Brandcurve - branding and marketing

Branding the News with CNN.com Headline T-Shirts

by Susan Gunelius on July 23rd, 2008

On July 28th, Brandcurve will participate in the Bloggy Giveaways, one of the biggest blog carnivals for contests!  One of the prizes I’ll give away on Brandcurve will be a CNN.com Headline T-Shirt with the winner’s favorite headline on it. 

When I first heard about CNN.com Headline T-Shirts, I thought it was a unique way to generate additional word-of-mouth marketing for the CNN brand and website.  With that in mind, I interviewed Andy Mitchell, VP of Interactive Marketing for CNN Worldwide.  Following is a recap of that interview:

Brandcurve: Where did the idea for CNN.com headline T-shirts come from?

Andy Mitchell: CNN.com was looking for an innovative way to showcase the great range of video on the site. Consumers perceived that CNN.com video was limited to only the important news they “needed to know,” like the latest in politics - and they didn’t expect to get the more irreverant, watercooler video, too. CNN.com has a huge range of video and posts 100 clips every day, so there’s room for levity in the mix and from that came the idea of using T-shirts to feature the great video headlines on CNN.com.

Brandcurve:  What are the business and branding goals behind the CNN.com headline T-shirts initiative?

Andy Mitchell:  We are not selling the T-shirts to make money. It’s purely a marketing initiative and we sell the T-shirts at-cost, so we’re just breaking even from the sales. From a marketing perspective we got a lot of attention both online - and offline - about the fact that we now had little T-shirt icons on the CNN.com home page. Internet users even blogged and chatted about the kind of headlines that would make good T-shirts, which at the end of the day was online buzz about CNN.com’s content. And any T-shirt worn in public is a walking billboard for CNN.com content. Having worn these shirts in public myself, I can tell you it works. People definitely read the T-shirt – and almost always have something to say about it.

Brandcurve:  Do the headlines come directly from articles published on CNN.com (meaning word-for-word)?

Andy Mitchell:  Yes, the T-shirts are printed verbatim for how the headlines appear on the CNN.com home page.

Brandcurve:  The Facebook tie-in is interesting.  Can you explain the goals for that social media marketing aspect of the initiative?

Andy Mitchell:  We know that different T-shirts resonate with different people depending on what they are interested in. And, especially in the social networking world in which we live, people like to share with their friends what they are engaged in, no matter what it is. People are going to buy a T-shirt if a headline resonates with them, and we wanted to be sure to provide them a way to share that headline with others in their social network.  

Brandcurve:  I read in your FAQs that headline T-shirts remain available as long as a headline stays on the Latest News section of CNN.com.  Currently, there are only 10 headlines available.  Are there plans to grow the offerings?

Andy Mitchell:  At launch we were only offering what was available on the home page but have since added an archive. It’s not like offering T-shirts from news headlines was a tried and true marketing method ,and we really had no idea how this was going to play out. But we made a conscious effort to keep an ear to the ground and respond to what consumers are saying. Consumers said they wanted to buy older T-shirts, so we added a place to get them at CNN.com/tshirtarchive. We’ll introduce some other changes soon that are a direct result of listening to the online community, too.

Brandcurve:  Is there anything else you’d like to share with Brandcurve.com readers about CNN.com’s headline T-shirts?

Andy Mitchell:  This promotion has far exceeded anyone’s expectations. It’s been a great ride and we are looking for even more ways to build on the excitement.

Stay tuned to Brandcurve for your chance to win a CNN.com Headline T-Shirt during the Bloggy Giveaways from July 28-August 1, 2008, or subscribe to the Brandcurve feed so you don’t miss it!

Image: Cnn.com

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POSTED IN: Brand Extension