Adidas was first positioned in the athletic shoe market as the leading supplier of soccer footwear worldwide. In the athletic footwear market, Nike was the leader in the market with 40 percent market share, followed by Adidas and Reebok with 16 percent market share. Adidas later expanded its performance footwear line, to incorporate fringe sports and most athletic sports in general, to pursue its goal in becoming the global leader in athletic footwear. To support its positioning in the athletic shoe market and target market of 12-24 year old customers and athletes, Adidas used the motto “Impossible is Nothing”, to further demonstrate that the brand had the ability to let individuals go beyond their conventional limits for athletic performance. Adidas also reinforced the brand’s value to its existing customers through its advertisements at sporting events and sports teams and players sponsorships. By using sports icons and innovative ways of delivering its advertisements, Adidas hoped to be perceived as a brand that effectively harnessed “the emotional concepts of improvement, challenge and achievement, bringing them to life in an inspirational narrative”. By directing its marketing efforts in digital media, personal mobile gateways, innovative advertisements, as well ‘intuitive marketing’, Adidas successfully acquired thousands of more sales and brand awareness among its target group.
2. What evidence does Adidas have that suggests the importance and potential success of digital interactive and mobile marketing?
Adidas knows that the future is in technology and as technology improves mobile phones are becoming everyday life’s lifeline to the rest of the world. The internet was getting more expensive with website takeovers costing up to $500,000 per day. However, mobile advertising was cheaper and with statistics such as 70% of Europeans owned a