Mobile ESPN has signed sponsorship deals with Coors, Cisco, GM, Hilton, Nike and Visa, according to Alice Cuneo of AD AGE. The deals, which begin February 5 when Mobile ESPN launches nationally with advertising on the Super Bowl, consist of “category-exclusive, one-year agreements covering animated or static brand logos that will appear before ESPN video clips on a rotating basis.” Coors will sponsor a feature that “tentatively is dubbed ‘The Answer Guy,’ in which a Mobile ESPN user can text-message a question and receive an answer within a short period of time.” Currently, the deals do not involve “‘mobisodes,’ or short videos made for the mobile screen, although ESPN is offering that as an option.” ESPN/ABC Sports Customer Marketing & Sales President Ed Erhardt “declined to discuss pricing,” but said that the deals would apply “not just to Mobile ESPN but also to ESPN content running on other mobile phones” ( ADAGE.com, 12/15 ). A previous report in sister publication SportsBusiness Journal said that Mobile ESPN's six charter sponsorship agreements were expected to be worth over $2M, or $350,000 each, which experts characterized as the “highest-priced advertising deals in the short history of mobile marketing" ( THE DAILY )
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| ESPN Inks Six One-Year Deals For Mobile ESPN |
