• by Karlene Lukovitz  @KLmarketdaily, April 13, 2010

The new "Anthem 3" campaign for Heineken's Tecate brand is bringing a more uno a uno approach to the brand's "beer with character" ("cerveza con carácter") positioning.

The three 30-second television spots for the campaign focus on celebrating moments from the lives of characters portraying the brand's core audience, male immigrants of Mexican origin -- including a construction worker, a window washer and a truck driver. The relevancy is heightened by the commercials' setting in U.S. cities, including New York and Los Angeles.

The more personalized creative approach represents a "natural evolution" of the "con carácter" positioning launched in 2008, including Tecate's award-winning 2009 radio "Disclaimer" ad, the brand's executives note. That ad used a tongue-in-cheek "disclaimer" message to define which men should not be Tecate drinkers (those who call their female significant others "Baby" or "Little Smurfette," or say "ouch" when they're hurt, etc.).

Like previous efforts, the new integrated campaign recognizes and toasts (quite literally, at the end of the TV spots), immigrants' masculine pride in overcoming a host of everyday challenges to establish new lives for themselves and their families in the United States.

The latest efforts in the "Anthem" series seek to "help establish a stronger emotional connection" with Tecate's consumers via "situation-relevant communications delivered by everyday individuals," summed up Heineken USA CMO Christian McMahan. Having "brought these men out of the shadows," Tecate has now "given them a name," adds Manuel Wernicky, president, chief ideas officer and managing partner of Adrenalina, Tecate's creative agency.

The TV spots, directed by Simón Bross, are being aired on national and regional Spanish-language networks, including Univision, Telemundo, Azteca America, Galavision and ESPN Deportes. In addition to the three main commercials, Tecate has produced spots specifically for its boxing and soccer marketing platforms.

The campaign also includes new radio commercials that are more direct follow-ups to the "Disclaimer" creative, poking fun at "ritualistic" daily behaviors by some men that the target audience would consider "less than manly, or lacking in character" (read: not macho). The radio spots are being aired on national and regional Spanish-language networks such as Univision Radio. Out-of-home is also a key element within traditional media. (The brand's media planning is done by MediaVest 42 degrees.)

Within television and radio, Tecate engages in "narrow-casting," meaning that it not only targets appropriate dayparts to broadcast spots, but produces creative specific to those periods of the day, Wernicky tells Marketing Daily. "We follow the 'consumer journey' through the day," he says.

"For instance, during the morning drive-to-work time, the radio spot has a message celebrating 'those who go the extra mile to make it.' At end-of-day drive-home time, the message is something like: 'For those who put in everything they had, because they have carácter.' During lunch time, or times when they are likely to be shifting from one job to another during the day, there are also different spots."

Wernicky stresses the brand's focus on reaching the audience through all touchpoints, including its heavy sponsorships of boxing programming (including "Solo Boxeo" on Univision and pay-per-view through its HBO partnership, which includes subsidizing discounted year-long viewing packages), as well as sponsorships of live boxing events through a partnership with Golden Boy Promotions, Inc.

Digital/mobile are growing parts of the mix, he adds, including the sites for Tecate and Tecate Light, a new microsite soon to be revealed, a Facebook fan page and other social media efforts.

Twitter? Not so much. In fact, not at all. Pressed on this, Wernicky admits that "tweeting" just doesn't seem to be something a Tecate guy would feel comfortable doing -- at least for the present.