Project on Marketing Strategies of

For The Rogers Cup

Course – Event Marketing BEMP 5004-0LA

Produced by – Cara Felicia D’Souza

Raghvendra Naidu

Veronica

Pritika Bose

Riali Goddard

For – Prof. Mike Dover

SUMMARY

In this report our team has diligently come up with key information in analysing the marketing elements adapted by Rogers to sponsor a legendary sporting event “The Canadian Tennis Open” since 2005.

Canada is ranked at 14th amongst countries where Tennis is a very popular sport. This is quite high considering the fact that 120 countries are taken into account while determining this statistic. The Canadian open has been the biggest tennis event in Canada and dates back to 1881. Rogers jumped into action in 2005 and became the presenting and lead sponsor of the Canadian Open Tennis Tournament. Thereafter it was called the Rogers Cup which was the idea behind sponsoring this event.

Our team has focussed on the history of the event, the brand strategy, the marketing mix, the event objectives, target audience, the event overview, the company overview, key industry statistics, competitor’s comparisons, and the relative conclusions.

Through our concise report, we intend to deduce the incredible marketing strategy which was planned for the future and well executed by Rogers to have a strong foot hold in the market for years to come. We have shared insights on how it has unfolded for one of the largest brands in Canada and how they reached the summit of becoming the biggest market share holders in the communications arena through this event.

ROGERS CUP – An Overview

The Canadian Open, currently sponsored as the Rogers Cup presented by National Bank, is an annual tennis tournament held in Canada. The men's competition is a Masters 1000 event on the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) tour. The women's competition is a Premier 5 tournament on the Women's Tennis Association (WTA) tour. The competition is played on hard courts. Classified as a Premier 5 event on the WTA calendar, Rogers Cup presented by National Bank offers over US $3 million in prize money and attracts the biggest stars in tennis year after year and the best players in the world have showcased their skills on Canadian courts.

The events alternate from year to year between the cities of Montreal and Toronto. In odd-numbered years, the men's tournament is held in Montreal, while the women's tournament is held in Toronto, and vice-versa in even-numbered years. Before 2011, they were held during separate weeks in the July–August period, now the two competitions are held during the same week in August. The Toronto tournament is held at the Rexall Centre, York University, and the Montreal tournament is held at the Stade Uniprix.

The men's tournament began in 1881, and was held at the Toronto Lawn Tennis Club, while the women's competition was first held in 1892. Of the major tennis tournaments in the world today, only Wimbledon and the US Open have been around as long and in 2004, the tournament became part of the US Open Series, in the build-up to the US Open grand slam tournament.

In the Women’s division, the impressive list of past champions for this Canadian stop on the professional tennis circuit includes such legendary names as Martina Navratilova, Chris Evert, Monica Seles, Steffi Graf, Martina Hingis, Justine Henin, Kim Clijsters, and Arantxa Sanchez-Vicario. And in the Men’s division the legends who have played here are Bjorn Borg, Ivan Lendl, John McEnroe, Andre Agassi, Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, and Novak Djokovic.

ROGERS – The Organization

Rogers Communications Inc. is a diversified Canadian communications and media company engaged in the telecom and media businesses. Rogers Wireless is Canada's largest wireless voice and data communications services provider and the country's only national carrier operating on the combined world standard GSM/HSPA+/LTE technology platforms.

Rogers Cable is a leading Canadian cable services provider, offering cable television, high-speed Internet access, and telephony products, and together with Rogers Business Solutions, provides business telecom, data networking and IP solutions to small, medium and large enterprise, government and carrier customers.

Rogers Media is Canada's premier group of category-leading broadcast, specialty, print and online media assets, with businesses in radio and television broadcasting, televised shopping, sports entertainment, magazine and trade journal publishing and digital media. They are publicly traded on both the TSX and NYSE stock exchanges and are included in the S&P/TSX 60 Index of the largest publicly traded companies in Canada.

The Foundation -

Vision Statement

- To grow in the business while taking care of corporate social responsibility.

Mission Statement

- To add great value to customers' lives by offering new and reachable products and services.

Strategic Objectives

Business - Maximize the number of subscribers and become Canada’s best communication and media provider.

Organizational - Achieve highest standards of business conduct among all employees.

Financial - Maximize profit and return on investments.

Current Strategy- Launched Long Term Evolution (LTE) so that customers can anywhere, anytime access to information, communications and entertainment.

The major competitors of Rogers are BSE Inc., Shaw Communications Inc. and TELUS Corporation under all verticals. Given the rich history of sports and its correlation with the society, Rogers had envisioned something massive in terms of strategizing a strong foothold in the communications sector over its competitors.

Canada is ranked at 14th amongst countries where Tennis is a very popular sport. This is quite high considering the fact that 120 countries are taken into account while determining this statistic. The Canadian open has been the biggest tennis event in Canada and dates back to 1881. Rogers jumped into action in 2005 and became the presenting and lead sponsor of the Canadian Open Tennis Tournament. Thereafter it was called the Rogers Cup which was the idea behind sponsoring this event.

Rogers have widely capitalized on the fact that they have made one of the most prestigious sporting events their own. Their strategy was merely

based on integrating sports with communications and connect with the people of Canada which is their target market. As we understand, no competitor of Rogers has been getting as much Brand exposure as them, the key lies in the strategic fore view of the marketing and brand growth strategists who embraced the opportunity of partnering with an event which will just grow in stature for years to come.

Everything about the event is directly related to Rogers and they certainly benefit from the exposure throughout the tournament and after. Their Media partners like CBC, RDS, SRC, 98.5 FM, TSN 690, Virgin Radio and many more have given them an unmatched platform for Brand exposure.

Rogers has successfully made it to the inroads of the Canadian people by placing their brand strategically through this Tennis event. Sports and its subsidiaries are now an integral part of the society and any links or connection with this field will only help brands and companies strengthen their relationship with the people.

Direct Competitors Comparison:

BCE = BCE Inc.

SJR = Shaw Communications, Inc.

TU = TELUS Corporation

Industry = Wireless Communications

RCI BCE SJR TU Industry

Market Cap:

19.19B

34.68B

11.94B 21.94B

7.35B

Employees:

28,026

55,830

N/A 42,300

4.60k

Revenue (ttm):

11.20B

18.31B

4.61B 10.21B

4.08B

Gross Margin (ttm):

0.38 0.39 0.40 0.35 0.45

Operating Margin (ttm):

0.22 0.22 0.29 0.20 0.12

Net Income (ttm):

1.20B 1.81B 742.08M

1.24B N/A

PEG (5 yr expected):

-7.93 4.29 2.29 2.20 1.05

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Market  Cap   Employees   Revenue   Gross  Margin  

Opera@ng  Margin  

Net  Income   PEG  (5  Year  Expected)  Am

ount    in  Billion

 $  

COMPETITORS  ANALYSIS  BCE  Inc.   TELUS  Corpora@on   Rogers  Inc.   Shaw  Communica@ons  Inc.  

ABOUT THE COMPETITION TELUS Corporation -

TELUS is Canada's third-largest telecom service provider is the incumbent local-exchange carrier in British Columbia, Alberta, and eastern Quebec. TELUS serves 7.6 million wireless subscribers, 3.5 million wireline customers, and 1.3 million Internet users. Through its Optik TV brand, it offers high-definition TV, video-on-demand and pay-per-view television, and personal video recorder (PVR) services to more than half a million viewers. TELUS International provides businesses with outsourced contact centre, BPO, and IT services. In addition to the typical consumer and enterprise services, TELUS provides telecom and IT services geared toward the health care industry.

Events and activities TELUS currently sponsors:

- TELUS Walk to Cure Diabetes - Canadian Centre for Child Protection - TELUS Day of Giving - Tree Canada

BCE Inc.

BCE is Canada's Biggest Communications Enterprise. The company (BCE stands for Bell Canada Enterprises) owns Bell Canada, the incumbent provider of long-distance and local telephone access in Ontario and Quebec, with more than 9 million lines in service. It also provides broadband Internet access to about 3 million subscribers under the Bell Internet banner and digital video subscriptions to more than 2 million viewers via Bell TV. BCE's mobile holdings include wireless carrier Bell Mobility and subsidiary Virgin Mobile Canada (more than 7 million subscribers). It owns 44% of Bell Aliant, which serves more than 2 million local phone and 840,000+ broadband Internet customers in eastern Canada.

Events and activities Bell currently sponsors:

Region Sports Arts and Entertainment

Québec • Montreal Canadians (Hockey)

· · Montréal International Jazz Festival

· · Festival d’état de Québec

· · Francofolies

Ontario • Ottawa Senators (Hockey) • Toronto Raptors

(Basketball)

· · Toronto International Film Festival

Olympics • Canadian Paralympic Committee

COMPANY MARKETING PLAN ELEMENTS

Currently Rogers has competition with companies like Bell Canada, TELUS and Shaw Communications. There are also new providers in the industry that are offering products and services at low prices. Rogers is a company that has the best technology in comparison of other providers. It is the only company that operates on both GSM and HSPA technology.

1Rogers operates in three areas. The first one is Wireless, which includes wireless voice and data communications services. Rogers is Canada’s largest wireless provider. The second one is Cable. Rogers is one of Canada’s largest providers of cable television services as well as high-speed Internet access, telephony services and video retailing. The third and the last one is media, which includes radio and television broadcasting, televised shopping, magazines and trade publications, and sports entertainment. Its backbone is its distribution channels, which includes 3,600 Rogers-owned, dealers and retail outlets. Rogers provides valuable customer services to its customers. Its goal is to maximize its subscribers and become the best communication and media provider. There are 70 subscribers out of 100 (2010) in comparison of 25 per 100 (2000). Furthermore, in the time of recession, Telecom industry is one of the industries that have been able to survive and make profit margins. Thus, Telecom industry is an industry where consumers go first which means that consumers would reduce their spending on other goods and services in comparison of telecom services. Therefore, if Rogers has brand image and the market is full of opportunities then why let new entrants capture the market share.

The second issue that Rogers face is regarding its financial position. If we see the table below, company’s sales growth in 2007 was 14.54% and cost of goods sold was $961 million. In 2008, sales growth reduced to 11.97% but cost of goods sold was more ($1303 million). If we see the last year that is 2009, sales growth was just 3.49% and cost of goods sold was $1380 million. This concludes that, if sales growth has been decreasing every year, cost of goods sold has not been decreasing with proportionate to sales growth. In other words, profit margin has been decreasing and company’s operation is not able to increase its sales growth and minimize its cost of goods sold. Morever, if we see the debt to equity ratio, it is increasing every year. In 2007, it was 1:2.3. In 2008, it was 1:2.61 and in 2009 it was 1:2.98. This concludes that Rogers is using a lot of debt to finance its operations. But on the other side, Rogers has good return on assets of 8.67% in 2009 in comparison of 6.18% in 2008, which means Rogers is earning more money on less investment this year.

In order to overcome current challenges, Rogers should use overall low cost provider strategy. Rogers should apply this strategy to solve its business and financial issues. The advantages of this strategy are customer satisfaction, moving towards its rivals, prevail market conditions and strengthen its market position. What else can Rogers do to maintain its market share and presence? Rogers can include features and services in packages that are essential to its consumers. It can find ways to achieve competitive advantage that would be hard for the current rivals and new entrants to match. Though the industry did have the slowest growth in 2009 from 2000, the analysis shows that there is a lot of room to grow. When Rogers would use lower pricing for its products and services then there would be less competition and more accessibility to local market that would increase its sales and revenues. By doing this, Rogers is completing its mission strategy, which is to add great value to its customers' lives by offering new and reachable products and services.

When companies’ raise prices of their products and services, they don’t realize that by doing this they are far away from their customers’ but new entrants are putting themselves in their customers’ shoes. In other words, they are thinking like their customers. This is what Rogers’s strategy should be, to think like its customers’ and add value to their lives. If Rogers would think like its customers’ then there would be brand loyalty and there is less risk of losing its market share and presence. If customers’ would feel that Rogers has understood them, then they would

Guy Laurence the President and CEO of Rogers travelled Canada from coast-to-coast, a total of 22,000 kilometres, and met with over 10,700 employees. Laurence has also spoken with leading Canadian companies, such as Air Canada and Bombardier, and conversed with all the major political leaders, including Prime Minister Stephen Harper.

His goal for this journey was to understand Rogers from “the inside out.” He asked each individual their thoughts of Rogers as a company, specifically what they should keep, what they should change, and what they would like to see in the future. The result was a plan that will unfold over the next two to three years called “Rogers 3.0,” something that was not from his mind, but directly from listening to the “customers, employees and shareholders.”

During an interview with media late Friday afternoon, Laurence was bold, direct and blunt. He’s a happy man on a mission. Laurence sees the last 30-40 years of Rogers as being “pioneers” within the industry, but proudly declared they are not “a company

that intends to go backwards. This is a pioneering company, we believe in innovation.”

Rogers has several assets in every arena, such as media, publishing, radio, home services, internet, wireless, entertainment, and sports franchises. All these will be coming under one roof — not playing on separate teams — called “One Rogers.” The goal is to make all these individual parts, especially all its unique content sources, come together to create a symphony that plays beautiful music.

“I am not an acquisition junkie,” said Laurence. “We will be utilizing things we already have… We will double down on innovation.” As stated before, they “will focus on fewer, more impactful initiatives and execute with more precision to deliver on our game plan.”

In an official press release, dubbed Rogers 3.0: Accelerating Growth and Overhauling the Customer Experience, Rogers new CEO Guy Laurence has set the stage for the coming years. There is a seven point plan that Rogers will abide by and was apparently based on feedback from “thousands of customers, employees and shareholders.”

1. Be a strong Canadian growth company 2. Overhaul the Customer Experience 3. Drive meaningful growth in the business market 4. Invest in and develop our people 5. Deliver compelling content anywhere 6. Focus on innovation and network leadership 7. Go to market as One Rogers

In October 2013 Rogers came up with the “Killing two birds with one stone marketing strategy”.

Canadian mobile users have disputes on which mobile company has the best and cheapest cell phone plans, and they always end up with three: Rogers, TELUS, and Bell. With Rogers’ new service, “Rogers Alerts”, hopefully those disputes will subside. Their new service that is yet to be launched will help spread news about their new promotions while connecting their advertisers to their customers. With phones being the device that people always carry around, this marketing strategy is effective for Rogers to directly interact with customers.

Because there is a low barrier and many substitutes in the Canadian mobile phone market with leading companies like TELUS and Bell, customer’s choice is crucial for Rogers. Bell, TELUS, and Rogers all have the same value propositions, but what differentiates them are their plans and services. To interact with customers directly, to know the opinions of their target market, and to put customer’s opinions into consideration is a step forward for Rogers, a step ahead of the other top mobile phone companies. Roger’s innovative marketing strategy gives them an advantage to potentially secure customer’s choice that is critical to beat Bell and TELUS. Perhaps with more advancement like these, more customers will choose Rogers over Bell and TELUS.

THE TARGET AUDIENCE

• Men and women • Aged 25-44 years old • University educated • Adults with children • $75,000 Household Income

EVENT MARKETING PLAN ELEMENTS

Marketing Strategies:

Partnership between Rogers Cup and Coupe Rogers (Toronto and Montreal) allows for a broad media coverage of 6 million domestic views and 150 million worldwide.

Sponsor benefits:

Television advertising

• Prime television brand exposure

• Tournament print materials

• On-site signage

• Retail space

• Tournament Web site branding

• On-site promotions (i.e. title of a specific day, sampling, tennis clinics, contests, giveaways, spectator’s activities)

• In-store promotions

• Exclusive world-class hospitality

• Media and public relations opportunities

• Integration with social media

Domestic media:

• 7 days of convenient coverage

• 123 hours English and 120 hours French domestic broadcast coverage

• 6.1 million television audience

• More than 8,000 national print/web news clippings

• 14.7 million web site page impressions in 2013

Brand Strategies:

The “Rogers Cup” brand introduces itself as an experience. The Rogers Cup marketing and brand strategies revolve around providing their fans with an exceptional and unforgettable experience. Rogers Cup successfully does this by practicing experiential marketing and hiring agencies that are highly qualified in the area of experiential marketing to execute their interactive campaigns.

The Rogers Cup is held in both Toronto and Montreal. For their 2014 Coupe Rogers in Montreal, they chose to work with a brand called Newad. Newad is marketing agency that are experts in the field of experiential marketing. Rogers Cup brands itself as an experience and very interactive with its fan base. An example of this is Rogers sponsoring a mural on Saint Laurent Boulevard (June 2014) and gave artists carte blanche (complete freedom to act as one wishes or thinks is best) to interpret his or her vision of tennis.

Newad also introduced a panoply platform (impressive collection of things) that consisted of experiential based prizes. For example, tennis fans were given the chance to enter a contest where they could get free entry into the Uniprix Stadium to a full VIP experience for the entire Rogers Cup weekend in Montreal or Toronto. Rogers makes their fans to crave the “ultimate” experience and the Roger Cup is not only viewed as a tennis tournament but a unforgettable experience.

Furthermore, in 2008 Field Day another experiential marketing agency partnered with the Rogers Cup to enhance the fan experience. Tennis fans are not only buying tickets for the tournament but for the overall experience. For example, when purchasing tickets buyers are given four options and two of those options are part of a direct marketing campaign. The Executive Suites that businesses can provide potential clients (corporate area of the question would revolve around this idea here - I can look up more on this) with the ultimate experience or the Single Platinum plus Seats. Both products intrigue a high profile client base that allows the buyer an experience like no other. With the best amenities, play meet and greets and the best seats, Rogers Cup markets not only the tournament, but the overall experience one will get at while attending the event.

Media Usage:

The Rogers Cup is viewed via television stations and live coverage that can be viewed on smartphones, iPad etc. This is the Rogers Cup main media resources during the time of the tournament. Leading up to the Rogers Cup it is clear that their most prominent media platform is social media.

Rogers Cup works in close partnership with Mosaic another experiential marketing agency that is based out of Toronto. In 2012 the Rogers Cup social media integration won a Silver Event Marketer technology award (Kerr, 2012). Rogers dominated social media while creating one of the most effective Twitter campaigns. Rogers Cup and Mosaic provided tennis fans with up - to - the - minute updates of the Tournament via Twitter. Fans were able to check the “Twitter fall” on their own personal accounts, as well as on the two screens positioned in the Rogers clubhouse at the Rogers Cup retail village. Digital Brand Ambassadors introduced fans to the live conversation that revolved around relevant topics and acted as the behind the scenes eyes and ears of the Rogers Cup tournament. Fans were part of a social media experience where they felt part of the overall tournament experience without even being present.

In the past years tournament (Rogers Cup 2014) there was a Facebook campaign launched called “Choose your Team.” Tennis Canada fans were encouraged to support their favourite player via social media. Rogers wanted to keep their fans involved and excited for the upcoming tournament. There was a video that circulated social media of each Rogers Cup player encouraging fans to “join their team.” The campaign went viral with the hashtag #CoupeRogers along with a team hashtag such as; #RenaArmy (Serena Williams), #SharaFamily (Maria Shorapova), and #LiNation (Na Li). Fans chose their team and did so by submitting a photo that illustrates their allegiance. Rogers again

branded themselves on experience by offering front row seats to the opening night at the tournament.

Target Audience:

The Rogers cups target audience is people aged 25 - 44, who are University educated, may/can be adults with children and make a household income of 75,000.

This market can be considered similar to the size of football, soccer, golf, basketball and downhill skiing enthusiasts.

It can also be 17% of the 12+ population