Oppo claims to be a young, trend-setting brand which aims to carve a niche in the market with aggressive marketing. This world cup the brand launched ‘India Give Your Heartbeat’ campaign.
OPPO invited cricket fans to showcase their passion for cricket by contributing their heartbeats through the OPPO Billion Beats App. Following which, collected heartbeats have been used to create the heartbeat song. The song reverberates with the heartbeats of fans and cricketers like Rohit Sharma, Jasprit Bumrah, Kedar Jadhav and Shikhar Dhawan.
In a tête-à-tête with Social Samosa, Will Yang, CMO, OPPO South Asia, sheds some light on the marketing tactics of OPPO as a brand, its’ association with World Cup 2019, and the latest campaigns.
OPPO has heavily invested in cricket with associations with Indian Cricket Team, UC Browser, and more. What kind of insights went in behind the decision of investing in cricket as a medium of marketing?
Cricket has always been a loved sport in India. It’s a nation that bonds together when the World cup begins.
Establishing a brand in a diverse market like India is extremely challenging and our association with BCCI and ICC has indeed been a very significant decision for our growth in the country.
OPPO is a young brand and the youth of this nation is extremely passionate about cricket. Associating the brand with the Indian cricket team has helped put us in the spotlight. The upcoming ICC World cup is an ideal platform to showcase and deliver the message our brand represents. We have been able to successfully achieve an increase in our sales volume, market share and have established brand affinity amongst our customers – these were the exact quantifiable measures we were looking at when we entered the Indian smartphone market.
What are the parameters you take into consideration before investing in a big-ticket event?
The idea to partner with any property is to capitalize on its follower base with an aim to increase consumer engagement as well as create the brand connect. Partnership with properties like these serves as an ideal platform par excellence for brands to connect with its target audience and expand its customer base.
In India, cricket is not merely a sport but a religion. People across the country are hooked to this sport and it is now a one-stop shop for brands to reach out to their target audience through a single medium.
Also, being the title sponsor of the Indian cricket team, it certainly gives us a unique recall value for our brand and has worked well from a long-term perspective.
What is your objective as a marketer behind associating with Cricket World Cup?
As mentioned above, the objective is to expand our customer base by capitalizing on the followers of the Indian cricket team with enhanced customer engagement to create brand affinity.
As a brand, OPPO has been committed to bringing unforgettable experiences to our consumers that go beyond our product offerings.
To this end, our partnership with the BCCI as the title sponsor of the Indian Cricket team has been instrumental in building affinity for OPPO with the Indian consumers. This year, we expect to consolidate our brand image and have an even better brand outreach and engagement.
How do you calculate ROI on sports marketing? Please take us through your measurement metrics
With our progress firmly embedded in the Indian market, we look forward to strengthening OPPO as a brand that resonates with the young minds of the country. Our association with BCCI has proved to be extremely fruitful as it has helped us in gaining more customer engagement and much higher brand recall. This year, we expect to consolidate our brand image with an even better brand outreach and engagement with India as a whole.
Also Read: Decoding profitable IPL sponsorships with Sandeep Tewari, Usha International
In the digital day and age, what are the benefits of associating with cricket and sports overall for marketing?
Consumers are increasingly becoming digital-savvy and a brand story is ultimately shaped by customer experience, right digital media strategy, and deepening brand connection. Today, brands are more focused than ever on adapting to consumer lifestyles and delivering an experience that resonates with their customers. The benefits of associating with cricket or any other sports are to reach out to our target audience and create a brand affinity in their mind with an impactful customer engagement strategy.
How will you be leveraging your association with the Indian cricket team across platforms? Please share your marketing & media mix
Being the title sponsor for the Indian cricket team, OPPO is all set to capture a billion beats during the most awaited sporting spectacle- ICC Cricket World Cup 2019. OPPO is proud to have partnered with the Indian cricket team which has helped the brand capture mindshare with a property that is followed and consumed by millions across the nation. This year, OPPO is all set to strengthen a billion heartbeats powering every shot for Team India with a 360-degree marketing campaign to strengthen brand affinity among its Indian audience. As the title sponsor, OPPO will be optimizing all mediums to connect to our target audience thus keeping with the enthusiasm of the game and spread ICC World Cup fever in the cricket crazy nation.
How much percent of your total marketing mix is reserved for cricket? Where does digital stand in the scheme of things?
As a company policy, we don’t share the economics side of the company, however, we do have an aggressive plan for our marketing strategy with equal emphasis on ATL and BTL activities.
Smartphones today have moved well beyond simple communication devices and are increasingly becoming a hub of overall activity for consumers. Studies make it clear that the demand for watching TV on small screens is surging. An increasing number of people are consuming video content on OTT platforms resulting in multi-fold growth in mobile video traffic fuelled primarily by 4G adoption. Therefore, we realize there is a substantial untapped target audience on digital media platforms and hence the aim is to connect to a wide number of audiences who enjoy TV on small screens. We are keeping up with the trends.
Any sports marketing trends you foresee?
India is one country that has increasingly shown interest in sports especially cricket. Consumer-centric brands have started to take notice of the marketing opportunity that the variety of sports India offers. We see experiential sports marketing is rapidly gaining acceptance across the country. Association with sporting events and properties has turned out to be a great tool for enhanced brand engagement. The intention is to capitalize on the opportunity of reaching out to our target audience through a rapidly evolving experiential sports marketing industry.
What was the idea behind roping in Aditya Roy Kapur for the F11 Pro campaign?
The idea was to propel the stature of our recently launched OPPO F11 Pro with Aditya Roy Kapur, who is a youth icon and is popular for his compelling personality and stylish attitude which resonates with our brand philosophy. Just like OPPO’s belief of bringing something distinctive and advanced, Aditya believes in doing the same for his fans. Our OPPO F11 Pro clearly calls out to millennials who believe in living their life to the fullest and capturing each experience.
What was the objective of the campaign and how has the response been so far?
When we associate with a celebrity, we make sure to leverage the maximum from that collaboration. Associating with a celebrity for a marketing campaign, helps us expand our horizons in terms of the target audience as well as cater to the wide fan base they appeal to. We have received a great response through our collaboration with celebrities like Aditya Roy Kapur, Vicky Kaushal and Kartik Aryan for #BeBrilliant campaign for OPPO F11 Pro.
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