Similar to the 2010 Winter Olympic Games in Vancouver, IMI International’s syndicated 2010 FIFA World Cup Sponsorship Study is now available and highlights key consumer responses from eight countries around the world.  Countries include the USA, Canada, Mexico, Argentina, Spain, UK, Ireland and Australia.

Complete perspective and context on the property, sponsoring brands, fan engagement and more is available with the following topics covered in depth:

• Sponsorship Highlights and Executive Summary
• Property Engagement and Viewership
  • Planned (March 2010 – NA Only) vs. Actual
  • Intended viewership for 2014
• How the World Cup was Consumed
  • Behaviour with various mediums
  • Behaviour when consumers couldn’t watch live
• Thoughts on the World Cup
  • Words that come to mind, favourite moments, favourite athletes
• The South Africa Effect
• Sponsorship Attitudes & Feelings
• Sponsoring Brands
  • Effect on Purchase Intent and Favourability
  • Winners and Losers of Sponsorship
    • Awareness, linkage, effect on consumers, themes that resonated
• Sponsor and Promo Tracking Case Studies

For more information on this study and its highlights, please contact Tim Bishop by phone 416-440-0310 ext 341 or 1-800-784-5757 ext 341 or by email at tbishop@consultIMI.com.

Relative to single event visitors, repeat visitors in this actual in-market case study register incremental impact on experiential event activations regarding these key measures.  For brands looking to drive greater ROI, experiential activations should encourage attendees to come back to events.  Give attendees a compelling reason to return, possibly by including special offers, e-reminders, bring-a-friend vouchers, etc to deliver additional value and incentives.

To view the actual case study statistics, broken out by both first-time event attendees and repeat visitors, plus on brand love and purchase intent, please click on the links below for the full article.

For more information on the EMF, visit http://www.experientialforum.com/ where you can join to receive regular updates on the latest experiential news, research and insights.  The EMF / IMI International research articles are also available for viewing on IMI International’s Downloads page.

All the evidence suggests the Leafs could comfortably co-exist with another NHL franchise in the Greater Toronto Area, arguably without a dent to the bottom line. In April, research by IMI International conducted to gauge interest in a second franchise showed there are roughly 800,000 residents who consider NHL hockey “a passion” but who haven’t been able to attend a live game in at least two years.

“There is massive demand for a second NHL team in Toronto,” said Don Mayo, global managing partner for IMI in Toronto. “If there is more supply, there will [still] definitely be great demand.”

“The Maple Leafs would be fine,” Mayo said. “The biggest impact would be on other sports teams, such as the [MLSE-owned] Raptors or the Toronto FC, or the Blue Jays [owned by Rogers Communications] because there’s only so much money in a marketplace. It would also impact cultural and other events because people don’t have unlimited funds.”

As seen in the newpaper and online on July 5 and July 8, 2010, IMI International provided local market insights for a joint Globe and Mail/TSN project to evaluate the impact of a second southern Ontario NHL franchise. 

Reporter David Naylor notes that “Hamilton and Toronto have the requisite economic prowess to support a professional sports franchise. An NHL team in Quebec City would have the professional sports market to itself, while in Winnipeg a franchise would face competition only from the opposite-season CFL.”

IMI International’s study in April 2010 across the GTA and Golden Horseshoe surrounding Toronto was conducted to determine the interest, impact and potential of a NHL team was for Hamilton, Kitchener and a second team in Toronto.

For more information, please contact IMI International.

As noted on the PMA’s website, the Promotion Marketing Association, established in 1911, is the premier not-for-profit organization and resource for research, education and collaboration for marketing professionals.

Representing the over $1 trillion integrated marketing industry, the organization is comprised of Fortune 500 companies, top marketing agencies, law firms, retailers, service providers and academia, representing thousands of brands worldwide.  

Championing the highest standards of excellence and recognition in the promotion and integrated marketing industry globally, PMA’s objective is to foster a better understanding of promotion and integrated marketing and its role in the overall marketing process.

The PMA is headquartered in New York City with its affiliate, the PMA Educational Foundation, Inc.

As a speaker for this conference, Don Mayo, Global Managing Partner of IMI International, will provide delegates with real-time insights into what clients want, need and demand from their agencies in 2010-11.

Don Mayo will be highlighting the very latest proprietary consumer insights in his presentation as it relates to agency and client dynamics.  The key focus will be:

• What keeps them up at night
• 3 biggest challenges and opportunities
• Perception of marketing, cause, environment, social, life attitudes
• Impact and momentum of marketing tactics
• Perception and reality of digital, social, mobile
• Best in class marketers
• Talk value:  what do they talk about and how
• What’s caught their eye
• What and why they change behaviour

As mentioned on the conference website, this event “is for agencies serious about taking immediate steps to improve their business. Spend 3 days with 35+ sessions, 40+ speakers and select peers. Examine the best practices of those agencies currently experiencing growth. From Creating New Revenue Streams to Rewriting Your Capabilities, take away strategies converting business.”

Don Mayo, Managing Partner of IMI International, is again one of the leading conference speakers for the Canadian Sponsorship Forum.  Held annually, this year’s event is hosted in beautiful Whistler, BC, site of the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games.

Be the first to see research focused on actual in-market effectiveness, impact of recent brand activations, consumer-validated insights and recent Vancouver 2010 Winter Games observations. Whether you’re an official sponsor or simply delivering best-in-class activations without any sponsorship affiliation, you will learn best practices both on how to win in the current economic climate and during major events.

Derived from a study completed during February & March 2010 by IMI International and in association with TrojanOne, the key focus of this session will be on the 2010 Vancouver Olympic Games as well as other major properties. Don will isolate case studies on ‘who impacted consumers,’ ‘who avoided consumers’ and ‘means to optimize your activation plan going forward.’ Further, this session will detail not only recent sponsorship activations, but will include trending based on consumer research completed throughout prior years.  

The key focus will be on the 2010 Vancouver Olympics plus other major properties, such as the Super Bowl, Grammy Awards, Daytona 500, NBA All Star Game, Mardi Gras and others.

Based on the study’s consumer-validated insights plus recent at-the-Games observation, IMI International will isolate some case studies on ‘who impacted consumers’, ‘who avoided consumers’ and means to optimize your activation plan going forward. Further, this session will detail not only recent sponsorship activations, but will include trending based on consumer research completed throughout prior years.

Highlights will include some of the ‘winner’ activations, featuring not only how marketing impacted behaviour, talk value and brand equity, but how winning campaigns engaged consumers. Additionally, the presentation will detail best practices both on how to win in the current economic climate and during major events, whether you are an official sponsor or simply delivering best-in-class activations without any sponsorship affiliation.

This Canadian consumer insights module conducted in autumn 2009 looks at a number of topics, including:

• How consumers viewed the recession during 2009
• The effect of the recession on various marketing tactics
• The changing attitudes of consumers and how these can explain the change in marketing tactic effectiveness
• Brand health with 85 brands ranked based on consumer responses
• Brand-specific examples of good and bad tactics used over the last 2 years
• Keys to your marketing success in 2010

This module provides a look into how consumers are thinking, what tactics will work the hardest for you and how brands have utilized these to their advantage.

For more information on ConsumerTrack™ Insights, please contact Tim Bishop at 416-440-0310 ext. 341 or by email at tbishop@consultIMI.com.

We’re fully committed to helping you succeed in 2010 and look forward to a mutually beneficial relationship.

Enjoy the holidays and we wish you the very best for the New Year!

Erik Hauser, founder of the EMF, noted a large gap in case studies, best practice learnings and research-validated insight in the field of experiential marketing.  Thus, the partnership between the EMF and IMI International was born to deliver just that. 

The newest articles focus on experiential optimization and evaluation, including “Optimizing Experiential Interaction Time to Impact Purchases” and “Mass or Experiential – the Cost Per Impact is Equal”.  These articles are now available on the EMF website to members.

For more information on the EMF, visit www.experientialforum.com where you can join to receive regular updates on the latest experiential news, research and insights.  The EMF / IMI International research articles are also available for viewing on IMI International’s Downloads page.

ATLANTA, USA – September 1, 2009 – The Experiential Marketing Forum is proud to announce that IMI International, a leading global marketing consulting and research firm, will be providing the EMF with a research forum with monthly insights and perspectives on topics that matter most to experiential marketers around the world.

The Experiential Marketing Forum, the largest global community of experiential marketing practitioners with over 8,000 members, seeks to expand its role in the development and communication of fact-based research methods and insights.  

Designed to be relevant, timely and informative, IMI International’s best-in-class insights will allow the Experiential Marketing Forum community to experience elements of the vast database of insights and best practices that IMI International has developed.  “IMI has been a great partner at delivering on market-proven principles, as well as the unexpected insights that they have become known for”, says Erik Hauser, the EMF’s founder. 

Since 1971, IMI has been maximizing clients Marketing ROI through consumer insights that establish best practices in developing, optimizing, executing, and key performance metrics. IMI has completed over 1,500+ experiential marketing campaign evaluations across 10 countries and 50+ categories, covering tactics across sponsorship events, street sampling to in-store and digital initiatives.  Clearly, IMI International is well suited to lead this exciting project. 

For all current members in the Experiential Marketing Forum, the launch of new insights that highlight the foundation of IMI International’s experiential marketing best practices is very exciting.  “Experiential marketing is one of the best ways to impact consumers and deliver quantifiable value to your brand and IMI International is here to help the community meet and exceed its business goals,” says Dan Hunter, Partner of IMI International.  “The fun part will be to watch how community members leverage these facts to build on their existing experience and take it to the next level,” said Hunter.

This partnership looks forward to hearing from the experiential marketing community to continue to grow this exciting field. 

To view the EMF – IMI International insights, please visit the Experiential Marketing Forum or view IMI International’s Downloads.

About the Experiential Marketing Forum

The Experiential Marketing Forum (EMF) is the center of knowledge for experiential marketing and related subjects. The EMF has several features that help teach individuals about experiential marketing methodology and related topics. The EMF community has more than 8,000 members from around the globe, and currently is translated into 11 languages. The EMF is a virtual “think tank” of professionals, students and others who share ideas and keep abreast of trends in media on a daily basis. The Experiential Marketing Forum can be found at www.experientialforum.com.  

About IMI International

IMI International is a leading global marketing consulting and research firm with offices in the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada and Australia.  Focused on improving its Fortune 500 clients’ marketing effectiveness, IMI International evaluates and optimizes brand activation campaigns to meet brand and sales objectives while achieving the highest ROI possible.  Privately held, IMI International has a robust database of action standards sourced from over 9,000 marketing evaluations over the last 35+ years across 80 product and service categories in 15 countries.  For more information on IMI International, please contact Dan Hunter at dhunter@consultIMI.com.