Puma has signed up Girls Aloud singer Kimberley Walsh to front a campaign for its new toning footwear range called BodyTrain.
Walsh appears in a six-month press campaign, beginning this month, showcasing the £70 trainer, which will be initially sold in Next and JD Sports.
The press ads were created in-house and media buying is handled by ZenithOptimedia.
They will run in national newspapers, including the Daily Star and the Sunday Mirror, as well as in magazines such as Health & Fitness and Heat.
Puma claims BodyTrain has toning benefits which offer wearers "better legs, tighter curves and thigh"’.
It is the German footwear brand’s first move into the toning trainer market, in which rival Reebok already has its EasyTone line out.
Reebok last year backed EasyTone with an eye-catching billboard adfeaturing Kelly Brook but was later told by the Advertising Standards Authority not to repeat a different TV campaign, after the ASA ruled Reebok had provided insufficient evidence to back its claim Easytone trainers "toned people's legs and bum more than regular trainers".
Dutch creative agency Amsterdam Worldwide has resigned the accounts for sports brands Asics and Onitsuka Tiger due to what it described as "strategic, creative, and financial differences".
The agency began working on the business in 2008 when it broke away from micro-network StrawberryFrog, taking clients including Panasonic, Chevrolet, Opel, Asics and Onitsuka Tiger.
Following the split, Asics Europe consolidated its regional creative business into Amsterdam Worldwide. StrawberryFrog had worked on the brands since 2001.
The Asics portfolio includes Asics performance wear, Asics SportStyle, Ayami and Onitsuka Tiger.
Brian Elliott, founder and chief executive of Amsterdam Worldwide, said: "Our team has built one of the most iconic sports fashion brands in the world over the past decade – and done so on the most modest of budgets.
"The decision to resign a piece of business is not an easy one, but strategic, creative, and financial differences with Asics mean we can no longer continue our relationship.
"We wish them well. We will always have great passion and love for the brands, and are proud of our accomplishments together. We have taken both Onitsuka Tiger and Asics a long way, and it's time to move on."
Last year the agency won a Gold Design Lion at the 2010 Cannes Lions Festival for its brand campaign for Onitsuka.
In December Asics launched a pan-European digital campaign to find the face for its Ayami women's sportswear range.
The Reebok Taikan viral video campaign, created by Saatchi & Saatchi Fallon Tokyo, became the second most viewed on YouTube in Japan in 2010.
Background:
Taikan is Reebok's performance enhancing clothing and footwear line that helps align the body for better balance which can lead to better breathing, flexibility and sports performance. The challenge for Reebok was how to gain awareness and exposure of the product line with limited budget and retail space allotment compared to competitors.
Aim:
The campaign was designed to raise awareness of Reebok's Taikan product line. KPI's included reaching 100,000 views within six weeks, a doubling of visits to the brand website and some free exposure in non-paid media.
Execution:
"A successful viral campaign involves much more than a great piece of film placed on-line. The agency carefully crafted a plan that was supported by some integrated activities that would help detonate maximum exposure of the video in a short period of time," said Zach Taub, brand director, Reebok Japan.
The central element to the campaign was a video designed to go viral, which was in fact a parody of a very well-known exercise show in Japan. The videowas released 1 April and was supported with limited but well-aimed integrated public relations seeding and guerilla tactics targeting potential users.
"The key to success was two-fold", Phil Rubel, CEO of Saatchi & Saatchi Fallon, explained, "First, the campaign taps into a tremendous cultural icon. The daily calisthenics show had been on TV for decades and almost everyone growing up in Japan knows about it and has probably exercised to it at some point."
He added that the campaign was based on an insight that everyone can relate too – which is people's penchant for purchasing expensive new equipment to improve their game, rather than improve their own physical core. "Of course, the surprising twist that people saw when they viewed the video which our creative team came up with made it absolutely irresistible not to pass on to friends," said Rubel.
Results:
"The Reebok viral campaign for the Taikan line of performance wear is an excellent example of how to do a viral campaign right. The KPI results speak for themselves ," said Taub.
"We had hoped to get 100,000 views in six weeks – we got 134,000 views the first day and over 1.6 million views by the six week mark." explained Rubel "In addition to the YouTube views, we also achieved over 550 million yen's worth of free TV exposure as almost all the key stations in Japan featured the video, the products, the performers and sometimes even Reebok representatives on their shows. And visits to the product website increased by almost 400 per cent."
The icing on the cake for this campaign was the recent announcement byYouTube Rewind that the viral video was the second-most viewed video on YouTube in Japan in 2010.
"We were only beat out by a famous local celebrity model's very steamy fashion shoot film called Glamorous. So if we're going to come in second to somebody, it might as well be to something like that," said Taub.
Currently the Taikan video is closing in on 2 million views.
Sneaker Tube TV is a brand new website that allows sneaker fiends from all around the world to interact and express themselves through video. The brainchild of seasoned retailer and all-round sneaker guru Premium Pete, Sneaker Tube TV allows you to quickly and easily plug into a vast, passionate online community. Whatever your attachment to sneaker culture, no matter how many kicks are crammed in your closet, you'll find plenty to talk about. Check it out at www.sneakertube.tv.
"At the end of the day, its all about the community" says Pete. "One of the main things I envisioned when creating SneakerTube.TV was having sneaker lovers, reviewers, collectors etc, from all around the world all in the same community as Companies, Boutiques and Shops. I encourage sneaker companies to sign up, Interact, and show the community what you have" SneakerTube.TV will be a place where folks can begin to exchange views and make friends with sneakers being the common bond that will branch out to other things. SneakerTube.TV also features one of the most flexible, high quality, and fastest importing video players online today. Members will be able to import You Tube and Vimeo videos without losing their view counts, and will also have the ability to create customizable profile pages, live chat, blog, create & join groups and make friends with other members. SneakerTube.TV (STTV) launches online today Wednesday, December 15th, 2010 and will be open to anyone to join and begin uploading and importing your sneaker related videos as well as watch videos from other members.
Asics, the athletics brand, is launching a pan-European digital campaign to find the face for its Ayami women's sportswear range.
The Asics campaign has been created to promote the women's sportswear brand as stylish and functional.
The activity, created by Amsterdam Worldwide, centres around a Facebook Asics page containing an online casting app that encourages women to upload pictures or films of themselves running towards the Asics Facebook wall. Members who view the images are then asked to vote for their favourite using the "Like" function.
The most popular runners will feature in an Asics "Lookbook" gallery on the Facebook page, while the overall winner with the most votes will appear in next year's Asics Ayami campaign by Amsterdam Worldwide.
Asics rolled out its Ayami range in March 2010 with a launch supported by an integrated marketing campaign, also by Amsterdam Worldwide.
