Fidelity Reaches Consumers Through Concert Tie

Fidelity’s link with, arguably, the baby boomer icon was the foundation of what became unquestionably one of the most successful entertainment sponsorships in recent memory. When it was over, the company’s sponsorship of Paul McCartney’s 2005 concert tour had generated hundreds of millions of dollars in new and incremental business.

Used to connect with millions of baby boomers—and get them to entrust their retirement funds to Fidelity—the McCartney connection brought together several layers of marketing integration under the umbrella theme “Never stop doing what you love.”

At the concerts, it all came alive with a series of interactives. A traveling living room set up in each market hosted VIP guests and Fidelity employees. Two displays plus teams of ambassadors at the venues helped raise awareness. Concertgoers received commemorative bracelets for donating $40 to The Music Lives Foundation—a nonprofit created expressly for the partnership that collected funds for school music programs. On site and online, the effort raised more than $400,000 for the cause.

Of course, there were also McCartney-related incentives for customers opening new accounts or contributing to existing ones. Kathleen Hall, Fidelity’s executive vp, says the company knew audience demographics would be perfect but was blown away by the tour’s ability to generate leads. “Not only did it deliver quality leads, but the people who signed up on site were six times more likely than our average to generate a branch appointment.”

Fidelity distributed more than 250,000 e-decoder cards, driving traffic to an online data capture page. Prospecting efforts gave custom CDs to anyone signing up for portfolio reviews, which helped the company capture more than 17,000 leads, and push thousands more into the sales cycle.