Saic Motor Football Advertising Case Study Introduction

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SAIC MOTOR FOOTBALL ADVERTISING CASE STUDY INTRODUCTION

PROJECT11

Played by 250 million people in more than 200 countries, football is the world’s most popular sport. It is therefore unsurprising to find advertising in the world’s most prestigious football leagues has become a valuable and unique indicator of brand awareness, campaign success, customer relations and consumer opinion.

Here at Project11, we specialise in helping brands tap into this global phenomenon by offering unrivalled advertising opportunities at the world’s top sporting events. We are best known for our rights in English and Spanish football, featuring the biggest and richest clubs in the world. We deliver a platform of innovative perimeter LED advertising, exciting sponsorship and partner opportunities, enabling brands around the world to connect with their audience. This report focuses on the exposure and impact achieved for SAIC Motor by advertising at top level La Liga matches during the 2017-18 season.

SAIC MOTOR INTERNATIONAL

SAIC Motor Corporation Limited (SAIC Motor) is the largest auto company on China’s A-share market. SAIC Motor strives to grasp the trend of industrial development and speed up the innovation-driven industrial transformation, as well as growing into a full-range vehicle products and travel services provider, from a traditional manufacturing enterprise.

Their core values are to bulid an innovative, globally recognized company that pioneers the automotive future. With the inclusion of integrity, responsibllity and collaboration, SAIC Motor aim to create value for stakeholders through a market- driven strategy. SAIC’s affiliated vehicle companies include Morris Garages, SAIC MAXUS, SAIC Volkswagen, SAIC-GM, Shanghai General Motors Wuling (SGMW), NAVECO, SAIC-IVECO Hongyan and Shanghai Sunwin Bus Corp (SUNWIN). SAIC Motor are a company with a huge global footprint with 11 offices spanning seven continents as well as cities including London, Sydney, Dubai and Johannesburg.

When people think of football, they think of Real Madrid and Barcelona. They see Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi. They remember the great players to have played in La Liga and are inspired by today’s crop of superstars. They feel the passion of the fans as they get fervently behind their team. When people think of football, they think of La Liga as one of the top leagues in the world.

La Liga attracts fans from all over the world, with a global cumulative audience of over two billion. To reach this audience, we use ground- breaking digital billboard replacement technology to tailor billboard North Europe advertising to geographical regions. America 1,444 M 155 M MENA Asia and 600 M China 466 M Central America 102 M

South America Africa 177 M 158 M

*Cumulative audience, season 2016-17

Ground-breaking technology means viewers of Real Madrid & Barcelona away matches can see their choice of billboard advertising specifically tailored for each geographic region.

This state of the art system allows region specific feeds to be generated from the one match, each with different graphics in any electronic format. The DBR recognises obstructions in front of the billboard, such as players, and places the replacement feed behind. This ensures advertising during La Liga matches is bespoke to the specific target audience requirements of each global region, without interfering with the viewer’s experience.

In short, the same match will show different adverts simultaneously to Actual LED each region, allowing local, regional SOUTH AMERICA REGION FEED and international businesses to Boards at Stadium appear alongside the biggest teams on earth.

EUROPEAN REGION FEED MENA REGION FEED

SAIC Motor requested a detailed campaign plan LA LIGA IN MENA targeting an increase in business and sales from the MENA region. La Liga’s popularity in MENA stems from the strong following FC Barcelona and Real Madrid have created in the region. The technical ability and skill levels of La Liga players has made La Liga was the perfect platform to advertise La Liga unrivalled in MENA, with 52% of MENA’s population actively following La Liga. This SAIC Motor in MENA using targeted Digital equates to approximately 200 million avid La Liga fans regularly watching fixtures in the Billboard Replacement (DBR). region.

The growing importance of MENA’s car market La Liga has captured the interest of those throughout MENA, with the Spanish league being and the popularity of Chinese car manufacture the league which was voted the sporting event with the most interest in MENA, outperforming brands, meant that SAIC Motor looked to every other sporting league in the world (35% said La Liga, 52% said World Cup, the rest effectively position their brand as the car of was shared between every other sporting event). Demonstrating the importance of the choice and maintain its leading position within collaboration between MENA and La Liga, Real Madrid opted to remove the crown on their the market. crest when shipping to the Middle East, to fit cultural preferences in the region. This alteration to the standard kit resulted in positive publicity throughout MENA, with merchandise sales According to the GCC, the car sales in MENA breaking records in the region, allowing locals to wear their favourite teams’ crests with are projected to hit 3.37 million units by 2020, pride. with Chinese car brands already holding a strong position within the market because of Ignacio M. Trujillo, La Liga’s Director of Innovation and Global Development, said: “There their affordability compared to European and are seven billion people in the world, two billion of which follow La Liga. No other company Japanese based brands. has such a wide reach.” MILLION FACEBOOK OF MENA’S FOLLOWERS FROM POPULATION As such, SAIC Motor are looking to maximise 3.2 ARAB COUNTRIES 52% FOLLOW LA LIGA their position and continue to grow the business MILLION LA LIGA MILLION within the region. FANS REGULARLY CUMULATIVE 200 WATCH FIXTURES 600 AUDIENCE

FEMALE POPULATION MALE MENA 49% 517.9 MILLION 51%

2016-17 SEASON CUMULATIVE AUDIENCE FEMALE* MALE* 600 MILLION 8% 92%

Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Oman, Palestine, Qatar, WATCHED MATCHES LIVE WATCHED HIGHLIGHTS Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, United Arab Emirates, Yemen 22.7% 77.3% ECONOMIC STATUS* AGE GROUP* BROADCASTER 15% AA Female 8% 28% A M<18 18% 26% B M 18-35 24% 20% B-C M 36-50 28% 11% C-D M 50+ 22%

0% 10% 20% 30% 30% 20% 10% 0%

SAIC Motor represent a number of brands, so the Project11 production team was tasked to create a number of perimeter adverts for the DBR campiagn. Adverts were then produced which represented SAIC Motor brands including MG Motors and Mundial. The designs put forward made sure that all brands under SAIC Motor achieved maximum exposure and impact.

The colour red was chosen to be the background for the Mundial advert whilst the word “Mundial” was repeated alongside their white logo. A duplicate of the Mundial advert with the text in arabic was also produced. Both adverts presented achieved a strong brand presence at La Liga games featuring Real Madrid and FC Barcelona in MENA.

In addition, SAIC Motor elected for a car promotion advert which not only included the logo and branding of MG Motors but also has a digital animation of the promoted vehicle. The animation was played slowly making it easy to read and for the audience to notice the new product.

ADVERTISED MATCHES INCLUDED FOUR DIFFERENT 82 MINUTES ACROSS 30 MATCHES ATLETICO MADRID ADVERTS USED OF SCHEDULED INVOLVING FC VS. FC BARCELONA, ACROSS THE SEASON, ADVERTISEMENT ON BARCELONA OR REAL ATLETICO MADRID VS. INCLUDING ENGLISH THE MENA DBR FEED MADRID DURING THE REAL MADRID, SEVILLA AND ARABIC VERSIONS 2017-18 SEASON VS. FC BARCELONA

SINCE THE START OF THE FOOTBALL SEASON, SAIC’S FLAGSHIP BRAND, MG MOTORS, LAUNCHED FOUR NEW CAR MODELS TO THE REGION: MG RX5, MG RX5 COMPACT SUV, MG ZS CROSSOVER AND THE MG 360

SAIC MOTOR’S CAR SALES HIT 6.93 MILLION UNITS IN 2017

2017 SALES WAS UP BY 6.8 PER CENT ON THE PREVIOUS YEAR

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