Sponsorship is vital to businesses that rely on brand exposure and front of mind awareness. Yet surprisingly, the only major brewery sponsoring WiFi hotspots in the UK is Heineken, with the sponsorship of BT Openzone Hotspots in over 200 pubs and bars, branded as the ‘Heineken Hub’.
The service is free on any wireless enabled PC, tablet or mobile device. The splash page is slick and gives access to exclusive content from the Independent’s ‘iNewspaper’ as well as local news, events and information about the participating venue, updated daily. It’s a fantastic ‘branded’ experience which gives a great impression of Heineken among its key target audience.
Each time a new user accesses the pub WiFi Hub, they’re asked to create a username and password in order to get online. The user’s data is captured and shared with Heineken and BT (as well as other companies if the user allows). This gives Heineken a great opportunity to get a better understanding of their customers and market back to them – reinforcing that brand message, which is something they may not normally have the opportunity to do.
But have Heineken missed a trick? The inclusion of Purple WiFi would have offered them the opportunity to link this activity to their social media strategy, building a solid and on-going relationship with the customer through Twitter and Facebook.
With Purple WiFi, customers log on to WiFi through their social media account, and they’re asked to ‘Like’ a Facebook page or a ‘Follow’ a Twitter account in return. As well as capturing some very useful, ‘clean’ demographic and usage information, the WiFi host builds social media followers and gains some great social exposure to the customers friends and followers.
If you’d like to know more about using Purple WiFi as a sponsorship tool, get in touch today. Call James on 0333 101 4127 or email jamesd@purple.so.