Chris Wilson, Head of Brand Partnerships at Ingenuity, shares what brands can learn from Love Island Partnerships

The UK’s largest TV show is coming to a conclusion tonight and is expected to attract a record number of viewers. The Love Island spectacle is the latest and most watched reality show since Big Brother. So, why is it so important for brands to understand the opportunities, risks and potential to partner with shows of this ilk?

Love Island provides brands unprecedented access to the millennial market, with ITV offering a complete multi-media proposition to help brands reach, engage and convert young audiences.

Every year, we discuss how the following of the show grows younger and more naïve, particularly when it comes to how they’re being marketed to.

Over the last four years, we have seen a multitude of brands being involved across sponsorship, OHH advertising, product placement and now ecommerce partnerships which help brands amplify their products and services to eager Love Island viewers.

What are the benefits to partnering with a phenomenon such as Love Island?

The benefits of an ITV sponsorship are clear. It provides guaranteed access to an audience who are as engaged as football supporters when they’re watching Match of the Day. While MOTD is on once a week, Love Island captures an audience for more than six hours a week.

There are also options to target millennial audiences through social channels, by promoting your products and services in a tactile way that gets results.

The best partnerships are as subtle as the VO5 product placement deal which sees the show’s contestants spend a large proportion of their time ‘getting ready’ or ‘doing their hair’, using Unilever brands’ products.

Partners of the show can expect to see a spike in product sales, engagement and traffic on their sites as a result of partnering. Ad breaks provide an easy opportunity to catch the eyes of  the consumer, allowing brands to target viewers while they eagerly await for the next part of the show.

Take last year’s partner, Superdrug, whose aim was ‘to cement themselves as the go to destination for 16-34s, whilst increasing awareness of their own brand offering.’ As a result of working with ITV, visits to the Superdrug website rose by 200k after each episode, alongside a whopping 900% increase in Superdrug brand search terms.

A new approach this year

Interestingly, this year’s deal with I Saw It First offers a new approach to the previous retail partnership with Missguided.

It provides consumers the opportunity to follow their favourite contestant and buy their outfits online, allowing a unique customer journey. The show has a vision of how they want the contestants to dress, which shapes how the retail partner can promote certain ranges during different parts of the show.

It’s a similar case with UberEats, the title sponsor of this year’s show. By paying £5m for access, ITV has given them the best seat in the house to target the hard-to-reach millennial audience of circa 5 million. They’re giving away discount on food delivery and Love Island products to the audience, in return for data capture and a spike in orders, not to mention the brand association opportunities for hitting their key clients in the space where they most want to be spoken to.

Fully integrated deals like these will become the norm, as different brands seek to engage audiences that follow particular shows. It’s now more than important than ever to think about how to ready your brand for further integration.

The Risks

As with any show like this, there are multiple risks for the partner. Brands cannot control what happens on the show and what the general public think, which may come to affect your brand reputation.

There are huge concerns around mental health support and how the show can manipulate young audiences into thinking in a certain way. The dangers of being associated with these difficult messages means brands need to have a watertight PR function that’s ready for anything.

There may be other, more secure opportunities that could provide similar results, with pre-recorded shows being prime example.

Building a strategy to engage new audiences

Having a partnership strategy in place in today’s market is a must; it has become the new bar for brands that want to build equity that lasts. With budgets on the decrease and targets on the up, partnerships offer brands a fantastic opportunity to be able to build a unique platform to engage audiences and utilise other brands assets as their own.

In an era where TV is not the only way to drive sales, a sustainable partnership prevents any brand from being a “one trick pony” and adds a layer to any marketing plan that drives even more deliberate and dedicated customer engagement.

Ingenuity London

Outside of Love Island, there are many partnership models that work, including brand licensing, sponsorship, on-pack promotions, loyalty incentives and merchandising. If you work for a brand and are looking for ways to develop partnerships, Ingenuity will consult on who in the industry you can partner with, how best to structure a deal and crucially how to get in front of these brands. To find out more, check out our website.

Our cross-category experience lies in building partnerships, strategy and growth for brands such as Merlin Entertainments, Nickelodeon, Cannes Lions, Tough Mudder, Lastminute.com, The Times, Virgin Red and The Beano.

If you’re interested in engaging new audiences or developing a new way to market your brand via partnerships, get in touch with Chris Wilson at Chris.Wilson@ingenuitylondon.com

The post What your brand can learn from Love Island Partnerships appeared first on IPM Bitesize.

Brass agencies Content, PR and Media teams come together to share their thoughts on Love Island and what marketers can learn from it.

Whether you love it or hate it (and TBH we fall into both camps), there’s no getting away from Love Island every summer. Whether it’s the daily show, slogan tees in Primark or meme accounts that infiltrate every social platform for 2 months; the show is one of ITV’s biggest success. And, unsurprisingly brands want in on the action. So if Love Island sounds like a bit of you, we share our view on what marketers can learn from it.

Nikky (Senior Content Executive) explains why brands should think ‘that’s a bit of me(mes)’.

“Are you even a Love Island fan if you don’t spend the ad break sifting through memes on Twitter?

The hashtag #LoveIsland was used nearly 200,000 times on the UK 2019 launch date as viewers competed to win the internet with the perfect meme, and before the first ad break we already knew that “It is what it is” was the catchphrase of the series.

Each night, our feeds are filling up with memes about the islanders. But what does this mean for brands? Meme marketing works because memes are native to the language of social media, and because of the amount of noise the show makes, Love Island provides an opportunity to be reactive and relevant with sharable branded content. Just make sure it’s a good fit for the brand. Royal Mail did this brilliantly by creating the ‘Loyal Mail’ meme with 2018 star, Georgia, after she made the phrase ‘I’m loyal’ notorious”

Why are brands coupling up with Love Island? Jenny (PR Account Executive) tells all.

“With 5.8m people watching Love Island already this year, brands have huge PR opportunities available to them by getting into bed with the show.

However, caution should be taken with this type of partnership. With so many people watching the show, slip ups can quickly go viral and potentially damage a brand’s reputation via association. Whether directly involved in the programme or simply jumping on the back of the latest catchphrase, brands that embark on capitalising on popular culture events or TV shows should always have a plan in place just in case a PR blunder happens.

Anyone remember the Carphone Warehouse sponsorship of Big Brother that went sour during the controversy with Jade Goody, Jo O’Meara and Danielle Lloyd?”

Becky (Organic Search Content Manager) spills the tea on whether Love Island’s content marketing approach is her type on paper.

“We can take a lot of content marketing lessons from Love Island, however the main lesson is that they really understand their core audience, and have got to grips with their lifestyle choices and interests, even down to what they read online.

Love Island has become more than just a TV show. People can join in with conversations online, watch behind the scenes footage, download an app and even purchase items used in the Love Island villa. Take these insights and apply them when developing your new campaign. Think about how you can get the most out of it, just like Love Island have done. Review different formats, partnership opportunities and ways you can personalise your content.”

Tom (Senior Organic Search Manager and non-Love Island fan) tells us why ITV need to pie off their current search strategy. 

“From a search perspective the way that ITV have utilised their news section on Love Island is almost as bizarre as the popularity of the show. Considering they have a huge advantage in terms of releasing news and “first looks” they almost never rank for their show’s own news stories. This is down to how poorly optimised their Love Island news section is and the fact they haven’t leveraged their newsworthy advantage to ensure people are linking to their news articles. They have likely neglected the news section due to the success that newspapers have had in terms of increasing viewing figures. Yet it can’t help but feel short-sighted, if they had built up rankings and traffic they could’ve leveraged this to launch the next painful reality show when people inevitably grow tired of Love Island.”

Fran (Social & Content Manager) gives us an insight into the power of coupling up.

“It’s no surprise that the contestants of Love Island go on to have successful stints as influencers, given 4.4 million people tuned into the opening three episodes alone. A large percentage of whom, we can (fairly) confidently say will have contributed to the thousands of overnight followers the contestants gained on social media.

The show itself is largely based on image, and as a result, brands such as Missguided and I Saw it First have snapped up the opportunity to be the show’s official partner, providing contestants with clothes that commonly sell out shortly after an episode has aired.

However with influencers increasingly losing trust amongst consumers, a Love Islander promoting your brand on Instagram may have been effective a few years ago, now it’s more crucial for brands to create meaningful experiences with their audience – especially as we’re seeing industry reports saying over half of all their followers are fake! Less promo codes and more personality, please.”

Caroline (Media Group Account Director) is asking whether Love Island advertising could be a bit of you?

“With viewing up 16% (+0.8m) year on year and total viewers reaching 5.8m this year already Love Island continues to be commercial televisions biggest ratings puller for viewers aged 16 – 34. With an average of 51% of viewers falling into this category. It’s no surprise that when it comes to influencing this audience group, Love Island becomes a solid contender for media investment. However, whilst this age bracket is not surprisingly the highest, what is interesting is the audience breakdown overall and the volume of viewers the show attracts across the board:

The opportunity to reach your audience is vast, and with opportunities in both linear and nonlinear, Love Island could be a great addition to your media strategy, generating both brand and commercial success.”

Love Island might not be your cup of tea, but there’s no denying that we can learn a lot from it – good and bad. It’s caught the nation’s attention and created a buzz, something most brands would fall head over heels for.

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Following the incredible success of last year, Jet2holidays is once again brand partner of Love Island.

With fifth series of Love Island having started this week and fans across the UK tuning in, Jet2holidays is once again designated official travel partner of Love Island, making the partnership a great way for the package holiday specialist to continue raising its brand awareness across the UK, whilst targeting millennials and young adults.

Love Island is one of the most talked about shows on TV and in the definitive game of love, every few days the Love Islanders will have to couple up, with those not in a couple at risk of being dumped from the island. With the path to true love littered with surprise bombshell arrivals and unexpected twists and turns, there’s never a dull moment in the islanders’ sunshine paradise. Ultimately the couples must win over the hearts of the public, who will have the final say on who wins the show and takes home a lucrative cash prize. The winners and finalists will return to the UK with the award-winning Jet2.com.

This summer, the UK’s second largest tour operator will reach this audience through commercial competitions, TV and digital advertising, social media, and a dedicated microsite hosting exclusive content. The company brings back the popular slogan “Love the summer vibe with Jet2holidays and Love Island” for the duration of the series.

Two bespoke advertisements capturing the summer vibe will support the partnership, showcasing the different holiday experiences that Jet2holidays offers customers, both in Majorca and right across its network of European destinations.

Jet2holidays is also offering viewers nine chances to a pair of money-can’t-buy tickets to the Love Island Live final and a Jet2holidays for two people to Majorca, through a range of competition mechanics throughout the series. In addition, independent travel agency partners who make the most Jet2holidays bookings during the series will be entered into a prize draw to win a pair of tickets to the Love Island Live final, alongside a VIP Family Trip for two people to Majorca.

On top of that, an in-show competition means one winner can win their own Love Island experience with Jet2holidays – a 7-night holiday for six people staying at Sol Wave House All Suites in Magalluf, plus £40,000 spending money.

Steve Heapy, CEO of Jet2.com and Jet2holidays, said: “Our brand partnership with Love Island surpassed all our expectations last summer, so we are delighted to be the official travel partner of the show once again. Love Island is one of the most popular and talked about shows of the summer, meaning we can enjoy fantastic engagement with a key audience whilst showcasing the range of award-winning holidays that we have on offer for young people.”

Claire Heys, ITV Brand Partnerships and Content Director, said: “We loved coupling up with Jet2holidays last year and I’m delighted that the brand is continuing to build on that partnership by returning as the official travel partner for the new series of Love Island.”

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Kellogg’s has teamed up with ITV2’s Love Island for an on-pack promotion on leading brands, Kellogg’s Corn Flakes and Kellogg’s Crunchy Nut, with a trip for two to Mallorca to see the Love Island final as the grand prize.

The partnership encourages consumers to buy a pack in store, take a selfie of themselves holding up the back of the cereal box and then share it on the Kellogg’s Facebook page, Instagram or Twitter with the hashtag #KelloggsCerealDater.

UK and Irish consumers are being offered the chance to win a two day trip to Mallorca plus a pair of tickets to the poolside Love Island live final, with additional limited edition Love Island fridge magnet sets available for runners up.

The on pack promotion will be available on Kellogg’s Corn Flakes and Crunchy Nut and aims to drive engagement with consumers in store and brand awareness on social media.

Niamh Cribbin, Senior Marketing Manager for Kellogg’s Europe, says: “Love Island was one of last year’s most talked about TV shows. The partnership allows us and the retailers to tap into consumers who wouldn’t necessarily expect to see Love Island in this category – or at breakfast. The promotion aims to drive sales and brand awareness, by tapping into a younger and trends influenced shopper.”

The offer runs until July 31^st.

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Lucozade Ribena Suntory’s TED – Technology, Entertainment and Design – team has delivered its first in-house TV creative; a Lucozade Zero and Love Island tie-up, which is part of a £6m multimedia campaign partnership with ITV2’s BAFTA award-winning Love Island show.

The Love Island partnership will also include VOD, OOH, Digital and Social to drive awareness and cultural relevance with Lucozade Zero’s target audience, as well as a competition to win tickets to the show’s final.

Pioneering a model of collaboration, TED led the strategy and creative, working closely with both the Lucozade Zero brand team and ITV to generate ideas and partnership assets, along with MediaCom to plan the media campaign.

The print and digital out of home elements of the campaign were shot by renowned fashion and sports photographer, Richard Allen, and the in-store campaign features bespoke smart-screens activated by warm weather. Consumers will also be reached through a branded Snapchat lens; Love Island app; influencer content; and a competition to win tickets to the Love Island live final.

The campaign kicks off with an upbeat, summery TV ad where the protagonist is looking for her perfect match. She optimistically engages with a couple of guys until she humorously realises they are not quite for her. Suddenly, the sound of a text gets her excited. It’s a new arrival, and it’s 100% her type. Finally, she’s met the one that ticks all her boxes: Lucozade Zero, a drink that tastes great and has zero sugar. The ad ends with the “Fancy It?” tagline.

Laz Ioannou, TED Creative Director, comments, “Our writers, designers and strategists sit alongside the marketing teams every single day, allowing us to get truly under the skin of their brand. We tapped into the Lucozade Zero brand team’s consumer insight and were then able to take them through every step of our creative process. Collaborating with ITV’s production house also opened the door to an agile and iterative process, which we believe has helped develop a great end result.”

Claire Heys, ITV Brand Partnerships and Content Director, adds: “I’m delighted to welcome Lucozade Zero as a partner of the summer’s hottest show. We’ve worked closely with the brand to launch Lucozade Zero on TV with a fantastic new Love Island themed advert which I’m sure will really appeal to viewers.”

The TED team includes designers, developers and strategists who sit within the Marketing department at Lucozade Ribena Suntory (LRS) responsible for supporting Lucozade Ribena Suntory’s brands with everything from pack shots and shopper marketing creative to billboard ads and TV spots.

Rick Oakley, TED Head, comments, “We recognise the invaluable expertise of our brand’s creative agencies, but we’ve built a hugely talented team able to deliver fine creative work and, where feasible, we’ll deliver projects of this size in-house. The savings the brands make here are ploughed back into media to ensure our great creative is seen even more widely and drives sales.”

Lucozade Zero was the biggest soft drink launch in 2016 and the brand is now worth £30m. The brand is part of Lucozade Ribena Suntory, one of the leading soft drinks businesses in the UK and Ireland. LRS was formed in 2014, and is part of Suntory Beverage & Food Europe. Soft drinks brands include Lucozade Energy, Lucozade Sport, Fitwater, Ribena, Orangina and True Nopal Cactus Water.

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