Is it stolen yet?

The folks at Wieden + Kennedy just took sports billboards to a new level. Their work for ESPN features astro-turf mats promoting Monday night football in bus shelters and along city walls in six major metropolitan areas.

In my opinion, the billboards are clever and engaging, but that's not the point. People are jacking them at an alarming rate. In just seven days, nearly 10% of the mats were lifted in NYC. And not just in the Big Apple. Thefts also occurred in Boston (3), Chicago (6), San Francisco (2), and Washington D.C. (5). And this is no small undertaking. Some of the mats are 72"H x 96"W in size.

So now ESPN is halting the re-installation of the stolen billboards. So here's my question: Could encouraging fans to take your advertising just be a genius PR stunt?


Here are my points:
-If they wanted to bolt those suckers down they would have
-If they didn't want people to touch and interact with them they would not have put them at street level
-What are they really losing? Both ESPN and WK are getting positive press from this

And even if ESPN is a innocent victim in all of this. Maybe there is a lesson for all of us.

Olympics 2014: Brought to you on ESPN?

Didn’t I just post about how NBC has made itself synonymous with the Olympics? Their contract runs out in 2012, and the bidding for the 2014 and 2016 games are coming up. The news today is that ABC-owned ESPN is interested in bidding for the games, along with Fox. I wanted to compare NBC and ESPN to see how this move could affect the games:

Affiliates. In addition to ABC and ESPN, certain live events could run on ABC Family, the way NBC is making use of USA and MSNBC for additional live coverage. It could be an epic opportunity for the Disney Channel to run more Olympic-themed content for a new generation of fans.

Live broadcasting. NBC lucked out in persuading Beijing to schedule swimming and gymnastics in the morning to ensure the best events were broadcast live, but many other key events like track and field were delayed. ESPN scoffs at NBC’s tendency to save the playback for primetime and promises live broadcasts all the time. But even in this age of mobile alerts, when immediate results are only a Google away, viewers are still tuning into the games at their highest rates in years. Besides, NBC is already live streaming many events successfully, and will no doubt have even better live online coverage in six years.

Visibility. Having the Olympics on network TV in primetime ensures the potential for wide reach. Everyone assumes that the cable penetration by 2016 will be as high as Yelena Isinbayeva’s pole vault, but John Rash noted that in 2008 in Minneapolis, it’s only about 75%. Another thing: Olympic viewership, though up among males this year, generally skews female. Would Olympic sponsors like Johnson & Johnson trust that their female target will flip to ESPN in droves?

Publicity. NBC’s reach matters more than just during the games, too. Olympic promos (like that logo integration I was talking about) hit viewers in the months leading up to the game. The early hype of the #1 Today Show drives conversation and interest in the games more than Good Morning America or Sports Center ever could.

Nostalgia. For die-hard fans of “normal” sports like the MLB, it wouldn’t matter who was announcing, we would still tune in to see our Twins kill the A’s 13-2. But for the (female, not necessarily sports fan) demographic who tunes into the Olympics, the personality of the Olympic broadcasters is part of the experience. Would the post-gold-medal interviews be as good if hosted by anyone but Bob Costas? What will our morning coffee be if it can’t be enjoyed while Al Roker gives the weather live from Sochi, Russia? It all comes down to the fact that the Olympic audience matches the NBC audience better than the ESPN audience.

The I.O.C. would be making a mistake if they went with ESPN, even if they scraped a few million dollars more out of the deal. NBC has done exceptionally well with the Olympic games, driving their popularity through the roof this summer. If Michael Phelps’s 8th gold had been on ESPN, and 25% fewer people had been watching, would he still be receiving the insane amount of media coverage he’s getting now? Would the viewership even be that high without NBC’s pre-race PR? To keep interest at its peak, the I.O.C. needs to maximize their publicity, and the best way is through a network.

Now pass me the chips and dip and let’s watch some obscure sport we’ll never think of again until 2012!

UPDATE: After reading this AdAge article, I'm quite sure NBC won't be in a hurry to drop the Olympics in 2014. All together now: WHEW.

Mobile Musings, Part 1: Sports Get It Right

(Welcome to the first in a series on one of our favorite topics here at Yaybia: mobile convergence.)

This week, AdAge has five compelling arguments why 2008 won't be the year of mobile. I argue they should amend their headline to say that 2008 won't be the year of mobile marketing, but some mobile content is getting pretty damn close.

With yesterday being the Twins home opener, I checked twinsbaseball.com in the morning. While the site redirected me to a text-heavy page clearly not designed for an iPhone or Blackberry, the mobile version is pleasantly easy to navigate, with the headlines and scores I want right at the top. Better yet, the alert package I signed up for is phenomenal. I get scores, lead changes after the 7th inning, and videos of home runs texted to me every game. All I had to do was enter my phone number and agree to tack $4 a month onto my bill, well worth it for the customized, instant content I want to get on the go.

That's what a mobile application should be: easy to use, to-the-point, and full of content. The MLB isn't the only one that understands consumers' mobile cravings, either. In early January, ESPN actually received more mobile hits than PC-based hits in a 24-hour period for the same section of one of its NFL pages. An article in today's MediaPost says, "Mobile is about a 'right now' experience. Just as TiVo shifts time to change the way people watch television, mobile changes the way people can consume content."

Companies that understand the need for local emphasis in mobile content will also succeed. What if Starbucks worked with carriers or manufacturers to develop an application that always shows the closest coffeeshop based on a user's GPS data? Or what if search got more specific than zip codes, and Google became intuitive enough to understand exactly what I want when I text "pizza hut washington ave & university ave minneapolis" to GOOG411?

I agree with AdAge that the ad industry doesn't have it yet. But it's always played catch-up with new technologies. We all remember watching 1950s TV spots in history of ad classes and seeing basically a print ad with sound. And it's only been the past few years that truly interactive and creatively compelling web advertising has become the norm, rather than flashing banners demanding we CLICK HERE! I see great potential for advertisers to sponsor instant alerts like the Twins baseball ones I mentioned before. I'd gladly take a five-second Jimmy John's spot before my home run video highlight if it offset the $4/month the Twins are currently charging me. Right now, it could be key to partner with a content provider who gives mobile consumers that instant information they demand--especially the weather, news, and sports networks that are getting better and better at understanding mobile needs.

(One last note: One of the reasons AdAge has no faith in 2008 for the year of mobile is poor penetration. But as young adults who have grown up with technology get off their parents' family plans and wireless carriers follow the lead of Sprint and its unlimited everything plan, the number of people with data plans is going to be insane before we know it. I, for one, can't wait.)