PRos in Training

I’m hoping that ESPN’s coverage of the LA Galaxy and the Chelsea FC (which stands for football club, by the way, I looked it up) will include some educational commentary about how the heck soccer is played… ’cause I’m clueless.

The marketing and PR machinery behind the Beckham’s arrival in the United States is phenomenal, but as I see a sold out Home Depot Center on ESPN full of fans from both sides of the pond, it appears the results are positive for major league soccer and easily measureable.

In a celebrity-obsessed culture, it’s not about selling soccer, though, the Beckhams are the commodity. And we’re buying!

The ESPN team has much more in the works for David Beckham’s debut. According to Ad Week, Portland’s Weiden + Kennedy is leading the charge. The list of tactics (via Marketing Blurb)

• A television commercial (which I love!)

• A digital takeoever of ESPN.com the day before the game
• Print ads in USA Today and ESPN the Magazine
• Radio ads
• Full coverage of David Beckham’s debut game with expanded pre and post show reports and interviews
• ESPN special one-hour documentary, David Beckham: New Beginnings
• A “Beckham camera” which will follow solely what David Beckham is doing on the field during his debut game for visitors at espn360.com

Will this translate to more fans in the long-term? I don’t know. Seems that ESPN and MLS is going to have to keep people’s attention for a while (and Beckham is going to have to be the stellar footballer the Galaxy is banking on). I’m already 27 minutes into my first soccer game… so we’ll see.

Image: Carl de Souza/AP/Getty Images