A New Pitch

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: Unorthodox spin

The Indian Premier League (IPL) is the flavour of the season. The teams launched recently have already grabbed the nation’s attention—the drama during the player auctions and the media reportage the following day is proof of the tournament’s potential.

What makes the tournament such a draw is the fact that some of the best talent across the world will be seen together playing for the same team. And it is precisely this that will also make IPL a big marketing challenge. Building a team brand is ultimately the responsibility of the team franchisee. And in this, franchisees can draw lessons from similar models abroad. Strategic merchandising, which is a tried and tested format across leagues like UEFA (Union of European Football Associations)/EPL (English Premier League), will help a lot to get player loyalty going. Regular mass media and local marketing initiatives can be effectively used to popularise the game in different cities and regions.

Non-traditional and unconventional ways of marketing the teams such as movie integrations, associative marketing etc can also be effectively used. Local player visits in cities that host the matches is imperative. One on one interactions with the common man in terms of road shows, public appearances etc have to be used to keep up spectator interest week after week.

A varied set of corporate social responsibility programmes and social service initiatives can also be intelligently executed retaining a city-centric and local flavour. Such activities along with the team and individual performances will gradually build local fan clubs.

My belief is that he IPL format will be able to sustain the mass following even into its seventh or eighth year simply because it’s proved to be a hit across audience groups. Player swaps and team rotation will make it more interesting every year. The game will also have a dedicated fan club following primarily because fan clubs are more about individual players than about teams. Fan clubs will also be a huge marketing tool for the future for both national and international brands in the country.