VML and Gatorade Push Digital Innovation

With its G Series iPad campaign and the recent launch of its social media hub, Mission Control, Gatorade is leading the way in new media innovation with direction from VML.

Gatorade launched the Flick Football interactive ad in the iPad edition of Sports Illustrated (www.SI.com) in support of its G Series product line launch.

IPad users viewing Gatorade’s ad within the Sports Illustrated magazine application are invited to play Flick Football, an interactive gaming experience inspired by the two-person tabletop game featuring a small, triangle-shaped paper football and hand-formed goalposts.

“Gatorade encourages active, digital engagement on every conceivable level,” said Chuck Searle, Group Account Director at VML. “Providing consumers the ability to interact with Gatorade in an emerging media space has allowed us to not only push the idea of brand innovation, but to integrate product messaging in a manner that is authentic to the space.”

At the end of the game, the ad exposes players to critical information about Gatorade’s G Series, including product and nutritional details for the three products in the G Series lineup: Prime, Perform and Recover. The combination of creative and technology provided seamless support of the Gatorade G Series product line launch and aided in driving Gatorade’s brand perception as an innovative company.

On average, users engaged with the ad for over a minute. That’s a significant amount of time spent actively interacting with the brand in a very focused environment.  You can view Game Play instructions below or download the application on your iPad at  http://gatorade.flickfootball.vmlapps.com/ :

Flick Football is just one of a series of Gatorade interactive iPad ads presented in a campaign featured exclusively in Sports Illustrated iPad apps. Next, Gatorade is launching a basketball shoot-around game featuring Gatorade NBA superstar athletes. VML and Gatorade have also developed a nostalgic interactive baseball game for iPad.

Since its founding, Gatorade has demonstrated a commitment to sports nutrition and innovation; the interactive iPad ad’s gaming capability extends that tradition. With tappable access to detailed product information, embedded videos and interactive gaming, Gatorade effectively leverages the new media space.

“The gaming environment entices a Sports Illustrated iPad reader to spend dramatically more time engaged with Gatorade’s ad,” said Tony Snethen, VML Creative Director. “The result is an expanded opportunity to educate the target audience in a consumer-friendly environment.”

In addition to the G Series iPad campaign, VML assisted Gatorade in developing Mission Control, the sports drink leader’s social media interactive hub. Mission Control was recently featured in an article published in The Wall Street Journal by Valerie Bauerlein (September 14, 2010).

More recently, Gatorade’s social media center was the subject of an article and video report in Advertising Age by Natalie Zmuda (posted on AdAge.com on September 28, 2010). Watch the video interview with Gatorade’s Carla Hassan and VML Digital Insights Analyst Sarah Buchanan: