Graves, GU get dialed in

The e-mail from Milwaukee arrived in Bismarck, N.D., with the note, “Mom, check this out!”

Glenna Mueller typed in her name and phone number and then watched a video unfold for Gonzaga women’s basketball. She said it was spooky when her named appeared on her computer screen, more so when her phone rang seconds later with Bulldogs coach Kelly Graves on the line with a recorded pitch.

But she was impressed with GU’s cutting-edge promotion, which has been the reaction from coast to coast.

“It’s definitely a home run,” Dennis Magner of Magner Sandborn Advertising Agency said. “It’s accomplished more than we set out to do with the campaign. It’s had great spread within the region, but it hit every state in the first four days, except Delaware.”

If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, the Bulldogs could be the envy of an industry.

“I’ve gotten a ton of calls,” Graves said. “Everybody likes it and wants to know how to do it. I told them they’re talking to the wrong guy, I’m just the talent.”

“We wanted to create a unique video that provided a ‘wow’ effect to the consumer so they were moved enough to send it off to their friends,” Gonzaga marketing director Matt Beckman said.

Mission accomplished, proven by Kim Mueller, a marketing director for women’s basketball at Marquette, and her mother.

“It’s been wonderful,” Beckman said. “It’s really exceeded our expectations.”

Colleges across the country have inquired as well as a marketing professor who wants to talk about it in class and an author who wants to include it in a book.

The idea is a takeoff from a Portuguese soccer team. Magner’s staff pitched the idea in place of a typical television ad and GU quickly jumped on board.

“Every idea is the evolution of something they saw previously,” Magner said. “There has been a lot of discussion in marketing circles about this. This is our first project that delved into that area. We knew it had to be done well.

“It’s tricky and it takes some really smart programmers. I’m not one of those folks, but we’ve got a Web team here. I flew the idea past them … and was told it was possible. Since it was our first time doing it, we gave ourselves plenty of time to work out the kinks.”

Two important aspects were watching the telephone budget for call backs, especially from foreign countries, and making it clear to viewers that there was no obligation, Magner said.

“The information is only for the video, none of it is stored, put in a database or anything like that,” Beckman said. “No information goes to our ticket department. We don’t call anybody back.”

Beckman said the filming took one day, because everyone associated with the women’s team was so cooperative.

More important than selling tickets was promoting the Gonzaga brand, which obviously worked just judging from the response.

As far as season tickets go, GU reports that there is almost 100 percent renewal from last year’s record total of 1,214 and almost 500 new fans, even though the price went from $50 to $75. That may have happened anyway with two-time defending national champion Tennessee on the home schedule (Dec. 30), but every little bit helps.

“It was such a new, unique campaign,” Beckman said. “We wanted to be part of it.”