AUCKLAND, Today: NZ-based creative content company Pitchblack Partners have set their sights on the US with Podium, a new coaching app for runners, launched last week in the US with a full brand design, app design, and ATL campaign.
Podium is the brainchild of founder Jon Ackland, and marketing director Stephen Dodd. Ackland is a world-renowned sports performance expert who’s worked for the All Blacks, New York Yacht Club, and NZ cricket; he’s a former national rowing champion, and has authored nine books on sports performance and endurance training.
Kicking off with brand and design strategy, Pitchblack was charged with naming and designing a unique look and feel for the breakthrough app. The team then developed the launch campaign and content for Podium, which launched in North America with digital and social video, designed for the mobile environment.
Unlike running apps like Strava or Nike Running that simply track your training, Podium is a coaching tool that collects information from wearable tech and develops a bespoke training programme to achieve a personal goal.
Pitchblack Partners were involved right from Podium’s inception, wanted to make an impact in a crowded international market. They knew that content needed to suit mobile first and foremost, “as that’s where its core customer lives”.
“Designing for a mobile-first, sound-optional environment challenged us to explore techniques to hook the eye.”
“Designing for a mobile-first, sound-optional environment challenged us to explore techniques to hook the eye,” says Sam Deane, director/creative at Auckland-based production partner Jetblack.
“The spinning perspective aims to stop social scrollers in their tracks, while also acting as a metaphor for what it feels like to train with Podium.”
The launch campaign kicks off this month in North America and will expand to global markets as well as New Zealand in coming months.
Podium marketing director Stephen Dodd said: “In a short period of time, the team at Pitchblack have taken our technology, named it, given it a visual identity and taken it to market. We couldn’t be happier with the result.”
About Pitchblack Partners
Pitchblack Partners is a creative content company, the result of a content/film production company merged with ex-agency creatives and strategists. The upshot is that we create and produce highly effective screen & digital content across all media faster and more competitively than an advertising agency is able to.
Pitchblack Partners is New Zealand-owned by its partners. This independence flavours our distinct approach and as a result the Pitchblack Partners have been recognised as among the most innovative marcomms practitioners in the world.
Our clients are based in New Zealand, Australia, APAC and the US.
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