The World Cup comes along every four years and so many brands work hard to have a piece of that pie. With Adidas, Coca Cola, Budweiser (which also sponsors the FA Cup), Emirates, VISA and other large names tied with the FIFA World Cup as partners or sponsors, it is the tournament of all tournaments for football fans and brands. Or is it?

Consider the viewership football receives all over the world. Even in India, where fans end up watching the matches at inconvenient times of the day, the excitement around the Premier League and the Champions League is in your face nearly all year. Chatter about the League matches makes its way everywhere, especially Twitter and Facebook, besides pubs and living rooms.

Unmistakeably, football is the second most-watched sport in India after cricket. With the mindshare that UEFA has attracted over the years, premium beer brand Heineken would rather have a large piece of that pie.

Globally, Heineken uses four marketing platforms, namely, the Champions League, music, James Bond films and the Rugby World Cup. However, for India, Heineken has chosen UEFA Champions League as its largest platform.

Leveraging its title as the global sponsor of UEFA Champions League (UCL), Heineken has been targeting football enthusiasts here through fun on-ground and digital activations, ranging from foosball tournaments and Twitter contests.

“Clearly, there is a very loyal audience for football in India. Cricket receives broad-based viewership and has mass appeal, and therefore fits with Kingfisher as a brand, but premier league football is upmarket, niche and along with Formula One, sits well with the younger segment of television viewers and the more affluent,” says Samar Shekhawat, Senior Vice-President, Marketing at United Breweries Ltd.

Notably, Heineken consumers are that same audience – the young people in India now exposed to international beer brands such as Carlsberg, Peroni, Heineken, Stella Artois, and Hoegaarden; and the older beer consumers who, although creatures of habit, now have the disposable incomes to venture beyond local mild beer.

The James Bond movies are, of course, a colossal attraction. But they come every 2-3 years. So nothing rules like football for India’s “second most expensive domestically brewed premium beer brand”.

Shekhawat further explains Heineken’s decision to up the ante around UCL, saying, “Besides, the frequency of Champions League being higher than the World Cup (it comes around every year), the standard of football tends to be very superior in UCL. Most iconic footballers play for their club teams for a large part of the year, and for their national teams a couple of months in a year. So, a strong association with UCL makes sense for us.”

In 2013-14, Heineken grew at over 65 per cent over 2012-13. As a result of its integrated marketing campaign around UCL, Heineken reports that consumer scores have gone up by 25-30 per cent. A hundred foosball tables were installed across India as part of the Heineken Foosball League. City-based tournaments were organised going all the way up to regional and national-level finals.

Other initiatives such as the Heineken Huddle and Heineken Share The Sofa have also helped the brand curry favour with consumers.

Heineken’s association with UCL, James Bond films and the Rugby World Cup over 15 years has led to it becoming the ‘Number One’ beer brand on Facebook, according to Shekhawat. There, it has a following of about half-a-million worldwide, but the brand’s India page has about 14 million fans. On Twitter, it enjoys a 5,000-odd following, even though it is more of a personality-driven platform rather than a brand-driven one.

All things considered, Heineken, which is sold in over 200 countries, now has every reason to continue leading with Champions League as a platform for promotions in India. Foosball enthusiasts can look forward to an international tournament next year.

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