By Oli Richards on February 1st, 2013

Tags: Athletics, Blogging, BMW, Brand marketing, Branded content, Brazil 2014, Broadcast sponsorship, Commonwealth Games, Communications, Consultancy, Content, Cricket, Digital marketing, Engine, Football, Football Sponsorship, Glasgow 2014, grass roots sport, London 2012, London 2012 sponsorship, Manchester United, Olympic sponsorship, Olympics, PR, Public relations, RBS 6 Nations, Rugby, Rugby World Cup, Ryder Cup, Sponsorship, Synergy

No comments

Analysis of industry data suggests that the F1 ecosystem raises over £1b per year from sponsorship. This includes Team Sponsors and Suppliers (ranging from £100m for the big boys to £20m for the smaller teams), F1 Partners (around £25m per year in cash or Value in Kind from each of the 6 global partners) and Race Sponsorship (around £10m for each of the races with title sponsors plus trackside advertising).

To put that into context, the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games raised around the same amount (£750m from domestic sponsors plus around £250m contribution from the IOC for TOP partners) – but that was for a 4-year cycle.

So here’s a question: Given how much is spent on it from some of the world’s leading brands, why is F1 Sponsorship not at the leading edge of sponsorship thinking and activation?

It’s fair to say that F1 is ahead of the game in virtually everything else it does. So surely F1 Sponsors should be cleaning up at the major sponsorship industry awards.  In fact, over the past 5 years, an F1 sponsorship has won only once out of a possible 47 SIA awards (Vodafone’s Best Sponsorship of a Team or Individual in 2009). Case studies from F1 should be inspiring sponsors in other sports.  Here at Synergy, we should regularly be showcasing examples from F1 in the ‘What We Love’ section of Synopsis. But this just isn’t the case – at least not to the extent that one would expect.

Don’t get me wrong, there are some great pieces of activation in F1 (I’ll point out some of them later), but as a whole, F1 sponsorship is pretty uninspiring.

Having run the Reuters sponsorship of WilliamsF1 from 2000 – 2003 (yes – I agree – it was nowhere near ‘award-winning’!), I thought I would have a go at answering that question based on my own personal experiences.

1. Most Formula One sponsorships are B2B

Reuters primarily used F1 for B2B relationship building. A quick scan of F1 sponsors shows that over 40% have significant B2B businesses. There is little better than F1 if you have a relatively small number of high-value, global customers who you reach through targeted sales and marketing programmes.  Travelling around the world to all the key markets, Formula One and Paddock Club™ are the absolute gold standard of corporate hospitality. With this being the focus of the brands’ activation programme, it is little wonder that it remains unseen by the mass audience, award panels and the Synopsis editors.

The activation challenge for the B2B partners, however, is to create the most compelling brand stories and event experiences to attract their audience.  Because the fact is, especially in the small markets, most of the B2B sponsors are going after a very similar audience, in some cases exactly the same people.

2. There is too much focus on brand exposure and logos on cars and not enough on activation

Whenever brand exposure is such a critical part of the sponsorship package, it is easy to rely too heavily on it at the expense of all the other things you can do with the sponsorship. I absolutely hate the “media value” figures that are at the heart of so many F1 sponsorships.  However, it is easy to measure and as long as the media value is bigger than the cost of the sponsorship, brands can be tempted to think “job done”. In comparison, Olympic sponsors can’t rely on any media value to justify their sponsorship.  That’s why they have to work much harder and be far more creative with their activation.

A knock-on effect of this over-emphasis on media value is the fact that it can lead to an under-investment in activation.  Typically, the rights fee is so high (because brands are paying for the exposure) that there isn’t enough left over for activation. I’m not a big believer in any rule-of-thumb ratios, but the proportion of rights fee to activation spend when I was at Reuters is definitely not going to make it into any how-to textbooks. I suspect this isn’t unusual for F1 sponsors up and down the Paddock

3. The calendar gives you no time to plan and develop great campaigns

The F1 season is relentless. The first race is in early March and the last race is in late November. In between is a never-ending cycle of travelling and managing the day-to-day execution of race weekends. Everyone goes on holiday during the 4-week summer break and at the end of the season, which then leads into Christmas. Trust me, if you want a year to fly past, get a job in F1.

Which basically just leaves January and February to do any sort of campaign development. But even those months tend to be dominated by tactical planning for the season ahead. There just isn’t the time to think about a season-long campaign or a brilliant piece of activation.

Another challenge is the global scale required by an activation campaign. Japan, Abu Dhabi, Britain, the US and Brazil have very little in common with each other from a marketing perspective.  So as an F1 sponsor you are sort of in limbo between creating and delivering a global campaign that doesn’t quite work in loads of markets and developing local campaigns which feel a bit ‘small’ and short term.

4. The F1 community is too closed

There are some great people who work in F1.  However, it needs more ‘churn’.

For example, when I needed a sponsorship agency, everyone I invited to pitch was effectively a specialist F1 agency. I understand why most sponsors do that, but it leads to a form of ‘groupthink’ where new ideas are thrown out in favour of “what we did last year” or “what we do with our other clients”.

This happens up and down the paddock. If an F1 team needs a new Account Manager, they are likely to hire someone from one of the other teams. If a brand needs an F1 Sponsorship Director, they are likely to hire someone who has done a similar job at another sponsor. If an F1 agency hires a new Account Director, they typically hire someone who already has F1 experience.

The danger of this ‘closed’ community is that it loses the fresh influences and perspectives that drive creativity.

I know it’s tough (I’ve been there myself) but I think F1 sponsors need to be braver and set the bar higher for their activation campaigns. The benchmark should not be: “we want to create the best F1 sponsorship campaign”, but rather “we want to create the best sponsorship campaign”. And to do that, I think that it is critical for sponsors to look for inspiration outside the very small world of F1.

The point of this blog is not to say that there are no good F1 activations – because clearly there are some great examples.

My point is simply that given the number of world-class brands who are sponsors in F1, the amount that they invest and the possibilities of F1 as a platform, there should be far more ground-breaking activation programmes than there are.

Some of our Favourite F1 Activation Case Studies:

Johnnie Walker – Step Inside the Circuit Series

Johnnie Walker extended this campaign with some experiential activity in Travel Retail environments but at its core was some great behind-the-scenes content, from Monte Carlo (below), India, Singapore and other races

Vodafone:

One car, no team:

Camping:

Santander:

London Grand Prix:

The Silverstone Chase

Hugo Boss - Dress Me for the Finale

Using a special online configurator, consumers in each country could create bespoke designs of the drivers’ race suits. The drivers wore the designs during qualifying for each race, while the best two designs as voted by the audience were worn on the Sunday during the Brazilian Grand Prix. Boss also did a good job of connecting this activation to their social media and retail channels:

Red Bull – Faces for Charity

In exchange for a donation to charity (which Red Bull matched), consumers could upload a photo which was then put on the car for the British Grand Prix.

Vodafone –  Drive to the Big League

Vodafone introduced this initiative at the British Grand Prix in 2010 which offered one of their small business customers the chance to put their logo on the car for the British Grand Prix.  Vodafone have taken it to a whole new level in India now, where they have combined it with a Dragons Den style TV programme to select the winner – watch it – it’s brilliant!!!

See – it is possible – more of that please!!!

By Carsten Thode on November 15th, 2012

Tags: Advertising, Alcohol, Awards, Brand marketing, Branded content, Consultancy, Content, Default, Digital marketing, Experiential marketing, Facebook, Formula 1, London 2012, London 2012 sponsorship, Olympic sponsorship, Olympics, Red Bull, Sponsorship, Sponsorship consultancy, Sponsorship consultants, Synergy, Synergy Loves, Synopsis

No comments

So, that’s it. London 2012 is over. Now we’re just left with misty-eyed memories, an impossible choice for SPOTY, a never-ending supply of video montages and the realisation that we’re unlikely to see anything quite like it again in our lifetimes.

It also provided a watershed moment for sponsorship in the UK. Ever since London was awarded the Games in 2005, London 2012 provided a focal point and growth engine for an entire industry.  So where do we go from here?

What will London 2012 do for the perception of sponsorship in the UK

London 2012 did deliver some predictable anti-sponsorship stories. Coca-Cola, McDonalds, Cadbury, Dow, Atos Origin and BP were all given a bit of stick (for one reason or another), while numerous articles questioned the ROI of Olympic sponsorships, the relative success of ambush campaigns and various activation #fails.

But all of those issues were pushed into the background once the Games began and for that reason they will not be the enduring perspective of sponsorship in the wake of London 2012.

The narrative is already starting to crystallise around the positive stories.  Sainsbury’s are out of the blocks early, claiming a 5.6% uplift in sales and a meaningful 0.3% market share gain as a result of their brilliant Paralympic sponsorship. Adidas, in fact, were able to confirm a positive ROI before the Olympics even started. You can expect the other sponsors to either follow suit or keep quiet.

No sponsor will admit to destroying value (why would they) while the positive case studies will be accentuated and decorated with plenty of awards. The overwhelming perception will be that sponsorship of London 2012 created business value and, of course, it is in everyone’s interest to support that perception.

Empirically, the sponsorship market is remaining buoyant as we continue to see a series of record-breaking new deals and contract extensions including Barclays/Premier League, Chevy/Manchester United, Samsung/Chelsea, Wonga/Newcastle, Capital One/League Cup, Investec/ECB, and O2/RFU and BMW/ RFU.

There is no doubt that London 2012 has accelerated the overall development of sponsorship in the UK – a trend which we see continuing as brands see how sponsorship can help them deliver their business, brand and marketing objectives.

What will the London 2012 Sponsors do next?

With the exception of Acer (whose category is disappearing with the convergence of consumer electronic devices), the rest of the TOP sponsors will continue on their Olympic journey. Some of these (e.g. Coke, McDonald’s, Visa, Samsung, etc.), have a strong portfolio of global sponsorship assets so probably aren’t in the market for any big new assets.

But the local sponsors, including Lloyds TSB, BA, BT, BP, Cadbury, EDF and UPS have an Olympic-sized hole in their marketing programmes.

BMW have already moved to sign an innovative new deal with the RFU to create the BMW Performance Academy, which creates a strong post-Olympic transition.

But the big question is what comes next for the others. All of these brands are in highly competitive markets with aggressive competitors who have major sponsorship assets in place.  It is probably safe to assume that some of them are looking for their next big play.

Another angle to consider is whether there is a group of brands that have been keeping the powder dry for the past few years. If one of your competitors was an Olympic sponsor, it might have been a clever strategy to avoid fighting a losing battle for exposure. We might start seeing them emerge into the sponsorship market with big ambitions and healthy budgets.

All of this will create demand in the pipeline, which will fuel the competition for the best sponsorship assets.

What interesting properties are available?

I have to start this section with an enormous health warning: when developing a sponsorship strategy, identifying the right property should be the last step in the process. First, you should develop a sponsorship strategy – a clear articulation of precisely how sponsorship will help you deliver your business, brand and marketing objectives. Only then should you look to identify the assets that will best deliver that strategy.

But that’s not going to stop me giving you a quick overview of some of the key opportunities that are out there. This is not meant to be a comprehensive list – just a quick look at why this is being called the ‘Golden Decade’ for sport in the UK.

Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games:

Coming so soon after London 2012, there is a danger that the Commonwealth Games will feel like an anti-climax. Of course, it won’t be anything like the scale of the Olympic and Paralympic Games, but the Commonwealth Games have a unique personality which some brands have historically been able to tap into very successfully, like Imperial Leather in 2002 and NAB in 2006.

Glasgow 2014 will be nothing like Delhi 2010. First and foremost, this is because many of the biggest names and most famous athletes will be coming to Scotland. The fact that the Home Nations compete as independent teams will add some interesting storylines, while the 2014 Referendum will ensure that the “Scotland” angle provides an interesting political backdrop and a lightning rod for Scottish national pride (despite the Governing Body’s best attempt to de-politicise it).

Rugby World Cup 2015:

OK – so Rugby doesn’t have the global appeal of Football, but make no mistake, the Rugby World Cup will dominate the UK sports agenda in 2015.  With a 6-week tournament taking place in all four corners of the country (plus Cardiff) and Stuart Lancaster building a team that can challenge for the title, the opportunity for sponsors is clear.

Athletics World Championships and World Paralympics Championships 2017:

This is as close as we’re going to get to a repeat of Super Saturday. With the IAAF and IPC World Championships taking place in the same city for the first time, we will be able to see first-hand the legacy left by Mo Farah, Jess Ennis, Greg Rutherford, David Weir and Jonny Peacock.

Ryder Cup 2014:

Anyone who watched the Ryder Cup last month knows that it delivers incredibly compelling sporting drama. It has an interesting narrative that opens the activation window beyond the 3-day event, while the event itself generates interest that stretches far beyond traditional golf fans.

UK Athletics and other Sports Governing Bodies:

After a 13-year partnership, Aviva has announced that it is not extending its deal with UK Athletics. UKA have announced that they are hoping to move away from a single title sponsor towards a “Champions League model”. However, I don’t think it’s a big enough asset to split into parts, with more value to one brand looking to “own the sport”.

While this isn’t public knowledge yet, the industry grapevine is abuzz with at least three other Olympic sports whose governing bodies are looking for new title sponsors. In many ways, this was entirely predictable – sponsoring an Olympic sport is a classic ambush technique. But it is a shame to see brands be so transparent and head for the hills as soon as the Olympics leaves town. Still, it provides a great opportunity for new brands to come in and create something brilliant. Do you like what Sky has done with Cycling and British Gas has done with Swimming? If so, there are plenty more opportunities like that.

Venue Naming Rights:

Venue naming rights are one of the fastest growing sectors in sponsorship. While O2 and Emirates have already done it well in the UK, looking to the US shows us what our future might look like. Over there, the Barclays Centre and MetLife Stadium are just the latest in a long line of major naming rights deals.

Over here, rights holders are actively selling naming rights for the Olympic Stadium, Aquatics Centre, “Copper Box” and VeloPark, while ExCel wants you to put “your brand here”.

Over the next decade, we could be also looking at a few new Premier League stadiums under construction. Chelsea, Liverpool, Spurs, Everton and QPR all have expressed the desire to either redevelop their existing stadia or build a new one. You can bet that most (if not all) of these will come with a naming rights sales pitch.

Arsenal Shirt Sponsorship:

AON, Standard Chartered, Samsung and DHL (for a training kit) all set the bar for the value of the kit sponsorship for a high-profile Premiership Team. Then Chevy came along and did a couple of backflips over that bar. Brands clearly still see huge value in these deals. If you are one of them, I would give Arsenal a call.

The Football League:

Npower announced recently that they would not be extending their title sponsorship of The Football League. The great thing about this asset is that it gives a brand the ability to reach deep into 72 communities around the country. It’s difficult to think of a better asset for a brand that wants to touch and be ever-present with the mass market.

England Cricket Team:

Brit Insurance cited a “shift in business strategy” for the decision to end their England shirt sponsorship, which they only signed in 2010. Their contract does not end until 2014, but this announcement clearly signals that they are looking for an early exit. If you move quickly, you can even be in place in time for the 2013 Ashes Series.

Self Created Assets:

Red Bull have been blurring the definition of sponsorship and re-writing the rules for many years. But I think that Red Bull Stratos has finally brought us to the tipping point where brands are more willing to risk blazing their own trail with self-created and other owned assets. The power of sponsorship comes from its ability to give you access to your audience’s heart and brands now see that they don’t need an established asset to take them there.

All in all, I am convinced that London 2012 will not be the high water mark for sponsorship in the UK. Rather, it will be the springboard which accelerates sponsorship to even more exciting places. The assets are there to do some interesting things and brands will become better and more ambitious in terms of how they use them. The accelerated development of the sponsorship industry will be one of the real legacies of London 2012, which is an exciting thought for all of us who are part of it.

By Carsten Thode on October 30th, 2012

Tags: Advertising, Ambush Marketing, Consultancy, Default, London 2012 sponsorship, Naming Rights, Olympic sponsorship, RBS 6 Nations, Red Bull, Ryder Cup, Sponsorship, Sponsorship consultancy, Synergy

No comments

There’s no doubt about it, London 2012 has been the most digitally connected Olympics we’ve ever seen. Compared to Beijing 2008 there are nearly 10 times the amount of people on Facebook and a whopping 80 times more tweeting away on Twitter.

Brands, consumers and even the stars of the greatest show on Earth participated with tweets, photos and videos, often in real time and always with real, honest to goodness, passion. It’s this real-time nature that made Social Media (‘SoMe’) transform the way we have experienced the Olympics and has held the key to brands making the most of their Olympic sponsorships.

So we at Synergy wanted to take a little look-see as to which brands best activated their campaigns through the use of content and digital channels. Whilst we were at it, we even decided to have a little medal ceremony all of our own.

Gold Medal Winner: adidas – Take the Stage

‘Take The Stage’ was the title of the integrated campaign launched by adidas to leverage its sponsorship of the 2012 Games.

Whilst television and out of home focused largely on the Team GB athletes themselves, the campaign also contained a public initiative which played out via digital channels. These channels provided the content hub to house varied material from emotionally-charged, nation-rousing videos of Ennis, Daley, and Idowu (hindsight’s a wonderful thing), to pieces on the athletes’ adoration of the Team GB kit and Stella (the designer, not the beer), even Keith Lemon interviewing the most successful British Olympian of all time, “Circus Hoy”, getting the Brownlees to Tri-a-Thong or Swingballdon with Andy Murray.

Even a medal-winner laden lip-sync music video to Queen’s “Don’t Stop Me Now” emerged from the content coffers. Add to that footage of a certain Mr Beckham surprising well-wishers in a ‘good luck’ video booth installation, and you have a piece of content that has generated 3 million views alone.

Digital channels also provided the platform for 32 youngsters to be given the opportunity to collaborate with a host of top sports people and pop stars by showcasing their own talent via YouTube.

SoMe was employed to get the public more deeply involved and engaged in the campaign. Aside from the dedicated website, consumers could engage with the brand by following updates on Facebook and Twitter, using @adidasUK and #takethestage. The ‘Take the Stage’ Facebook app invited users to create their own campaign image and mantra in the same style as the striking photographic portraits, share it with their friends and post the image within the dedicated gallery.

When it came to content, there really was something for everyone.

Some stats

- The @adidasUK Twitter following climbed by 25% with the hashtag #takethestage being mentioned 109,241 times.

- Throughout the 17 days of the Olympics, adidas’ global Facebook page increased by 202,429 fans with more than 5 times the usual amount of shares.

- The David Beckham photo booth stunt has been viewed more than 3 million times.

- The adidas Team GB “Don’t Stop Me Now” video has been viewed more than 1.5 million times.

- Adidas claims it has “already recouped” its Olympic sponsorship investment through merchandise, with further sales still to be expected.

Why Gold?

Adidas realises that sports sponsorship and social have common ground – unified by passion. The brand generously sprinkled patriotism into the mix and fed consumers’ passions by telling great stories in an ‘always on’ environment, building familiarity, likeability and trust on the way.

‘Take the Stage’ focuses on what adidas as a brand stands for and not what it sells. The content is ‘shareworthy’; so meaningful, useful or interesting to its audience that they want to share it with their own friends, families and other connections.

Ultimately, adidas’ approach to sponsorship and digital during the 2012 Games has allowed the brand to build deeper, more meaningful and more enduring relationships with its consumers.

Silver Medal Winner: P&G – Thank You Mum

Proctor and Gamble brought to life its sponsorship of the Games most effectively through its ‘Olympic Mums’ YouTube campaign. Its aim was to recognise Mums as the special person behind every athelete.

Content for the campaign took the form of a series of video tributes called “Raising an Olympian”, stories told by the Mums themselves, which were then distributed on TV and online through sponsored content and video ads.

Facebook provided the destination to share special moments between the athletes and their Mums, and also allowed consumers to thank their own Mums by uploading family photos and writing messages for them to be shared in their news feeds. Twitter provided the platform to cheer on the athletes and allowed P&G to keep its followers informed.

Some stats

- The campaign achieved over 206,397,926 impressions.

- Over 5 Million views on YouTube.

- 43 online articles were written.

- Retailers that activated the campaign with in-store displays have seen a 5% to 20% sales lift for P&G products in the three- or four-week Olympic merchandising period.

Why Silver?

The content which P&G dispersed told emotional and compelling stories, which people naturally wanted to share.

Who could resist the pull on the heartstrings, the concept of ordinary kids becoming Olympians and the contribution their own mothers made to getting them where they are today?

Using social to roll out content a full 100 days before the Olympics shows P&G’s understanding of how using its “mum-umentaries” to engage wasn’t limited to the actual Games themselves.

Using real time distribution of narratives added to the impact, exemplified by the airing of a ‘thank you’ message from one Volleyball player to her Mum halfway through the final set of the match.

A robust paid-for seeding strategy also ensured the content reached the right audience. Oh…and finally, P&G forecasts that its Olympic campaign will generate over $500 million in additional sales.

Bronze Medal Winner : Coca-Cola Move to the Beat

Coca-Cola has been involved with the Olympics since the 1928 Games in Amsterdam. In 2012 the focus moved from more traditional advertising to a more ‘Liquid and Linked’ approach to story-telling. Launching an integrated campaign, which largely played out through SoMe, Coke targeted its audience with the spotlight on music and youth culture.

Bringing in some musical ‘big guns’, Coke worked with producer Mark Ronson and singer Katy B, with Ronson setting out to produce an original Olympic anthem for 2012. To achieve this he travelled around the world to capture the sounds he needed from various sportsmen and women in action to form a ‘rhythmic backbone’, for the anthem. Imagine Ronson in the meeting with Coke selling in the idea that he needed to discover a rhythmic backbone. He captured sounds from Table Tennis in the UK, archers from Singapore, hurdlers in the US, sprinters from Russia even Taekwondo in Mexico.

Coke then told the story of Ronson’s mission through a series of videos. Users were driven to Coke’s Move to the Beat website where they could become the producer themselves and combine their favourite sport with their favourite beats to create their very own version of the anthem. If the user so desired they could further manipulate the anthem through the movement of their mobile phone via an associated app.

Coke uploaded the UGAs (User Generated Anthems) to its global community and further facilitated the sharing of these user-generated anthems through Facebook and Twitter. Users posted the videos on their Facebook profiles and propagated them via tweets.

Some stats

- 3 million user-generated anthems were created.

- Coca-Cola has now hit 50 million fans on Facebook.

Why Bronze?

Coke understands the importance of creating content which resonates with its audience, and more so, it understands that co-creating this content makes it all the more powerful. People love to share what they themselves create and Coke facilitates this. Make the content unique, valuable and easy to share, and an audience will happily amplify your brand message – and do so with a smile.

In summary, whilst the Olympic Flame may now have been extinguished for another four years, the brands above have demonstrated that they have the ability to start their own fires through the power of Social Media. By creating truly outstanding content, allowing users to put their own stamp on that content, and helping them share it via social, these brands can sit back and enjoy the warm afterglow as consumers ‘fan’ the flames on their behalf.

Full disclosure: Synergy works with the Coca-Cola Company

By Lee Thomas on September 10th, 2012

Tags: Advertising, Digital marketing, London 2012, London 2012 sponsorship, Olympic sponsorship, Paralympics, Socialympics, Sponsorship, Twitter

No comments

As the first truly social Olympic and Paralympic Games come to a close, we take a look back at the Games according to Twitter – exploring who generated the most conversation, who gained the most followers and what impact winning a medal does for your popularity in the social sphere.

Social media became such a large part of the Games for athletes, journalists and fans alike that one Australian bookmaker even went as far as to offer odds on who would gain the most Twitter followers over the course of the London 2012. If you had the foresight to put some cash on Tom Daley, rest assured you will see a nice return on your investment.

Despite Michael Phelps leaving his final Olympic Games as the most decorated Olympian of all time with 22 medals, his gain of a ‘meagre’ 950,000 Twitter followers (an increase of 293%), was only enough to bag him a silver medal in the social media stakes. In the end  Daley took the gold, winning more than 1 million new followers over the course of the London 2012 (an increase of 275%).

Daley’s meteoric social rise was triggered by two events. The first of these sadly brings to light one of the negative aspects of the medium, when a user cruelly invoked the name of Daley’s late father after he failed to medal in the Synchronised Diving – sending Tom’s following up 300,000 to almost one million in just a couple of days, as people rallied in support. The second was Daley’s impressive bronze in the individual competition towards the end of the second week, which took the number up past 1.3 million.

There were also other significant movers across the rest of Team GB. Jessica Ennis picked up almost 500,000 new followers as she stormed her way to Heptathlon gold, while Bradley Wiggins followed his success in the Tour de France with an Olympic gold medal, picking up 230,000 fans in the process. Double gold medallist Mo Farah increased his Twitter fan base by 220,000, while Andy Murray’s gold and silver medals saw him pick up more than 100,000 new followers.

Of course, not all athletes in Team GB were members of Twitter prior to the Games; in fact, only 52.7% had active accounts before the Opening Ceremony. Incredibly, by the Closing Ceremony, 73.6% of Team GB athletes had signed up, with Jason Kenny (who didn’t have an account until 9 August) gaining nearly 30,000 followers in the two days up to the end of the Games.

So, what does a medal get you in terms of followers? Looking at a sample of 27 British medal-winning athletes, we explored the uplift in followers that an athlete gained from the Opening Ceremony up until directly after their first medal win. This averaged out at an incredible 57% per athlete. Among our sampled athletes, Anthony Ogogo led the way with an increase of 324%,  to reach more than 24,000 followers – albeit from a low base. This was  followed by Tom Daley who increased his following by 258% to over 1.3m – although as discussed there were other contributing factors to this rise. Next was Louis Smith who saw an impressive 124% increase and Ben Ainslie, who increased his following by 122% after his first medal to 22,000, which has since risen above 40,000.

According to stats released by Twitter, more than 150 million tweets were sent about the Olympics in total and perhaps unsurprisingly, diver Tom Daley topped the list of British athletes discussed on the site, with more than 1 million mentions. Overall, and again unsurprisingly, the most tweeted about athlete was Usain Bolt, with Michael Phelps second and Tom Daley and Ryan Lochte third and fourth respectively.

Despite the countless incredible sporting stories over the Games, the Great British public’s appetite for the ‘celebrity’ still burned strong, with the Spice Girls reunion somehow managing to rack up more tweets than during any of Usain Bolt’s or Mo Farah’s gold medal winning races, with a staggering 116,000 tweets per minute – or roughly 2,000 tweets per second. Although, to put this is some context, the most simultaneously tweeted-about event was the televised screening of a Japanese anime film in 2011 – Castle in the Sky – which registered 25,088 tweets in a single second. There’s no accounting for taste…

And so to Rio. With 33.3 million Twitter users and counting, Brazil currently stands 2^nd behind the United States in active Twitter users, after recently overtaking Japan. As users from across the globe, and, in particular from emerging markets, continue to flock to Twitter, Rio 2016 has the opportunity to learn lessons from London to deliver the most socially shared event to date.

By Tom Whiteside on September 10th, 2012

Tags: Brazil, London 2012, London 2012 sponsorship, Olympic sponsorship, Olympic sponsorship consultants, Team GB, Twitter

No comments

Think you know the slogans and straplines of the London 2012 sponsors and organisers? Did you even know them in the first place? Well, here’s your chance to test your knowledge – and the effectiveness of a lot of heavyweight marketing.

We’ve created this (entirely unofficial) crossword featuring the IOC, IPC and LOCOG slogans, and the campaign straplines of the Games’ global and domestic tier one sponsors.

View and download it here and test your knowledge. And if there are a lot of London 2012 experts in your office, why not challenge them to a speed test?

We defy you to complete it without Googling (especially 19 across and 22 across).

But when you do, you’ll find you have not just a completed crossword, but a London 2012 word cloud.

Enjoy.

By Tim Crow on August 30th, 2012

Tags: Advertising, Brand marketing, Default, London 2012, London 2012 sponsorship, Olympic sponsorship, Olympics, Paralympics, Rio 2016, Sponsorship

No comments

Where other broadcasters and sponsors have hesitated, Channel 4 has embraced the Paralympics and looks set to reap the rewards.

After the perfect ‘warm up’ of the Olympics, Channel 4 launched its Paralympic activity with the broadcaster’s biggest marketing campaign to date – with a ‘roadblock’ premiere of  the quite stunning ‘Meet the Superhumans’, the 90-second advert showcasing the stories behind the Games’ athletes and their unique talents. The advert aired across 78 different TV channels and signalled Channel 4’s intention to launch the Paralympic Games firmly into public consciousness.

As Jessica Ennis became the face of the Olympics, Channel 4 have positioned swimmer Ellie Simmonds as the face of the Paralympic Games. With gold firmly in her sights once again, I’m sure the public will take Ellie into their hearts just as they did Jess. Ellie Simmonds is just one of a series of athletes enlisted by Channel 4 to create some really strong content, which is not only helping with the significant education job that needs to be done around disability sport, but is also showing them to be the world-class athletes that they are.

We should not underestimate the importance of the advertising support that Channel 4 has put behind this campaign in contributing to record ticket sales – a major move in ensuring that these Games will live long in the memory of the British public. Sales have already significantly surpassed Beijing and this could now well go on to be the first ever sell-out Paralympic Games.

There will surely be a case of missed opportunity for sponsors who passed up the chance to create meaningful and evocative content and conversations around an event which has captured the public’s imagination. Many are now instead frantically trying to buy up spots on Channel 4. Hopefully, the Paralympic Games of London 2012 will act as a wake-up call to sponsors in the lead-up to Rio 2016, resulting in greater investment and subsequently the further development of Paralympic sport globally.

Along with the work done by the IPC, Channel 4 has gone a long way to breaking down some of the stigmas that surround disability sport. While the big test – 150 hours of live sport coverage – is still to come, Channel 4 has already gone a long way to securing its place on the Paralympic podium.

By Tom Whiteside on August 29th, 2012

Tags: London 2012 sponsorship consultants, Media, Olympic sponsorship, Paralympics, PR, Sponsorship, Synergy

1 comment

I’ve been pretty lucky over the past few years, working in sport and enjoying some incredibly memorable events. Maybe even the odd Welsh Grand Slam – certainly not the type of thing I was used to when I was growing up.

Indeed, I’ve been privileged to work on the Olympic Games, helping to plan and deliver BMW’s London 2012 vision. Sometimes I really do have to pinch myself.

You could argue some others are not quite so lucky. Some people are born without arms or without sight. Some suffer from debilitating illnesses that they fight for a lifetime. But some don’t think about it that way.

Today marks the start of what I think will be the most amazing and emotive event we’ve ever seen, in what has been the most amazing and emotive summer of sport. Today, the Superhumans begin the greatest show on Earth at the London 2012 Paralympic Games.

As a nation, we’re fired up. We’ve developed a thirst for the most compelling of sporting stories. Tomorrow, when the action begins, we’ll be ready to lap it up.

Athletes will take to the field, pool and track ready to give it everything. Brands at London 2012 have shown great support to the Paralympic Games, but right now, I think one or two will realise they’ve missed out. Have they given it their all?

The next few weeks will define Paralympic sport in the UK and inspire a nation. It will challenge the way we think and the way we perceive disability sport. It will also show us the future in sponsorship.

Brands that have got it have been brave, they’ve trusted their instincts and they’ve exploded into a new space. This is the very essence of creating great creative sponsorship – brands that are prepared to step into the unknown and re-imagine the way they think and deliver.

So as we sit back to enjoy the lionhearts of Paralympic sport in action, we’ll also be experiencing a key part of the development for the future in sports marketing. The Paralympic Games will show that the brave come out on top; both on and off the field.

Full disclosure: Synergy works with BMW on London 2012

By Ben Wilkinson on August 29th, 2012

Tags: Advertising, London 2012 sponsorship, London 2012 sponsorship consultants, Paralympics, Sponsorship, Synergy

No comments

Having been slightly underwhelmed by certain pop-up venues away from the official Olympic events, a visit to the Mizuno Performance Centre was met with a certain level of trepidation. On approach, the grubby windows of the building did little to attract passing footfall, and it was only through strained eyes that the extensive Mizuno window displays could be made out. This seemed a shame and a missed opportunity, yet we were greeted inside by friendly staff decked out in striking purple uniforms. They directed us up the Mizuno-adorned stairs to an exhibition room that was filled with staff but noticeably short on visitors.

The concept behind the ‘Mizuno experience’ was first hand consumer involvement with the brand. This was achieved through three sporting tests, each performed wearing a different set of Mizuno footwear from their new ‘Seiei Collection’. The football and handball challenges involved measurements of accuracy and speed; we were issued with a pair of boots for football and, perhaps slightly unnecessarily, a pair of trainers for the handball. Nevertheless, all the footwear received unanimous nods of approval for lightweight feel and comfort. The technology raised the challenges above other similar, simpler experiential events and it was the athletics experience that represented the most impressive area of the centre. We were each handed a pair of Mizuno spikes and invited to record our quickest times over 20 metres on the custom-made indoor track. Accurate times were recorded and replays of the sprints were shown on surrounding widescreen TVs.

Away from the challenges, an exhibition showcased Mizuno’s Japanese heritage, whilst the VIP rooms provided the brand’s athletes and corporate guests with a place to unwind, away from the Olympic hustle and bustle. Part of this included a Mizuno wall, where athletes had scrawled notes of thanks to the brand for their continued support. It seemed a nice touch and lent the lounges a more personal feel.

Due to Olympic regulations, Mizuno were unable to leverage any of their ambassador assets around the Centre, and instead cleverly relied on sketched sporting artwork on the walls. This presented a slight issue when it came to any of the Synergists naming a Mizuno athlete, which in turn reflected a bigger issue for Mizuno: as impressive as the centre was, do ventures like this provide real value for smaller sports brands when breaking into Western markets so dominated by the larger companies?

The Performance Centre represented a display of how a brand can showcase itself in a simple yet effective manner. The challenges allowed a level of immersion into the brand in a way that did not feel overly gimmicky, and the crisp and clean technological delivery was thoroughly impressive. It was a fine showing from Mizuno through a series of athletic experiences, which, when handled differently, can so often lead to indifference and disappointment.

By Rob Guppy on August 15th, 2012

Tags: Athletics, Brand marketing, Experiential marketing, Football, London 2012, Olympic sponsorship, Olympic sponsorship consultants, Olympics, Running, Sport, Synergy

No comments

The first thing anyone in sponsorship learns about the Olympic Games is that the Field of Play is sacrosanct. No advertising or commercial branding. No marques or sponsorship identification on any athlete uniforms, save from a Nike swoosh here or a Puma feline there. This strict ‘clean venue’ policy is zealously enforced by the powers that be, and underpins the commercial model from The Olympic Partner (TOP) programme, down.

But it is not quite that simple. London 2012 has seen a number of brands appear on the Field of Play and into the eyes and Twitter feeds of fans worldwide. Some of this exposure has even been sanctioned by the IOC. In typical post-event style, here’s the London 2012 Field of Play Top 10.

1. Omega

An unexplained quirk of the Olympic sponsorship programme, and a source of irritation for fellow TOP sponsors;  despite the clean-venue approach, Omega was plastered across every timing screen or timing-related piece of equipment at every venue. The brand even featured on the ‘final lap’ bell at the Athletics, the Velodrome and the Aquatics Centre.

2. Panasonic

A new entry on to the Field of Play for London 2012. Creeping into the Omega realm of explicit but sanctioned Field of Play branding, Panasonic logos were visible on all event screen venues. Screens variously showed spectators scores, replays, venue instructions and films about the rules of Water Polo, the ‘kiss-cam’ and ’bongo-cam’ and the official Muse song and montage. In terms of eyeballs on logos, one for the attendees rather than the TV audience.

3. MINI

Anyone who watched the Athletics cannot have failed to see the remote controlled ‘mini MINIs’ zipping around the Olympic Stadium, retrieving stray javelins, hammers and discuses, as part of BMW’s sponsorship of the Games. Although the car marque was absent, you didn’t have to be a Top Gear devotee to recognise the signature silhouette (or the  ‘it’s a MINI adventure’ tagline). And it certainly helped that the Olympic Broadcasting Service regularly zeroed in on the cars to ensure the MINI became a quirky focus of coverage rather than an incidental logo.

4. Powerade

Athletes have got to stay well hydrated throughout competition, so inevitably there will be drinks on the Field of Play. At the Olympics, Powerade is the sports drink of choice. While The Coca-Cola Company was required to produce special labels for the Games – reading ‘Sports Drink’ rather than ‘Powerade ION4’ – the signature blue Powerade product would have made it clear to viewers what athletes were consuming.

5. Schweppes Abbey Well

Another Coca-Cola brand that was evident on the Field of Play, again without the brand logo. Instead, the label read ‘Still Water’ in the Abbey Well colours. The fairly recent re-launch of the brand’s identity probably made this a less immediately recognisable brand for many consumers.

6. Heineken

While we’re talking hydration, Field of Play exposure does not come much more high profile than the plastic Heineken bottle launched onto the track at the start of the 100m Final. ‘Bottle yob’ was dealt with, but not before global media coverage of the offending item.

Looking at all the above, you’d be forgiven for thinking that the rules are a tad inconsistent – Panasonic branded things they sell (TVs); Omega branded things they don’t (bells); Powerade and Schweppes Abbey Well de-branded their products; while MINI removed their brand but included their tagline (including the word ‘MINI’). I’m sure there’s IOC method somewhere in the madness…

So what about the non-Olympic family, AKA the ambushers? Leaving aside the permitted sportswear logos on athlete kit, a few brands managed to stand out on the Field of Play.

7. Beats by Dre

Dr Dre and his Beats headphones became the most high profile recipient of LOCOG’s policing, but not before the headphones had encroached on to the Field of Play, and become a talking point in the Twittersphere. Inevitably, the clampdown simply brought the oxygen of publicity to Beats’ use by athletes – entirely in keeping with the brand’s endorsement-led strategy. The sweet sound of success for an orchestrated approach that reportedly included a collection point at Shoreditch House for invited athletes.

8. Nike

When your rival has Bolt, how do you grab attention on the track? Bring out the Volt. Nike’s fluorescent yellow / green shoe didn’t contravene any rules and certainly brought a new colour to the track. Of all the colours in the spectrum, the eye is more sensitive to yellow / green than any other (according to the Nike press release). Nike has form when it comes to iconic footwear at major sporting events – from the golden pair given to Michael Johnson in Atlanta in 1996 to the orange boots worn by Nike footballers at the 2010 World Cup.

It will be interesting to see if rivals will copy their ambusher blueprint when Nike moves from poacher to gamekeeper as an official sponsor of Rio 2016.

9. Kinesio Tape

More fluorescent adornment. London 2012 has seen unprecedented use of Kinesio tape in a variety of colours and patterns. According to inventor Dr Kenzo Kase, the Japanese-made tape can help to mend injuries by allowing more movement of fluids below the skin than conventional tape. Interestingly, the scientific research has not proved as sticky as the tape itself. In spite of this, London 2012 has certainly brought it into further the public consciousness, not least as female Beach Volleyball players had a particular penchant for the tape. Cue a fad akin to Robbie Fowler’s nasal strips?

10. Yohan Blake’s watch

Yohan Blake risked a slap on the wrist from the IOC for wearing a custom-made Richard Mille tourbillon watch during the Olympic sprints. It was designed in the Jamaican colours of black, green and yellow, reportedly in an attempt to comply with the regulations. But, as official sponsor of the time pieces category (including watches), Omega will not have seen it that way.

Media exposure analysis of the Field of Play brands would no doubt score Omega top of the chart. Does that mean they take home the sponsorship gold, as suggested below?

Hats off to Omega for emblazoning their logo across a supposedly brand-free environment. If that was the objective they have well and truly succeeded. But sponsorship has evolved from a discipline obsessed by media exposure as a measure of success to focus on relevant engagement. Omega’s exposure is relatively meaningless ‘wallpaper’ that says little about their luxury products and does nothing to connect meaningfully with consumers.

I’m pretty sure there would have been more column inches, tweets and Facebook posts about Blake’s timepiece than the Games-wide Omega timing system. Winning the ‘Field of Play’ gold is about more than maximising brand exposure, it’s about relevant brand or product integration that is amplified and engages with consumers. Not branding for the sake of it, but talking points that generate fan conversations and a become part of the memories from London 2012.

By that measure, there is only one winner for me, and it is operated by remote control. One of the unintended legacies of these Games will be the rush of Rio 2016 sponsors knocking on the IOC’s door to claim their equivalent of MINI’s little adventure at London 2012.

Full disclosure: Synergy worked with The Coca-Cola Company and BMW UK on their London 2012 sponsorships.

By Tom Gladstone on August 14th, 2012

Tags: Ambush Marketing, Athletics, Beach Volleyball, BMW, Brand marketing, Brazil, Brazil 2014, Brazil 2014 Sponsorship, Brazil 2014 Sponsorship Consultants, Default, London 2012 sponsorship, Olympic sponsorship, Olympic sponsorship consultants, Product placement, Rio 2016, Rio 2016 Sponsorship, Rio 2016 Sponsorship Consultants, Social Media, Twitter

1 comment