Wilson Sporting Goods Co. launched “My Wilson,” a major brand marketing campaign featuring Serena Williams, Roger Federer to cast the spotlight on the relationship that exists between athletes and their equipment and the journeys and stories they create together.
Wilson designed the campaign to create a conversation among youth athletes across a wide range of sports and celebrate the role their equipment plays in their lives as they pursue their personal ambitions in the sport they love to play.
“No other brand in the sporting goods industry has studied and understands the relationship a tennis player has with her racket, a quarterback with his football, a first-base woman with her glove, or a golfer with his driver, than Wilson,” said Amy Weisenbach, VP of Marketing. “This relationship is a true partnership that is intensely personal and where the sum is greater than any one of its parts. Together, an athlete and his equipment chase dreams, celebrate personal achievements, face adversity, feel the sting of defeat, and rise to the occasion.”
The new “My Wilson” campaign is a 360-degree marketing effort, with a heavy emphasis on social and digital media. At the heart of the campaign is a video called Nothing Without It, that features amateur athletes alongside some of the world's best professional athletes recounting the ups and downs of their journeys. Wilson Advisory Staff Members featured in the video include many of the biggest names in sports today, including Serena Williams, Roger Federer, Dustin Pedroia, Kerri Walsh Jennings, Brendan Steele and Grigor Dimitrov. All of the youth athletes starring in the video are avid baseball, golf, tennis, basketball, soccer and football athletes.
“In developing this campaign, it was critically important that we show young and pro athletes side by side,” added Weisenbach. “While many brands in the sporting world show moments of greatness, we wanted to show the shared 'moments of truth' that are a part of every athlete's story the real highs and lows that are the common thread between the best in the world and those just starting out.”
Athletes are invited to join the conversation by adding themselves to the My Wilson video. To participate, consumers can share a short video clip of themselves with their Wilson equipment and post it on their social channels using the hashtag #MyWilson. Wilson will aggregate this content and select consumer videos to insert into the video. The newly “remixed” videos will be shared across social and digital channels. Wilson will also share and celebrate the individual clips at www.wilson.com/mywilson and on the brand's various social channels.
Wilson has also partnered with Whistle Sports Network to develop exclusive content for the campaign. Over the next three weeks, more than 20 Whistle Sports creators across a wide variety of sports will share personal versions of the My Wilson video and challenge their communities to participate in the campaign. The creators will curate the best clips from their followers and share remixed versions of the video back out to their communities.
Additionally, between September 8 and December 31, 2015, Wilson will give $1.00 in new sports equipment, up to a total of $250,000, for every original consumer video and photograph posted to Facebook, Instagram or Twitter tagged with the hashtag #MyWilson. Wilson will give this equipment to national and community-based organizations that seek to provide young athletes with access to sports equipment and champion youth sports participation. This equipment donation builds upon the company's efforts to give-away sports equipment to a variety of youth sports programs through its partnerships with local and national nonprofit groups, national sports leagues, and Wilson Advisory Staff foundations and philanthropic programs.
“We share our athletes' love of the game and passion for sports, and we are committed to helping all athletes perform at their full potential,” said Weisenbach. “Our hope is that we can spark a dialogue with youth athletes everywhere about the shared experience of being an athlete, and celebrate with them the role their Wilson equipment plays throughout their journey.”
The “My Wilson” campaign was developed in partnership with Phenomenon, an integrated marketing agency based in Los Angeles, CA.
Chicago-based Wilson Sporting Goods Co., a subsidiary of Amer Sports Corporation, is one of the world's leading manufacturers of sports equipment, apparel and accessories. Wilson is a global leader in a variety of sports including, tennis, baseball, softball, football, golf, basketball, volleyball and soccer.
