Taking it to the Hole: Nike's Jordan Strategy

What's better than sitting around in your office reading about marketing strategy and wondering how it can possibly apply to helping your clients find the right talent? Easy. Taking a trip down to Maryland to catch the 2011 AAF Baltimore Ad Week. Better yet, I sat in on a session with none other than Sean Tresvant, Global Marketing Director for Nike.

Sean spent an hour detailing how Nike builds and executes a marketing strategy for the brand that sent Nike soaring, the Jordan brand. Each year the brand launches a new shoe, and though I didn't even realize it, this is going to be their 26th year. Being one of the world's most recognizable brands and keeping things fresh for 26 years has its own set of unique challenges.

Sean explained that long gone are the days of walking into your local shoe store or Footlocker and talking with the sales rep about the latest and greatest in footwear tech. These days, the brand's target demographic (the 17 year old competitive athlete) is conducting all of their research digitally before ever setting foot into a brick and mortar store. It came as a bit of a revelation that teenagers were comparison shopping and checking out the specs for shoes online, but who can blame them?

What their consumers want to consume has even changed. Sean discussed the ever-increasing amount of technical details that his consumers want about each shoe. It's interesting to note that during the brand's birth, the brand itself was enough to sell the shoe. It was a Jordan, plain and simple. Now the most clicked link on the shoe profile page is for the technical details. Buyers want to know why the shoe is better than the competition and what it can do for them.

As we got rolling into the question and answer portion of the afternoon, the audience seemed to be interested in learning about community pushback that Nike has to deal with from time to time. I specifically brought up the current Nike 6.0 campaign and Sean took it in stride and gave the answer you want to hear as a marketer and advertiser: Nike pushes the limits with its products and does the same with its marketing. Remember that the brand is 26 years old and keeping your audience's attention means pushing the limits and being provocative...which sometimes brings a bit of heat. I, personally, have always enjoyed Nike's advertising and it was refreshing to hear such a candid response.

The discussion was a great opportunity to peer a little bit into the mind of a man that directs a massive global marketing brand. But, here are my questions to you: Do you think the Jordan brand will stay relevant? Is Nike still known for pushing the envelope in advertising?

Just a few things to think about.