1. CONVERSE
Online Strategy
Amber Rozzisi

2. CONVERSE
“The brand enters its
second century by
honoring its heritage of
seeing things a little
differently, loving people
who want to change the
world for the better, and
basically celebrating the
spirit of rebellion and
originality in basketball,
Rock & Roll and
anywhere else you find it.”

3. INTRO TO CONVERSE
Challenges:
Due to financial issues Nike bought Converse in 2003. Nike and Reebok
International have claimed the positions as the top athletic shoe companies,
Converse must now reinvent its brand and find another niche in the shoe market. the
first step in their reinvention was realizing that its target audience is male teens with
an edgy, rock and roll attitude rather than their former audience, male athletes.
Endorsements no longer going to professional basketball players, but rather
musicians, artists and fashion designers.
Goals:
1. Create an online personality that appeals to their new audience.
2. fight the backlash that has come from the companies former financial issues.
3. With a lot of conversation about converse still being directed toward their old
financial issues and being bought by Nike, the company needs to gain more control
over the online discussions taking place.

4. BACK TO BASICS
Since the company is reinventing its self and its target audience, Converse
really needs to start over fresh. Going back to the basics of online advertising
with be very important for the success of the campaign. Converse needs to
reach out to its consumers and audience and show that they appreciate their
comments and concerns.
For example, Converse already has two Facebook pages created, both with
nearly 2.5 million members. On these pages many discussions are taking
place about conversesʼ current financial situation and concerns about the
Nike take over. However, there are no responses from Converse. Converse
must join the conversation. This will help its consumer feel closer to the
product and ease concerns and negative stigma about the company.

5. SOCIAL MEDIA
The Facebook example from the previous slide is a great demonstration of
the actions Converse will need to take in reference to its social media
presence. Converse needs to ensure that its customers are not only
recieving the products they want, but legitimate information about the
company as well.
Other Sources for joining the conversation:
Twitter
Blogging
Digg.com
Stumbleupon.com

6. BLOGGING
Converse already has blogs created:
http://www.theconverseblog.net
www.theconverseblog.com
Although they may have created these pages, they are not monitoring,
responding, or even updating as often as they could and should be. Its
important for a company to remember that there is more to blogging then
just creating it and updating every so often. Although it may seem tedious to
such a big corporation, blogging is a great way to join and even control the
conversations going on about your company.
1. To start Converse will need to start blogging 3-4 times a week.
2. A natural increase in posting and commenting can then occurr once traffic
and followers increase.

7. ONLINE PR
Converse has a very well planned and designed website
(www.converse.com). However, no current up to date Press Releases.
Writing and sending out Press Releases is not only a great way to start
conversations about a company but also update and inform consumers and
the media about new products.
With its new image and many new products getting out “good” information
about their new image and products should be a top priority for Converse.
So once again its “back to basics.” Current Press releases about how well
the company is doing now and new products is a must!

8. GOOGLE ADWORDS
Although Converse already uses what Google Adwords has to offer, there are
a few aspects of Search Engine Optimization they could brush up on. For
example, in order to reach their target audience of teen males, who are
usually musicians, artists, etc., converse needs to ensure that they are
choosing their Keywords properly.
The company needs to think about why people are wearing their shoes
nowadays since they are no longer wearing them for sports. They now wear
them because they are edgy, retro, cool, custom and maybe even vintage.
There for when searching for new shoes they may type in “edgy shoes.” In
this instance, converse would want to have requested this keyword so they
would pop up on the results page.

9. MEASURING SUCCESS
One way that Converse can measure my strategies success is with
googles conversion tracking tool. This tool will help calculate the
companies return on investment.
Also, just monitoring the discussion about the company and looking for
negative vs. positive conversations will give insight into the effectiveness
of this strategy.

10. COSTS
1. Man hours:
Most of the costs from my proposal will be allocated to man hours.
This is because much of Converses challenges lie in joining the
conversations already going on about the company. Therefore their money
will be spent on employing individuals to write blogs, press releases and
respond to conversations on various social media sites.
2. SEO:
Another Portion of the costs will go to SEO and purchasing key words
for Googles search.