Under Armour or UA, a premier brand in athletic clothes grew from a basement ran T-shirt maker in 1996 to a global giant in 2017 with nearly 5 billion in sales and a collaboration deal with mega star Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson. By 2013 the company had already reached monolithic proportions with sales around 2.3 billion but only 21% (500 million) of that came from female buyers even though they make up nearly half of potential customers. Because of the untapped potential under UA focused its efforts on to potential female customers with the “I will what I want” campaign that focused on a female dancer; who despite the odds made her own dreams comes true (Maheshwari, 2014). Prior to this ad UA had an aggregated strategy that focused on athletics in general but after the campaign they were able differentiate their female line using differentiated segmentation to cater to specific needs (Kardes, 2015 pg. 42-43). This is important because the brand isn’t leaving the male athletics market, they were simply making their same image appeal to a new market segment that did not feel connected to the brand.
When seeking out a segment or in this case a new segment to grow an already massive business it is important not to alienate the original customers. Of course the company wants to get involved with an untapped market segment, but if in doing so the already massive men’s’ segment falls the action is self-defeating or cannibalizing. Fortunately, in this case men and women’s different taste prevent the company from competing with itself (Kardes, 2015 pg.45). Secondly we need to consider the cost of sales. As seen in the Adidas case there was an attempt to increase sales to women that fell flat, but the attempted viral failure was likely not a costly one(Clapp, 2019). UA put 15 million dollars into their swipe at garnering the female market and increase female sales by 28% or 140 million indicating that the potential market was large enough to be segmented and catered too (Nudd, 2015). Another consideration for segmenting the market is geography; do we need to focus our attentions on the country or world at large or scale are marketing to key points globally (Kardes, 2015 pg.47). The U.S overall presents a giant target in the athletics department, but certain areas and states just don’t seem to prioritize fitness.
Like geography we can also segment based on demographic and focus on areas that have a higher concentration of the women UA is seeking out. Certain areas and messaging platforms may favor males or older women less interested in fitness apparel. An example of this would be using YouTube in viral video distribution, YouTube favors males at 62% and 80% of views are outside of the U.S. this means that while it is a good idea to have the content available on YouTube it would benefit UA to distribute a female centric video on more female centered platforms and channels (Aslam, 2019). By paying the appropriate attention to all of these aspects we help form a geo-demographic idea that allows us to focus our attention on the most target rich of areas and create efficiency around our marketing campaign (Kardes, 2019 pg.48).
A combination of two groups that may make a potentially profitable segment are late baby boomers and early gen Xers, a group of people born between 1960-1970 (plus or minus a few years). In recent years this group has seen a rejuvenation of wealth as once demolished 401k plans come back to life, alimony payments and child support conclude, and their children who have reached their late 20’s and early 30’s are hopefully leaving the house. These people are male and female between 55-68 years old, and multi ethnic. Though middle class they have had their belts tightened as they support a family or in many cases multiple broken families. Because of their new found relaxed financial situation I believe that this demographic is poised to make higher end comfort purchases, travel arrangements and other higher dollar items that they feel they missed out on in earlier life.
In order to reach this segment, we will use the media that they are most accustom to. Currently Facebook is the most used social media by the older demographic with “62% of online Seniors aged 65+ are on Facebook and 72% are between age 50-64” (Aslam, 2019). Another avenue to reach this segment would be television commercials. Currently between 58% and 68% of 55-74-year old place watching television above other forms of media making them prime targets for traditional television ads (Blodget, 2014). Finally we should institute campaigns that encourage word of mouth both on social media and traditionally gen Xers tend to distrust large corporations and marketing and boomers are excited about new experiences making them susceptible to suggestions by friends (Friesner, 2018). In any case both groups have disposable income that they are not accustom to, social media they are only beginning to understand and a lifetime of bucket list dreams that they want to make a reality.
References
Aslam, S. (2019, January 06). YouTube by the Numbers: Stats, Demographics & Fun Facts. Retrieved January 20, 2019, from https://www.omnicoreagency.com/youtube-statistics/
Aslam, S. (2019, January 06). Facebook by the Numbers: Stats, Demographics & Fun Facts. Retrieved January 20, 2019, from https://www.omnicoreagency.com/facebook-statistics/
Blodget, H. (2014, May 04). If Newspapers And Magazines Think Life Is Tough Now, They Won’t Want To See What Happens Next… Retrieved January 20, 2019, from https://www.businessinsider.com/media-usage-by-age-2014-5
Clapp. (2019). Clapp Communication. Retrieved January 20, 2019, from http://www.clappcommunications.com/company/blog/under-armour-i-will-what-i-want-and-why-it-works/
Friesner, T. (2018). The Six Living Generations In America. Retrieved January 20, 2019, from http://www.marketingteacher.com/the-six-living-generations-in-america/
Nudd, T. (2015, June 24). Droga5’s Gisele Campaign for Under Armour Scores the Cyber Grand Prix at Cannes. Retrieved January 20, 2019, from https://www.adweek.com/brand-marketing/droga5s-gisele-campaign-under-armour-scores-cyber-grand-prix-cannes-165541/
Kardes, F.(2015). Consumer Behavior, 2nd Edition. [Chapter 2]. Retrieved from https://mbsdirect.vitalsource.com/#/books/undefined/
Maheshwari, S. (July 31, 2014) “Why Under Armour Made That Mesmerizing Ad with Ballerina Misty Copeland,” BuzzFeed News, http://www.buzzfeed.com/sapna/under-armours-powerful-new-misty-copeland-ad-kicks-off-recor#.ookjnO1r9(accessed May 2, 2016)
(Maheshwari, 2014)
MKT 345 