MASCOTS FOR

MARKETING

Raluca Ionita is the Chief Marketing Officer at AYG Romania. She is a content creator, focused on Social Media strategies, Community Development and Youth Engagement. Before AYG Romania, Raluca was involved in volunteering activities, supporting NGOs with consultancy and training. Follow her on Twitter @ionita_raluca!

HOW TO USE

MASCOTS FOR MARKETING YOUR BUSINESS:

Raluca Ionita

What is a mascot?.............………………….….…5 How to use a mascot for Marketing .…………..9 Examples of brands having & using mascots………………………..………………….…....12 Conclusions and additional information……………………………………….…….16

TABLE OF CONTENTS:

CHAPTER 1

WHAT IS A

MASCOT?

The term mascot includes anything used to represent a group with a common public identity, such as a school, professional sports team, society, military unit, or brand name.

Mascots are also used as fictional, representative spokespeople for consumer products.

Mascots may take the form of a logo, person, live animal, inanimate object, or a costumed character, and often appear at events and are often used as marketing tools for brand’s target groups.

HOW TO USE MASCOTS FOR MARKETING YOUR BUSINESS

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Etymological, the term “Mascot” derives from the Provincial French “mascotte”, which was meant to bring good luck to a household.

However, others think that the term derives from Portuguese “mascoto”, meaning witchcraft or “mascotto”, meaning spell.

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A good mascot has to be memorable. If it's hard to identify or isn't recognizable as

something specific, it's not going to do the job it's supposed to. A mascot needs to stand for something. It needs to be more than just

cute - it has to have a personality. ~Don Carter

HOW TO USE MASCOTS FOR MARKETING YOUR BUSINESS

The word was popularized by

Edmond Audran’s

through the comic operetta

“La Mascotte” in 1880.

The word was popularized by Edmond Audran’s through the comic operetta “La Mascotte” in 1880. The story concerns a farm girl who is believed to bring good luck to whoever possesses her, so long as she remains a virgin. The title (in English) initiated the use of the word 'mascot' in the English language to mean an animal, human, or thing which brought luck.

Source: Online Etymology Dictionary

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HOW TO USE MASCOTS FOR MARKETING YOUR BUSINESS

CHAPTER 2

HOW TO USE A

MASCOT FOR

MARKETING?

Mascots are captivating and efficient symbols that will create long lasting impressions with your targeted audience.

Mascots, such as logos, are highly important in the branding process of a company and are great tools for humanizing the brand and increasing its exposure.

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Today, every company is looking for new techniques to stand out! Why? On the grounds that we are being “attacked” by ads every day, every hour, everywhere we go. Statistically, we are exposed on a daily basis to about 250 ads – TV, radio and print. If we were to take into consideration the amount of ads we are exposed to over the Internet, this amount would probably double. For this reason, it is essential to create a message that will stick on the customer’s memory.

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HOW TO USE MASCOTS FOR MARKETING YOUR BUSINESS

We are exposed on a daily basis to

about 250 ads: TV, radio and

print. Source: “Our Rising Ad Dosage: It’s Not as Oppressive as Some Think,” Media Matters, February 15, 2007.

First of all, let’s start with some basic things a mascot can do for a company.

Can you kiss or hug a company’s logo? Can you greet or high-five a logo? Well, in theory, you could, but in practice, that would be slightly awkward...

Using a mascot for a company is a part of the Marketing strategy and it’s a great way to attract and support more customers. Having a physical, huggable, meet-and-greet mascot to touch, kiss, high five and take pictures with, will significantly sky rocket your promotional coverage through an increased exposure and will strengthen your brand association.

Consumers, usually speaking, buy the products they trust – and it’s more possible for an identifiable character to earn someone’s trust considering the fact that it generates more impressions. Thereupon, you are more likely to love a mascot, which is visual and tactile, which smiles and waves and which consumers are associating with your brand than a cold logo, which, of course, is also associated with your brand.

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HOW TO USE MASCOTS FOR MARKETING YOUR BUSINESS

HOW WILL A MASCOT HELP INCREASING EXPOSURE?

Mascots seem to catch people’s attention, some would say…but, let’s see how. We made a research upon the usage of mascots in promotion and the following results came to life. On the account of our research, we can truly state that mascots are successful living both in an online and offline environment.

MASCOTS AT WORK!

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Source: https://mascot-games.london2012.com

Events A mascot, such as a person, will be a part of the community. Therefore, he will attend local events: sporting events, student events, festivals, educational events. However, if the mascot is not the organizer, be sure to ask permission before attending the event. Advertising campaigns One’s mascot can raise awareness of the brand and heighten the company’s visibility. The mascots can hand-out product samples, or they can share flyers, posters or informative materials. For sure, the mascot won’t say “No!” to a shooting or an autograph session. Promotional objects Imagine a private nursery who’s mascot is a teddy bear dressed with a red T-shirt. How cool would it be to hand out all the new born children in the nursery a toy impersonating the mascot? Or offering all the mothers a customized red T-shirt with a nice congratulation message using the company style?

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HOW TO USE MASCOTS FOR MARKETING YOUR BUSINESS

OFFLINE

Community Development A mascot is representing the brand, and every brand should take care of the community within its CSR strategy. For this purpose, the mascot also comes in handy, being a lovely character doing community outreach and charitable work, or visiting children at local hospitals and orphanages.

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HOW TO USE MASCOTS FOR MARKETING YOUR BUSINESS

Holiday Events Imagine only how nice it would be for a company to organize a Christmas Party, and instead of the traditional Santa Clause, to have the company’s own joy-bringer, its own mascot dressed in a seasonal costume and offering the employees customized items, sustaining the brand and motivating the staff. Or the mascot doing the same thing for the community or the underprivileged ones. Just lovely!

Source: Japanese Mascot for blood donation - http://pinktentacle.com/2008/11/japanese-blood-

mascots/

Social Media

According to E.J. Schultz, “mascots are brands’ best social media accessories”.

Carol Philips, president of Brand Amplitude, declared that “mascots are the gift that keep on giving – they never get in trouble with the law, they don’t up their fees and you can use them for a long, long time”.

This being said, who else could possibly better represent a brand?

Companies could also increase their visibility by creating shows with their mascots and sharing them on social media platforms.

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HOW TO USE MASCOTS FOR MARKETING YOUR BUSINESS

ONLINE But wait: our lives have digital extensions! We live on the Internet also, we communicate with our friends online, we are buying products online, we see companies online, so, mascots should also be online.

Mascots are the gift that keep on giving –

they never get in trouble with the law,

they don’t up their fees and you can use them for a long, long time.

~Carol Philips

A mascot can also be easily transformed into a TV star and through the company’s Facebook page stories about the ad can be created. Games and social applications A mascot can also be the star of customized brand games (flash games, console or computer games). Or it can be used for creating social media applications. Augmented Reality Solutions Imagine a kindergarten’s presentation brochure. By scanning a code, a picture or even the logo on the brochure, the kindergarten’s mascot could be revealed and could interact with the user. How amazed would a child be if he saw that coming? YouTube/Vimeo videos A creative marketer could create some awesome movies with a mascot that can be “viralized” on video sharing tools.

In many cases, consumers would rather interact online with a cute or cuddly character than with a faceless corporate executive”

~Marta Majewska – V.P. Digital &

Social Media Strategist Porter Novelli

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Ergo, our designers at AYG Romania, came with a series of features for designing a good mascot. * *Please note that this is not an exhaustive list, so everybody can contribute with pieces of advice.

We are witnessing over the last year a mascot phenomena. More and more companies are getting to know the benefits of Mascot Marketing, hence, we are seeing more mascots. However, unfortunately, we are also participating in the usage of poor quality mascots, “bought on sale” over the Internet, or, even worse, misappropriated online.

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HOW TO USE MASCOTS FOR MARKETING YOUR BUSINESS

A GOOD MASCOT: CHARACTERISTICS

If a company needs user interaction,

then creating a mascot can be a pathway for

brand revigoration.

Source: David Kam, “Mascot for Marketing and Branding Your Business”, 2007

Originality A good and efficient mascot should be original; each mascots are designed for a specific brand, based on certain needs and requirements. Remember that a mascot will help the communication and exposure of a brand, thus, when creating a mascot, everyone should consider the uniqueness of elements found in all brands. Sure, there are plenty of mascots online at good prices, but, we ought to take into consideration that the cute and funny mascot identifies with our brand. It’s the same as a logo – what perspective one has when seeing two companies having the same logo?! Logic A very important aspect in the creation of a good mascot should be logic. Visually, each element should have a reason. Credibility Each mascot should have a story, a history. This story should influence the aspect of the mascot, or, at least, this is recommended. Another important aspect is the one that it ought to reflect the company’s personality. Positivity It’s really important to know what feelings a mascot will arouse. In general, it should have a nice state of mind. The mascot needs to be expressive and detailed. It should be friendly and close to the consumers.

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Vectors A mascot should be designed using vectors. This way, the quality is better, the colors are brighter and lively and, not in the last row, it is scalable. You can modify the dimensions without loosing quality. Even better, design a 3D Mascot. Advantages of 3D models over 2D models include flexibility, ease of rendering and photorealism.

If opting for a 3D mascot, it is also versatile, thus having the possibility of numerous instances, using it in various areas depending on the specific needs. (Easter, Christmas, special occasions. Colors When designing a mascot, another important element is the color. In the case of mascots, as in logos, 3 colors are more than enough. When choosing the colors for a mascot, taking into consideration that the mascot represents the brand, then, the company’s brand colors should be used. If the company’s logo is red, then, the mascot should also wear something red. It’s easier this way for consumers to identify the mascot with a specific brand.

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Source: Rigged 3D models of Vancouver 2010 Mascots - http://www.3drivers.com

Easy to understand A mascot should be comprised of easily identifiable elements. Most of the people will not have the patience to understand which concept a mascot represents. Therefore, a good mascot should be connected with a concept which is known by the target audience. Mascots should identify with the brand somehow. If a random mascot is assigned to a specific brand, it won’t imply that the consumers will identify with that mascot or respond with increased sales. Fluidity in design When watching a mascot, it’s highly important to emphasize on the right element. This element should be a simple yet memorable one, and the rest of the design elements should be comprised in the first one. The human brain has the tendency to perceive some parts of an object and then fill in the blank spots with assumptions. Taking this into consideration, it’s crucial that the elements perceived by the brain are the ones that the designer wants to be perceived.

Proportions When designed, a mascot should respect some defined proportions. One can use prime numbers or, “the Golden Ratio”.

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CHAPTER 3

BRANDS HAVING

AND USING

MASCOTS FOR

MARKETING

Advertising is the

rattling of a stick inside a swill-bucket.

Source: George Orwell, The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations, 1992, New York: Oxford University Press, p. 501

From rise to dawn, we are exposed to hundreds of ads. We drive to work, we listen to the radio and we hear spots with commercial character. We pass by billboards with huge images announcing sales, discounts or the newest trend in their products. We open our computers and we receive newsletters promoting different services or coupons with brand promotion. The explanation? We have adopted a selective behavior in order to protect ourselves from information overload. Be that as it may, but, some ads are imprinted on our memory. Why? Because we connect with their message, or maybe we associate some emotions with the information. And, since we are familiar with the quote “A picture is worth a thousand words”, we are more likely to remember an image, a shape, a logo or, a charming, big eyes, playful look cartoon-character.

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Mascots represent a successful marketing tool which is believed to have been implemented since the 19th century. In order to raise awareness and increase sales, every company used and is still using marketing techniques to promote their brands and their products or services. And, better yet, if they needed to instill a personality in their brand, what better way to do it than creating a character in order to live their brand. Now, as we could read from the previous chapter, not all the mascots are created in a way that positive represents a corporate image. Furthermore, we will see from the study cases, not all the mascots needed tons of work, exhausting brainstorming sessions and dozens of focus groups – some of them were created by mistake.

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Anyway, created by mistake or not, there were plenty of famous brands which took into consideration the value, impact and momentum given by their great brand mascots.

Example of a mascot costume

Ronald McDonald is a clown male character, created by Willard Scott in 1963, used as the primary mascot of the McDonald’s fast food restaurant chain.

The Quik Bunny is a male bunny character introduced in 1973. He is voiced by Barry Gordon and replaced puppeteer Jimmy Nelson and his puppet characters Dan O'Day and Farfel the dog who promoted the product on television in the 1950s. In 2001, the Quick Bunny was renamed Nesquik Bunny, the redesign being made by the cartoonist Ramon Maria Casanyes

The original Ronald McDonald as pictured on the United States trademark application filed in 1967 Source: Wikipedia

Ronald McDonald

Nesquik Bunny

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Delma was launched in Romania in 1999 and it brought a fresh view on the margarine market thanks to their funny animation character. Delma, the mascot, was used in promotional videos , marketing campaigns and, at a certain moment, was even a star in a local TV show.

Alexa The Owl (Bufnita Alexa) was created in 2006 by Gabriel Ovidiu Sarghie, at that time a student in the university. Alexa is the mascot of Alexandru Ioan Cuza University from Iasi, and it is used for educational purposes. In the Greek Mythology, the owl is the symbol of wisdom, therefore, this is the reason behind the concept.

Source: http://www.marketingportal.manager.ro

Delma

Alexa The Owl

Source: http://www.studentie.ro/campus/bufnita_alexa_mascota_de_la_cuza/c-70-a-8121

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M&M's originated in the United States in 1941, and are now sold in as many as 100 countries, being produces in different colors, some of which were changed over the years. The team is comprised of: Red, cynical and sardonic (milk chocolate candy), Yellow, romantic peanut candy, Cool Blue for almond candies, seductive Green for dark chocolate M&Ms and the neurotic Orange for crispy candies. Since 2012, Ms. Brown was introduced.

DO & MO were launched in 2008 for the retailer DOMO. DO is a funny representation of a dog and MO is a cute representation of a cat. Together, they form DOMO, the famous brand.

M&M’s

DO & MO

Source: http://www.mms.com/us/about/mmshistory/

Source: http://www.domo.ro/

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CHAPTER 4

CONCLUSIONS

AND ADDITIONAL

INFORMATION

A mascot serves as a real-time character that promotes a brand, product or company. Therefore, it is a character that is associated with your brand, encouraging consumers to buy services or products, thus increasing visibility and sales performance. Mascots are tools which need to be integrated in the marketing strategy of the company and it facilitates the interaction between the brand and the consumers, especially through social media. A mascot can be used both online and offline and it’s enjoyed both by adult target audiences and young target audiences. A mascot should be original, custom made, not bought over the internet. It should be nice and positive, credible and easy to understand. Remember that people won’t take too long to understand the concept behind the mascot.

A good mascot has to be memorable. If it's hard to identify or isn't recognizable as something specific, it's not going to do the job

it's supposed to. A mascot needs to stand for something. It needs to be more than just cute - it has to

have a personality. ~Don Carter

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However, remember that a mascot does not guarantee a successful marketing campaign. There are elements that everyone should consider prior to ordering a custom made mascot. Sometimes, you might not even need a mascot. Before creating one, a deep analysis of the communication part is needed. Elements that need to be taken into consideration are the target audience and the message you want to transmit . Before adopting a mascot, everyone should analyze both the pros and the cons – in the end, it’s your brand image in stake.

It’s not a question about our product or the way we price it, it’s getting more people to watch it.

~Chris Gibbs

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THE R.O.I.

OF MASCOTS

Find out whether your investment in a mascot would pay off. Request a price offer for a mascot today.

www.ayg.ro