Head to Head
Raising the brand profile
I
t’s been a busy year for Intersport with membership soaring and a strong branding and consumer marketing campaign rolling out across the UK. Yvonne Holberton talks to Susan Herbert, Intersport’s marketing and communications manager to find out how plans are taking effect to raise the brand profile.
What does your new role at Intersport entail?
My remit is to raise the brand profile of Intersport within the UK and Ireland. Intersport worldwide and especially in Europe is very strong but in the UK and Ireland, by comparison, it’s actually quite small. We aim to raise the profile of the group with the brands that we deal with in terms of product detail and buying decisions across the group but also from a consumer perspective with joint promotions and advertising work. We aim to make the brand and the group a much stronger operating platform to benefit our members.
Are buying group memberships rising because trading conditions remain so difficult?
A buying group gives independent retailers support and security. But predominantly the rise in membership is a result of the marketing focus we have initiated and how we have approached the business, changed the way we are operating and what we offering.
Does Intersport expect its UK membership to grow further since the influx of retailers from Allied Partners? Merging with Allied Partners was a big push for us but we are still growing our numbers. We constantly want to drive forward and find the right people to work with to continue to build the strength of Intersport as a group but also to give us better coverage across the UK. We tend to work with recommendations more than anything else, and we have independents approaching us directly, so it is something we are working on all the time.
Intersport is building its consumer brand awareness in the UK. How are you achieving this?
We have some fantastic opportunities with the brands we work with and we have done some great campaigns this year. We have just finished the World Cup campaign with adidas, which was European wide with Intersport as a group. Likewise with Asics, we have collaborated on two running campaigns this year and have more planned for next year. But we are really looking to work with all the brands in this sort of way so that we can offer the membership a broad choice across as many sports as we can. From the beginning of next year we are introducing quarterly brochures for members focusing on relevant sports for those months and working closely with the relevant brands. They will be consumer facing brochures for the stores to utilise to create awareness at local level, for example with the local press. The brochures will link in to what the brands are doing nationally and locally and will be marketed under the Intersport banner, both to raise the brand as a whole but also to give members a tool for which to sell and promote their business locally as well as promote it nationally. The aim is a very joined up approach across the board from above the line with the brands conducting national campaigns trickling down into local and then below the line in store with either promotions or point of sale. Within that we are about to launch our new website on 1st September and we will incorporate social media to promote the Intersport brand.
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