#OOH Scores Highly During #WorldCup Fever
Adrian J Cotterill, Editor-in-Chief
With one of the UK’s most anticipated sporting event of 2018, the FIFA World Cup Russia, now well underway, and England emphatically qualifying for the knockout stage after thrashing Panama 6-1 on Sunday, the next few weeks are surely set to be a perfect opportunity for brands to capitalise on consumer interest in the World Cup using out-of-home.
New research from Exterion’s work.shop.play has shown that almost 80% consumers will likely watch the matches live, while 72% are planning to watch match highlights and almost as many will listen to the matches or keep up to date with scores, results and team news. Of those planning to watch the World Cup live, the majority are planning to watch at home or at a friends’ or relatives’ house (76 percent) or (surely more likely) down the pub (44 percent).
The World Cup equals big consumer spend: 20 million litres of beer will be sold in pubs during the group stage and during the knock out stages, retailers, pubs and restaurants are likely to reap an extra GBP 1.3 billion. This increases to GBP 2.5 billion on souvenirs, sportswear, televisions and celebrating if England should ever get through to the final, creating a huge revenue opportunity for businesses in these sectors.
Alexandra Porritt, Senior Client Strategy Manager at Posterscope, told us “It’s no surprise that OOH works hardest in the summer months, with 15 percent more time spent outdoors. Add to that our love for all things football when it’s World Cup time and OOH really comes into its own. The afternoon kick-offs for nearly all of this year’s matches are perfect for capitalising on the digital OOH opportunity, by building excitement in the morning, bringing news to those out and about during the afternoon, and celebrating (or commiserating) after each game, significantly increasing brand recall.”
To demonstrate the effectiveness of dynamic copy in DOOH, back in 2017, Posterscope funded an independent piece of research conducted by VirtuoCity, to test the impact against key KPIs. Against every measure, dynamic copy that was more relevant to the location, time or context delivered a stronger result versus linear content. There was an 18 percent increase in spontaneous recall, a 53% increase in message recall and 173 percent increase in relevance being cited as a reason for recall.
In March 2017, for example, Guinness launched a locally targeted, dynamic out-of-home campaign to celebrate its status as the official beer of the Six Nations Rugby, that automatically served ads to proximity digital OOH to provide kick off times and distance to direct fans to nearby pubs screening the live match. A network of sensors fitted in participating pubs captures footfall data and, based on capacity levels, triggers real-time, tailored creative executions cleverly drove fans to the best venues to watch the game. These pubs saw 4% incremental uplift in footfall during the campaign.
OOH is one of the few media channels which continues to see its audiences grow when others are seeing fragmentation. The average British person is now exposed to 71 adverts per day and in one week, OOH can reach 98% of the UK population***. It is also up to four times more effective at driving online behaviour than any other traditional channels, particularly amongst the younger and harder-to-reach 18-24-year olds – and through mobile.
For those networks, both big and small wanting to get in on the act; Screenfeed has added two limited-time products to its standing library of 100+ digital content offerings – both feature multiple language options, enabling network operators everywhere to connect with followers of what is the biggest single-sport event in the world.
The Match Results, which include group play, and bracket play graphics, will be available in six languages: English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, German, and Arabic. The
World Cup News will be offered in three: English, Spanish, and Arabic. Both products also feature fun layouts, and bold color palettes designed to catch the eye in any environment, be it an airport, a mall, transit station, healthcare waiting room, reception lobby, or corporate communications system.
Group play graphics will be available for immediate playlist scheduling, so that network operators can start building audience awareness, and buy-in leading up to kick-off. Bracket play graphics recapping match outcomes, and point totals will follow once the games begin on June 12, and will update automatically after every game from Round of 16, through the final match, on July 15th, thanks to Screenfeed’s plug-n-play technology, compatible with any digital signage software.
OOH and the World Cup are a powerful combination for brands looking to tap into this once in a four-year opportunity.
VirtuoCity is a sophisticated driving simulation which places respondents in a virtual driving scenario. Respondents were exposed to poster creatives for six real brands, with some creatives matching their audience profile (test) and other creatives that did not (control). Attitudes to the advertising and brand recall were measured, and when shown relevant creative audiences revealed a 12% uplift in advertising metrics including spontaneous awareness, prompted ad awareness and message recall. Brand effects experienced a 17% increase for creative rating, brand consideration and net promoter score. VirtuoCity is an MRG awarding winning research methodology and in this individual study a robust sample of 600 respondents watched a VirtuoCity video via the respected Dipsticks Research panel. VirtuoCity is an ideal methodology for test & control research because you can isolate the specific variable you are interested in, in this instance the creative, whilst ensuring all other variables remain constant.
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