The 2018 FIFA World Cup Tournament has been over for a while. If there is one thing that is hard to forget about the global soccer competition besides the controversial acting by Brazilian’s top player, Neyma; it will be the way that brands in Nigeria deliberately battled to sustain market share with the consumers and drive sales. The battle was fierce as both local and international brands were practically playing to the gallery through market promotions and creative advertising.
Literally billions of people tuned in worldwide to watch the 2018 FIFA World Cup tournament, making it the perfect platform for companies to get their names in the faces of the consumers. A claim by FIFA indicated that the 2018 FIFA World Cup Tournament attracted 3.2billion viewers during the competition and a brand who paid the partnership fee paid close to £100million. Most brands who could not afford to be an official sponsor, opted for other creative and subtle approaches that they hope will also be impactful. This was the case for Pepsi, the Cola brand that launched the very engaging “Naija all the Way” campaign in Nigeria that went viral. Pepsi also managed to get a few of the Super Eagles players in the “Naija all the way” campaign along with their official music and DJ celebrities.
This happened even after Coca-Cola had reinforced their position as an official partner of the 2018 FIFA World Cup Tournament. Coca-Cola created a huge pre-FIFA World Cup experience were they brought the original “one-of-a-kind” all-gold FIFA World Cup Trophy to Nigeria and got fans to hang-out with iconic trophy. There were even sales promotions from Coca-Cola that got their lucky customers to win a trip to Russia to go watch the games live. During the game, there was as much engagement by Coca-Cola, as the Cola brand went on to have viewing centres, promotions that connected fans to the Super Eagle Players and even went on to have a FIFA World Cup musical remix to the Naira Marley’s song, “It’s a goal!”, among other things. Well, if the Super Eagles had moved pass the first qualifying stage, I am sure there would have been more interesting engagements from the Coca brands.
Some other brands that took advantage of the 2018 FIFA World Cup Tournament to influence their customers here in Nigeria were Startimes, Peak Milk, TomTom, Emzor, MTN, Sensodyne, GoTV, SoKlin, Budweiser, Star Lager, Panadol Extra, EcoBank, Amstel Malta, Aiteo, Panasonic, Guinness Nigeria Plc, Hisense, Adidas, Total, Opera News, PZ Cussons, Nike and Nokia amongst others. On an average, brands in Nigeria would have spent about 15 billion Naira to reach their consumers as they battled for share of voice and wallet. While it would seem that brands were not going to pass on the opportunity of the 2018 FIFA World Cup Tournament, the real top dogs were those brands who actually committed huge marketing budgets to the tournament. Globally, the official brand partners of the FIFA 2018 World Cup were VISA, Coca-Cola, Adidas, Qatar Airways, Hyundai Motors, Wanda Group and Gazprom. The brands that were the official 2018 FIFA World Cup Sponsors were Budweiser, MacDonalds, Hisense, Vivo and Mengniu. Those official sponsors and partners that are present in the Nigeria also had to replicate global marketing campaigns locally.
Nike, the sport brand was also on high demand when they introduced, in collaboration with the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF), the official Super Eagles 2018 FIFA World Cup gear. Wizkid, Nigeria’s super star musician was one of the models that unveiled the gears. The designs from Nike caught on quickly and became a viral movement globally. The lime green and white zigzag pattern literally sold for $90 and had over a record breaking 3 million people trying to pre-order. In some parts of the world, there were people queuing to buy the jersey. Nigerian celebrities also helped in the sale as they latched on to the “fear of missing out” idea and created huge buzz across social media as they posted their photos wearing the jersey. In the Nike Shop in Lagos, the entire Nigeria Kit was also sold out during the 2018 FIFA World Cup Tournament. This was a big move by Nike as they generated huge revenue from the sales of the Nigeria FIFA World Cup gears.
Sport brands may not have huge marketing activations in the Nigerian market when compared with brands in telecommunication, finance and FMCG but you will notice that 3 out of the 4 teams that reached the semi-finals were Nike sponsored and the Grand Finale between Croatia and France was an all Nike affair. The Golden Boot – awarded to the player with most goals in the tournament – went to English captain Harry Kane, a Nike athlete. Again, this shows Nike’s superiority above other sport brands like Adidas and Puma.
While Television was that prime medium for accessing the 2018 FIFA World Cup games, for brands, it was a unique opportunity to reach a vast number of consumers. Television allowed the games to reach an audience in more than 200 countries. Research according to Zenith, the mega sporting tournament added $2.4bn to the global advertising market. Social Media also played a huge role in getting brands to connect with their consumers during the 2018 FIFA World Cup Tournament. This happened through influencer marketing, sponsored advertising, live updates, polls, predictions and innovative content engagements online that stirred interesting conversations.
Overall, the 2018 FIFA World Cup Tournament was that huge opportunity for brands in Nigeria to position themselves in the hearts of their consumers; thus, creating that engagement that invariably should produce both the initial and anticipated sustained value. The marketing campaigns carried out by brands during the 2018 FIFA World Cup will definitely be top of mind for a long time by their consumers.
Nosa Emma-Iyamu, Assistant Consultant, Quadrant MSL, is a hard-working, skilled communications strategist with a keen eye for analysis, planning and implementation. He is committed to ongoing development, passionate about brand strategy and completely intrigued by the ever changing dynamics of today’s consumers. On the lighter side, he’s a lover of good movies, music and superheroes.
