Irvine-based Brand Affinity Technologies Inc., a startup that looks to hook up celebrities and athletes with online advertisers, is getting into billboards.
The company struck a deal with the billboard unit of New York-based CBS Corp. that’s designed to let Brand Affinity clients create versions of online ads on billboards, bus stops or other outdoor advertising venues.
Brand Affinity runs a database that advertisers and marketers can tap to hire celebrities and athletes for endorsements for local markets.
A relationship between President Ryan Steelberg and a senior executive at CBS Outdoor led to the partnership between the two companies, according to Allie Savarino-Kline, vice president of marketing at Brand Affinity.
One of the first campaigns between CBS Outdoor and Brand Affinity came from Royal Motors Group, a San Francisco auto dealership group.
The group featured San Francisco Giants pitcher Matt Cain in online and outdoor ads.
Brand Affinity has spent the months since its March inception building alliances with national and local players including Microsoft Corp., Centro LLC, a Chicago online media planning and buying company, and Irvine-based Freedom Communications Inc., parent of the Orange County Register.
Brand Affinity doesn’t expect Freedom’s bankruptcy filling earlier this month to affect the partnership, according to Savarino-Kline.
“I can’t speak to anything specific, but I would imagine less will change than any of us would think,” she said.
Toll Road Pitch
Costa Mesa-based Marshall Advertising is doing the next phase of its campaign for the county’s toll roads.
The agency plans to do print, cable TV and Internet ads for Irvine-based Transportation Corridor Agencies, which runs the county’s toll roads.
Marshall started working for the toll roads in 2003.
The latest TV spots are a continuation of Marshall’s “cardboard cutout” campaign, featuring cardboard cutouts of people trapped on the freeways instead of at home or at soccer games.
The print campaign will target local newspapers and magazines.
Marketing the toll roads is a challenge, according to Milly Alfidi, account supervisor at Marshall. The San Joaquin Hills (73), Foothill (241) and Eastern (261) toll roads all vie for drivers with the county’s freeways.
“We have always tended to struggle with it, because people have a choice to travel on the freeways for free,” Alfidi said. “We’ve found people turn to the toll roads because of the time they save.”
Increases in toll prices over the years have contributed to the marketing challenge.
The ad shop is trying some online advertising, Alfidi said.
“The online (campaign) is still in development stages, but we’re looking into rich media campaigns as well as experimenting with more unique features,” she said.
The ad shop plans to launch the online component next month in phases.
The campaign is expected to run from September until around May.
Video Games Marketing
Irvine-based Ink got its game on with London-based 505 Games Ltd.’s latest release.
The ad shop helped with the U.S. launch of “Rolling Stone: Drum King” for Nintendo Co.’s Wii video game console.
505 Games, which develops, publishes and distributes vi-deo games, first launched the game in Europe earlier this year as “We Rock: Drum King.”
The game tasks players with keeping smooth timing by mimicking drumming through use of the Wii remote and nunchuk.
The ad shop developed box art and a Web site for the game.
“We extended the look of the box art to the Web site with game trailer and screen shots, illustrating the interactive, arm-swinging, beat-busting action in the game,” said Todd Henderson, principal at Ink.
Ink also developed the Internet campaign with banner ads as well as a Facebook page.
Bits and Pieces:
Irvine-based Morgan Marketing and Public Relations LLC is doing an Internet marketing program for Irvine-based Ramirez International Financial & Accounting Service Inc., an accounting and consulting firm. The public relations firm plans to target current and potential clients for the accounting firm with a business-to-business Internet campaign that includes accounting news updates and legislative alerts … Newport Beach-based strategic marketing agency Hayes Martin Associates Inc. has been named the agency of record for Andalusia at Coral Mountain, a golf and country club community in La Quinta developed by Montana’s Drummond Real Estate Group. The ad shop recently was involved in the advertising for Newport Beach-based Irvine Company’s launch of the Village of Woodbury East … Costa Mesa-based ArtsPR launched this month with Christopher Trela as president. The shop’s clients include the Chance Theater, Classical Mystery Tour: A Tribute to the Beatles and One Earth One Dream EcoFest 2009. Trela also is under contract with The Laguna Playhouse as its director of communications.
