• by Dan Eisenberg , February 5, 2013

A more connected marketplace has made consumers and sports fans smarter and more sophisticated than ever before. This means there is a need to focus on building local relationships, regardless the size of your brand. Brands are now looking to their local affiliates to capture successes with a local audience. Yet, what can brands do to avoid losing sight of the big picture and risk appearing too fragmented?

Here are five tips/steps to optimize your national sports marketing strategy at the local market level:

1. Connect: Brands must ensure that their message is connected by a unifying theme, no matter the mode of communication. If a consumer is on your Facebook page or watching your TV spot during the game, they are taking away the same message, even if that consumer is miles away.
   
   
2. Consistent: As brands participate in a range of seemingly unrelated local platforms, it is important that consumers realize the brand values and message are the same. This consistency serves to unify the effects of diverse platforms in a local market, allowing multiple local events to work in unison, and also making the impact of the entire portfolio of activities greater than that of any single activity.
   
   
3. Creative: The average consumer is exposed to nearly 3,000 advertisements a day. In a world of clutter and oversaturation, do not overlook the power of creativity to stand out in any advertising/marketing campaign. A creative approach that is based on the understanding of each hyperlocal audience and what they enjoy about the platforms you sponsor are crucial to identifying and claiming “ownable positions” for your brand.
   
   
4. Activate/Amplify: National sports marketing campaigns and local sponsorships do not happen in a vacuum. Arm your local markets with the tools to activate the umbrella campaign with the ultimate goal of generating engagement and “shareability.” Sharing should not be limited to consumer-facing assets. Best practices and standards must be shared among internal stakeholders, as well. 
   
   
5. Measure: Do not save this for the end of a sponsorship or sports marketing campaign. Before you even begin, establish the local success metrics. Then, use the desired outcomes to create elements that not only engage, but motivate consumers to take action. During the local campaign, adapt and evolve depending upon the consumer attitudes and reactions which your measurement functions uncover. If an adjustment is needed, do not be afraid to pull the trigger. 

These integrated sports marketing efforts need to work simultaneously to create a clear and concise portfolio in which the whole is greater than the sum of its hyperlocal parts.