Meerkat dances off with Grand Prix

Relatively young sponsorship agency Exp Sponsorship made its presence known at the Marketing Excellence Awards by scooping four awards, including a Grand Prix, for its strategic management of the Absa Cup 2006.

Andre Beyers, managing executive: brand and advertising, Vodacom SA, says: "The greatest reward is the confirmation that not only the marketing community, but our customers have confidence in the Vodacom brand, as they are the key to our success."

Additional

These awards are in addition to this year's Markinor/Sunday Times Top Brands Survey achievements, when the company was credited as SA's second favourite overall brand, while retaining its number one position as SA's favourite advertisement. Moreover, the Sunday Times Generation Next 2006 survey awarded Vodacom with the Coolest Telecommunications Provider Award, and Mo the Meerkat, Vodacom's new brand icon, was appointed as the third Coolest Brand Icon.

"Vodacom's brand power is built on the key focus areas of great innovations, products and services, iconic advertising, impact driven sponsorships, customer insight, investment in people and a clear focus on the brand and what it stands for.

"If you do the one without the other it doesn't work. People can't just smile at your ads, there has to be something concrete beneath that and I think this year's Marketing Excellence Awards results give testimony that the Vodacom brand resonates not only within the hearts and minds of our customers - but all South Africans," Beyers concludes.

Large budget sponsorship

The four awards for Exp Sponsorship were for: The Absa KKNK (arts and music festival) - Silver award, The Absa Cape Epic (Cycling event) - Gold Award, the Absa Cup (soccer tournament) - Gold and Grand Prix Award.

Exp received the awards for its strategy development, management and execution of the three Absa sponsorship properties. Since being appointed as Absa's lead sponsorship agency in November 2005, Exp has been solely responsible for all Absa sponsorships (with the exception of rugby).

With regards to the Large Budget (over R5 million) Grand Prix Award for the Absa Cup, after the initial three years of establishing a strong brand association for Absa in South African soccer, in 2006 Exp took the sponsorship to the next level, revamping the theme of the tournament in partnership with the above-the-line agency JWT and various other role players, and developed a series of new experiential tactics which gave the campaign a fresh appeal.

"Independent BMI research on the 2006 Absa Cup showed that the tournament received the highest ever awareness levels and return on investment figures since its inception in 2003. We believe that there has to be strategic fit and a larger business objective behind each tactic that is implemented in order to build the clients brand using the sponsorship as the platform to achieve this," says Justin Sampson, MD, Exp Sponsorship.

"The Exp Sponsorship team has combined sponsorship experience of over 40 years, even though the agency has only been in existence since October 2004. Being a relatively young agency, this is a great accolade in recognition of the impact we are making for our clients brands within the market place. And not just in sporting events, but arts and culture as well." he concludes.