Assess the digital efforts of Champion across multiple marketing channels, benchmarked against competitors namely; Nike, Adidas and Puma. Propose improvements to strengthen brand reputation.

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Digital marketing (BS 1617)
Champion's Digital Marketing Strategy
16 November 2016
Word count: 2498 word
Prepared for:
Rajesh Bhargave
Prepared by:
Chelsea 16
Cris Ong, Josephine Belloin
Katharina Maier, Marc Glawogger
Qingying Wu

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Content Page
Introduction......................................................................................................................................................3
Website..............................................................................................................................................................4
Design Layout ................................................................................................................................................4
Usability..........................................................................................................................................................6
SEO....................................................................................................................................................................7
Link Building...................................................................................................................................................7
On-Page Optimisation....................................................................................................................................8
Email................................................................................................................................................................10
Mobile App......................................................................................................................................................10
Social Media Strategy....................................................................................................................................11
Facebook......................................................................................................................................................11
Instagram .....................................................................................................................................................15
Twitter...........................................................................................................................................................18
Conclusion......................................................................................................................................................21
Appendix.........................................................................................................................................................22
References......................................................................................................................................................38

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Introduction
Established in 1919, Champion is an American sportswear brand established across North America and
Europe. Champion manufactures high quality athletic apparel and streetwearfor all ages (Champion, 2016a).
Despite continuous quality, design and performance innovations, brand awareness and consumer interest
dropped.
The objective of the report is to assess the digital efforts of Champion across multiple marketing channels,
benchmarked against similar competitors,namely Nike, Adidas and Puma, in order to propose improvements
to regain previous reputation.
Multiple analytical tools were used to assess its digital strategy:

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Website
According to SimilarWeb (2016), Champion currently has a lower global rank, estimated visits, time-on-site
(TOS), and page views as compared to its competitor Nike. It also has a high bounce rate of 32.77%.
Design Layout
The low bounce rate may stem from the overloaded homepage layout. The top red banner emphasizes an
e-commerce perspective of bargains and sale, conveying a conflicting message to the company’s goal of
producing high-quality, superior athletic apparel (Champion, 2015). Contrastingly. Nike displays starproducts
rather than aggressively promoting them (Appendix 1). It relies on emotional storytelling and and high-
resolution lifestyle videos that appeals to sports enthusiasts.
To make its landing page less static and more interactive, Champion can allow customers to view products
from a 360-degree angle to highlight specific product details and increase engagement. It should also focus
on sharing its brand history through short films for greater brand awareness.
Additionally, customers can opt to provide feedback of their web-navigation experience; this however results
in a pop-up form. While seeking feedback can provide strong insights for improvements, Champion’s current
feedback form layout may backfire. Firstly, instead of recognizing that customers are browsing from
Champion’s website, it asks the customer to identify the site they are shopping from. This creates an
additional step the customer has to take to make the final checkout.

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Secondly, the words “Terms of Use” are repeated twice with the anchor link at the bottom, rather than beside
the sentence “I accept the Terms of Use”. Thirdly, the text “Thank you for your feedback (…)” is overlaid on
top of the “Submit” button, showing poor layout design.
Its low time-on-site (2:55) can be caused by the multiple links at the top that encourages customers to leave
the website and visit its parent company Hanes for example. This should be either removed, or made less
prominent.

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Usability
Champion also has poor website usability. Firstly, its large page size (5.4MB) reduces performance page
speed (17.1sec) resulting in visitors abandoning the site and reducing conversation rates (Appendix 2).
Secondly, the header which is meant to facilitate user experience, is however incoherent where the seven
keyword categories hold no consistentrelevance to each other. Thirdly, its clearance banners despite having
a call-to-action is not clickable. Fourthly, despite its growing popularity for its streetwear line, this page
(“explore champion life”) is however hidden at the top-right of the website and is difficult to locate.
Champion should recategorise its page tabs, create banners that direct buyers to a purchasing action, bring
forward their streetwear line and improve web speed and overall web-functionality to decrease bounce rates,
and increase page views.
Champion’s feedback form should not be a pop-up but open in a new window, as it provides sentiments of
greater credibility. It should improve the form colours and layout and remove irrelevant steps and information.
Lastly, ‘Customer Service assistance’ should not appear in this pop-up feedback form, but be integrated in
the actual website where customers can actively seek this function.
Despite this, Champion’s website is mobile responsive and user friendly (WebsiteGrader, Appendix 3).
However, its poor content creates a long purchasing journey that takes more than five clicks for consumers
to reach a T-Shirt (Appendix 4A). On.running, for example, only requires three clicks as shown by the Mobile
Phone Emulator Tool (Appendix 4B). Therefore, creating a simple and direct menu and changing the display
design to facilitate purchase would be the first step. It should also aim to improve mobile page speed under
3 seconds to prevent high bounce rates (HubSpot, 2016).

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SEO
Link Building
According to SimilarWeb (2016), Champion has high search traffic (46.52%). This could be due to its generic
company name where extra traffic is driven to the site when people google for the term “champion”. This may
be beneficial for brand visibility but it can also consequently explain its high bounce rates.
While 85% of Champion’s web visits are driven from search, direct URLS and referral links (similar to Nike;
88%), it fails to optimise its webpage to generate traffic from other sources. As it is a lesser-known brand, it
should not neglect its social and email channels as they are important to increasebrand awareness especially
during the early stages of the customerjourney. Its ineffective social media strategy will be further discussed.
The top referring pages to champion.com are its parent company Hanes or bargain websites. While it
effectively leverages on local partner sites, it however does not provide valuable content worth being
mentioned by other entities. Champion is suggested to engage in guest posting from credible and relevant
sites like Hypebeast or Highsnobiety, and create exclusive, shareable content.

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On-Page Optimisation
While Champion has a generic name, it is important for it to use unique keywords to differentiate itself. By
adding “aethletic apparel | sportswear| activewear” in its page title, it increases its SEO rankings. To educate
audiences of its content, it makes good use of its organic keywords in its meta tags that reflect its web content
(Appendix 5). However, these organic keywords are not unique to Champion. Nike, for example, labels its
products with innovative names such as Flyknits or AirJordans. Champion can create unique product names
and conduct A/B testing to identify the impacts of these keywords on SEO rankings.

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Champion has many web pictures that do not use alt tags. These tags are not evaluated by Google spiders,
and are not informative as they do not contain the page’s keywords. More importantly, it advertises products
that link to their mother company Hanes, driving traffic out of Champion’s website. Champion should remove
such links and also focus on providing more specific alt tags for its images.

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Email
Only 1.39% of traffic on champion.com comes from mail activity. There are a few plausible explanations:
Firstly, the customer receives no on-screen confirmation upon signing up for Champion’s newsletter, leaving
doubts on whether the process was successful. Secondly, the email confirmation often ends up in the spam-
box, which may create frustration amongst customers who are outspokenly interested in receiving important
company information. Thirdly, in its confirmation email, which is its first touchpoint with the customer, it does
not personally address the recipient but uses a commercial subject line (Hi: Check out This Special Offer!).
Additionally, these emails are pushed out from Hanes (champion@mail.hanes.com) confusing the customer
about the reliability and authenticity of the contact (Appendix 6). Further emails are then directly sent by
Hanes and make no reference to champion.com at all.
Champion should select a subject line that explicitly welcomes first-time subscribers to create a positive first-
experience. Nike, for example, personalizes this by saying “WELCOMEYou’re now in the game with athletes
worldwide” and further promotes advantages the subscribercould get by registering and becominga member
(Appendix 7). Instead of focusing on strict commercial content, Champion should add the recipient’s name
and provide content that motivates the customer to click and be directed to the website. Additionally,
Champion should link its social media channels at the end (Appendix 8).
Following email content should be predictive by analyzing past purchase, web visit and email click data
combined. Currently, Champion sends five emails across a span of four working days, causing irritation
amongst its customers (Appendix 6). These emails automatically encompass separate content pertaining to
Hanes, Champion and even other Hanes subsidiaries. Champion should hence provide customers with
options to unsubscribe from specific mailing lists and reduce the frequency of emails. Additionally, it needs
to make content more visual and engaging to enhance click-through rates to its website (Appendix 9).
Mobile App
As most sports brands engage with their customers through a training app, Champion can also consider
creating its own personalized training app to give users a unique experience and build its Champion
community. The “Champion Training” app can provide customers with a variety of training programs for
customers to select (Appendix 10). Champion can then collect a detailed database of specific customer
preferences and conduct behavioural targeting to recommend relevant products the customer may find
interesting. A community of sports enthusiasts can be built through personalized workouts (coach advice,
training videos etc), running plans and the possibility to join the Champion Club. However, as researchshows
that 25% of app users do not return to an app after they first used it (eMarketer, 2015), Champion must
therefore constantly update and provide new engaging content for retention.

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Social Media Strategy
According to SimilarWeb, Champion does not fully utilise its social media platforms to drive web traffic
(Appendix 11). It is hence important to look into the performance of each platform.
Facebook
Champion’s Facebook page currently amasses 877,841 page-likes showing high exponential exposure of
page content. However, these figures are not representative of Champion’s performanceas LikeAlyzer (2016)
reveals its poor engagement rate of 0.19% compared to the 7% benchmark. Although it has higher likes than
Puma, it however has lower PTAT (people-talking-about-this) and engagement rate.
Further analysis on Klear unveil that Champion previously published highly engaging Facebook content in
years 2014 and 2015 (Appendix 12). However, this engagement dropped in 2016. This poor current
performance can be attributed to the following:
 Low Post Frequency & Ineffective Post Timing
According to LikeAlyzer (2016), Champion currently posts only 1.57 per week, compared to Puma’s 0.94 per
day. As FanpageKarma (2016) shows that Its main audience is understood to commonly interact on a
Saturday night between 9pm-12pm. Champion can counter its low visibility by increasing post frequency and
tailoring its posting practices to follow the suggested days and time periods.

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 Minimal Post/Content Type
Champion mostly relies on picture or video posts of which both achieves relatively good engagement.
However, it can further increase its video posts to encourage higher engagement. Competitors like Nike,
mostly post videos and achieved good results on both usage and engagement (Appendix 13).
Further analysis revealed that Champion’s picture engagement in terms of shares and average total reactions
is higher than that of videos’. However, it pales in comparison in terms of comments generated. While it can
be understood that the audience prefer pictures, it could however be due to the fact that videos posted have
relatively poor content. It is difficult to pinpoint which post type is better. Champion is hence recommended
to conduct frequent testing; this includes encouraging more picture comments by adopting other post types
like asking questions, and making video content more shareable. It is important to assess the quality of
comments generated. Champion can also improve its “friendliness” by responding to relevant comments
when possible.

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By accomplishing the above, Champion may boost its current low fan retention where 78.6% of interaction
are fans who interacted with the page only once.

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Instagram:
Champion’s new Instagram account (@Champion) has 143,059 followers with 4,567 average likes and 32.6
average comments (Champion, 2016b). This achievement is commendable for an 8-month period. Based on
Keyhole (2016) statistics, it is interesting to note that there is no strong correlation between higher post
frequency and higher average-engagement. In the months May and October, Champion posted 17 and 24
times respectively; however, average-engagement for May increased only slightly from April’s six posts and
average-engagement for October fell to 4,471 from 6,557 in September.
Further analysis reveals that average-engagement fell drastically for October due to its caption-related
picture-posts. Out of the 24 posts, 21 were photos of which 5 included in-picture quotes. These posts
generated low likes of 2K compared to its average of 4.5K likes, and few comments. As such, Champion is
recommended to avoid posting in-picture quotes. Instead, it could insert these quotes in their captions. Nike
does this by using metaphoric quotes and user stories to complement its images for effective user
engagement (Appendix 14).

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The spike in average-engagement for June (only 1 post) is caused by the mention of its collection with
‘PacSun’. This brand partnership not only widens Champion’s exposure and amplify target customer
engagement, but also allows Champion to tap onto PacSun’s brand equity.

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The table above emphasises the benefits of brand partnerships, where one single post generated 73
comments,of whichmostconsistof ‘friend tags’. These people act as brand fans of Champion and Champion
should attempt to retain them by engaging in more relevant partnerships to increase their brand interest. For
example, its recent Fall/Winter collaboration with Supreme, Stussy and BAPE (Hypebeast, 2016) was not
mentioned on their Instagram and could have been better leveraged. Pumaexcels in this by using customized
hashtags and listing call to actions (CTA) in every single post (Appendix 15).

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Twitter
Similar to Instagram, Champion operates with one Twitter account (@ChampionUSA). With 10.8K followers
and 3K following, the follower-to-following ratio of 3.57 reveals that more people are following due to interest
than follow-back (Klear, 2016b). Compared to competitors like Puma with follower-to-following ratio of 1870,
this figure is mediocre but not necessarily bad as Puma’s high follower’s rate may not be from real active
accounts, which requires further research.
According to Social Bearing (2016), Champion’s current Twitter strategy is to mix tweets types; it tweets more
replies than retweets and tweets. This suggests stronger interactions as replies reflect active social listening
and authenticity (Appendix 16). However, Champion can increase its number of replies to encourage greater
real-time communication. Nike for example, replies to 100/100 tweets. (Appendix 17).

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Interestingly, Champion’s retweets garner greater engagement; this is especially so for retweeting celebrities
or breaking news. By partaking in the trending conversation, Champion acts as an information-sharing
platform which expands its network. These retweets include articles from Hypebeast that highlighted its many
collaborations with other large industry players that its Instagram strategy failed to tap on (Appendix 18).
Hypebeast, hence acts as one of its major influencers. This is especially true where Hypebeast’s main
Twitter-follower demographics (64.3% male) aligns with Champion’s Twitter audience (73.3% male)
(Appendix 19). Champion should enhance this ‘friendship’ by mentioning and favouring their tweets and
piggyback on its large follower base (398K vs 10.8K). Despite this, Champion should not neglect its personal
feed and should attempt to make its own tweets shareable/retweetable to maximise brand exposure.
Champion does not have a clear post-day Twitter strategy; however it has a preferred post-time between
2pm-10pm (Tweetstats, 2016). Champion’s optimal post time is on Wednesday-Friday between 7pm-3am
(Keyhole, 2016). Champion can utilize social scheduling tools like SproutSocial, Hootsuite and Postcron to
automate these posts ahead of time.

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Conclusion
To increase overall traffic and brand awareness and engagement, Champion is advised to implement all
the below suggestions with the help of this timetable:
For Youtube strategy, refer to Appendix 20.

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Appendix
Appendix 1: Champion vs Nike’s Website (Champion 2016a)
Appendix 2: Website Usability (WebsiteGrader, 2016)

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Appendix 3: Website Grader – Mobile Responsive Site & User-friendliness (WebsiteGrader, 2016)
Appendix 4A: Champion Mobile Journey (Champion, 2016a)

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Appendix 4B: On.Running Mobile Journey (OnRunning, 2016)

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Appendix 5: WebsiteGrader – Champion’s SEO ranking (WebsiteGrader, 2016)

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Appendix 6: Champion (and Hanes) Email Marketing (Champion, 2016c)
1. Friday (11 November 2016) 2. Monday (14 November 2016)
3. Monday (14 November 2016) 4. Wednesday (16 November 2016)

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5. Wednesday (16 November 2016) 6. Wednesday (16 November 2016)
Appendix 7: Nike Welcome Newsletter (Nike, 2016a)

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Appendix 8: Nike Newsletter (Social Media Links) (Nike, 2016a)

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Appendix 9: Proposed Champion’s Subscription Newsletter

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Appendix 10: Sample of Champion Training App

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Appendix 11: Champion’s Social Network Traffic Sources (SimilarWeb, 2016)
Appendix 12: High Engagement in 2014-2015; Poor Engagement in 2016 (Klear, 2016a)

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Appendix 13: FanpageKarma (Nike) – High Video & Picture Engagement (FanpageKarma, 2016)
Appendix 14A: Nike – Metaphoric Quotes (Nike, 2016b)

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Appendix 14B: Nike – User Stories (Nike, 2016b)

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Appendix 15: Puma – Collaboration Hashtags & Call-to-Action (Puma, 2016)
Appendix 16: Champion’s Twitter Replies (Socialbearing, 2016)

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Appendix 17: Nike vs Champion’s Tweet Analysis (foller.me, 2016)
Nike
Champion

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Appendix 18: Top Engagement Tweets – Retweets of Celebrities & Collaborations (Socialbearing, 2016)
Appendix 19: Twitter Follower Demographics (Keyhole, 2016)

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Appendix 20: Youtube Strategy
Champion is encouraged to create its own YouTube account, but also, reach out to relevant influential
Youtube bloggers to improve its brand perception. This “mega-phone effect” which allows customers to
access and influence large audiences through social media (McQuarrie et al, 2013) is important as influential
marketing is more favourably received. Doing so allows Champion to attract higher traffic and also improves
its SEO rankings. Therefore, Champion should identify these key bloggers and co-create engaging content
for greater word-of-mouth and virality.

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References
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http://ir.hanesbrands.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=200600&p=irol-reportsannual [accessed: 14th November 2016]
Champion (2016a). Company Website. Available from: https://www.champion.com [accessed: 14th
November 2016]
Champion (2016b). Instagram Website. Available from: https://www.instagram.com/champion/ [accessed:
10th November 2016]
Champion (2016c). Welcome E-Mail. [accessed: 12h November 2016]
E-Marketer (2015). App Marketing 2015. Fighting for Downloads and Attention in a crowded market.
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Crowded-Market/2001610 [accessed: 12th November 2016]
FanpageKarma (2016). Facebook Analysis. Available from:
http://www.fanpagekarma.com/facebook/champion [accessed: 12th November 2016]
Foller.me (2016). Tweets Analysis. Available from https://foller.me [accessed: 12th November 2016] =>
intext reference!!
Hypebeast, (2016). Champion Lookbook Available from http://hypebeast.com/2015/12/champion-2016-
spring-summer
[accessed: 12th November 2016]
HubSpot (2016). Responsive Design http://blog.hubspot.com/insiders/why-responsive-web-design
[accessed: 12th November 2016]
Keyhole (2016). Social Media Statistics. Available from:
http://keyhole.co/account-tracking/preview [accessed: 10th November 2016]
Klear (2016a). Facebook Statistics. Available from:
http://klear.com/facebook/champion?np=1#/overview [accessed: 10th November 2016]
Klear (2016b). Social Media Statistics. Available from:
http://klear.com/profile/ChampionUSA#/overview [accessed: 15th November 2016]

39. 39
LikeAlyzer (2016). Champion Social Media Review. Available from: http://likealyzer.com/champion
[accessed: 12th November 2016]
McQuarrie, E. F., Miller, J., & Phillips, B. J. (2013). The megaphone effect: Taste and audience in fashion
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Nike (2016a). Welcome E-Mail. [accessed: 12h November 2016]
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https://www.instagram.com/nikewomen/?hl=en [accessed: 10th November 2016]
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November 2016]
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[accessed: 12th November 2016]
Socialbearing (2016). Champion Twitter Analysis. Available from:
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TweetStats (2016). Twitter Statistics. Available from: http://www.tweetstats.com/graphs/ChampionUSA
[accessed: 15th November 2016]
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15th November 2016]