupons. It can be regarded as a small sprint before the listing.
The phenomenon of many brands joining the market, exposing themselves and making quick money is common. However, most brands can only obtain short-term high exposure, driving the weak development of the category. If you want to enhance your brand reputation or bring real users to the platform, it is a different matter. Although the Chinese brand
has become the biggest "funding host" of the World Cup, compared with the "sophisticated work" of sports events by brands such as Coca-Cola, Adidas, etc., the cross-border marketing system built, and mature routines.
domestic brands need to continue their efforts. In the future, how to strengthen the global voice of Chinese brands will not only rely on brand sponsorship, but also depends on whether they have high-quality creativity, overseas ability, supporting measures and other aspects.
