Red Bull Versus Coca Cola Sport Sponsorship from a Sponsor’s Perspective

The business of sports is one of the fastest growing industries in the country. All over the world, many people participate as players and spectators in a variety of sporting activities, creating opportunities for the marketing of a company’s goods and services. An important part of the business of sports is sports marketing, which revolves around understanding consumer behavior and motivating target markets to purchase goods and services. Sports marketing at Clemson University has many different aspects ranging from sports and technology and sport law to sponsorship and sports economics.

This document will focus on the situation analysis of Red Bull. The first section includes internal environment and external environment which affect the company. The internal environment can show the strengths and weaknesses as well as opportunities and threats can be analyzed by the external environment.

Marketing plans and strategies are an important part of almost any business today. One of the biggest industries marketing plans have benefited and changed in a number of different ways is the sports industry. The development of the sports marketing industry has led companies to invest millions of dollars to have their product associated with specific teams, players, and sporting events attempting to connect with consumer and create profit for both parties involved. The money involved in sports marketing calls for these sponsorships and endorsement decisions to be made both strategically and confidently. After researching the sports industry from a business perspective the importance of marketing decisions is

21. According to the text, for sports marketers engaged in the strategic sports marketing process, two common goals are attracting more fans and keeping them. Benefit segmentation lies at the heart of these two objectives.

This article continues to explain that once a sports marketer creates a product and advertises it on a small scale, “Sports marketers get ahead by gradually representing bigger, more important and more prestigious sports teams, companies, associations, and athletes.” In other words, sports marketers need to have a plan of action to promote their product on a larger scale over time. Also, sports marketers spend much of their planning on the aspect of promotion. Mihai verifies that the category of promotion serves to prove that the product is desirable through advertising, sales, sponsorship and public relations. If a sports marketer follows these planning steps, his/her work will lead to a successful product with a large margin of profit.

In traditional marketing business companies have to make sure that they are providing the right product. Determining the product is essential in business. For instance, Pepsi Co. has defined its product as cola soda. Likewise in sports marketing a product needs to be defined also. A sports agent’s product is the athlete. He or she has to represent the client well enough to get preferred contracts or top dollar endorsements. There has been some debate as to what constitutes the “core” product in sport marketing. For example, some posit that the core product is the actual event. On the other hand, if we applied a mainstream marketing definition, the “core” product is the benefit that consumers seek from a product, service, or experience, therefore taking the focus off of the actual event. (Masteralexis, Carol & Mary, 2012)

Sports’ marketing is becoming more readily known as the vehicle that drives the sports business to success. It is “orientated toward consumers and about thinking, deciding and acting in terms of the final consumer. You have to know who your consumers are, what they want and need and use this effectively as a sports marketer orientating the drive more toward the market, not the product (Sports Marketing: The motor that drives the sports business

The career of a sport management professional offers a large number of various positions. One such career is that of a director who specializes in promotion and development. “Promotion and development directors are hired by sports teams and school athletic programs to design and implement promotional campaigns that will increase ticket sales” (Sports Management 1). The biggest part of their job is to provide a profit for the organization they are working for. Directors set up opportunities for the sports team to make money off of sponsors. They also set up deals with advertisers to pay a sum of money in exchange for their ads or products to be listed or shown at their sporting event (Sports Management 1). Good advertising and production of cash flow go hand in hand while promotion directors try to help them to succeed. Development and promotion directors play an important role in developing a profit for their organizations.

Nike will have a number of different marketing objectives for their isotonic sports drink, Nike Go. A main market objective will be to establish the isotonic drink as the most credible sports drink in the market. This will not just happen though, this can only happen through a lot of promotion and appeal. Creating strong consumer awareness is very important in gaining market share as it is a completely new product from Nike. This can be done through promoting the product, Nike Go, and allowing consumers to become aware that Nike has this new product. In order to establish brand recognition, there needs to be a capture of market shares in the sports drink segment. This will mean the product, Nike Go, will be well known

Red Bull has built an image as a trendy energy drink, catering to young adults and young professionals between the age groups of (16-29) years. It also targets young club-goers and private parties in order to spread its picture as a stylish drink. It also believes that it is not just selling a beverage, but instead it is selling a ‘way of life’. Red Bull also uses a catchy slogan as ‘Red Bull gives you wings’. These non –traditional marketing strategies of Red Bull are not unique to any market.

Sports' marketing is a comparatively new field and dimension within the broad concept of marketing. It is continuously evolving and changing today as society combats the free market to decide the legal and ethical limitations of business today. It is significant to note that this discipline within marketing is not clearly defined. Sports today use corporate sponsorships and television money in order to contend and pay for top quality athletes. Those companies use teams, leagues, colleges, and individuals to make a distinction between their products in a very aggressive business environment. What makes up sports marketing to one person could be considered selling out to another. The business world keeps pushing to find a competitive advantage and the sports world has in general welcomed the money offered (Weikel, n.d.).

1. Describe Red Bull’s Sources of Brand Equity. Do they change depending on market or country?

This report is focusing on the market of energy drinks on a microeconomic level, which has exploded over the past two decades, especially after the launch of Red Bull. Dietrich Mateschitz, an Austrian businessman, developed the energy drink in his country in the mid 1980’s. He was inspired by an energy drink he discovered in pharmacies during a trip to Thailand. Before Red Bull entered the market, few soft drinks included caffeine. Starting Red Bull is not only about the launch of a new product; it was the birth of a totally new product category. As the end of 2013, Red Bull is sold in more than 166 countries, the company counts 9,694 employees and it has sold around 5.3 billion cans worldwide

The report will discuss the affiliation between UEFA and marketing specialists Television Event and Media Marketing (TEAM). The writer will show that this association was fundamental to the emergence of the UCL and discuss the strategies developed by TEAM to ensure the competition was seen as a credible and visible brand.

The strong marketing strategy, which is the “buzz-marketing” strategy, which we have, is one of its main strengths because Red Bull is becoming a wide known brand all over the world.