AIB has been a partner of the GAA, Ireland’s national sports, for over 30 years. Through ongoing research and insight, our platform has maintained relevance and ultimately, increase brand affinity, a key objective of the sponsorship.
At the beginning of 2020, research unlocked fresh insights into the mindset of our audience. We discovered that it was becoming even harder for teams to compete. The same teams were winning every year and the cost of running teams was increasing. It was harder for fans to believe their team could win.
Despite these challenges, nobody was deterred.
Our insight: People believe that no matter how tough things get on or off the field, the values instilled in them by the GAA can help them rise to any challenge.
Then Covid-19 hit, stopping all sports.
How were we, the no.1 sponsor of GAA going to connect with our audience and increase brand affinity in the absence of any games?
Our insight, against it’s greatest challenge, held true. The GAA community rallied around its most vulnerable and at a time when there were no games to be played, the values of the GAA were more prominent than ever.
We partnered with an award-winning filmmaker to create The Toughest Summer; a 6-part online docu-series and 1hour documentary which aired primetime on our national broadcaster, RTE1. Early indicators show the campaign was a success; with 63 million impressions, sentiment shifted from 82% positive or neutral pre-broadcast to 94% during the broadcast. We are confident that these results will contribute towards affinity growth for AIB.
