The Age of Event Sponsorship is over

One of the main points I sought to get across in my progress this morning was that the age of huge corporate sponsorship of sporting events like the World Cup is well and truly over. Associations like FIFA can no longer guarantee exclusivity to its partners. This World Cup has in my opinion proven that a well-timed ad or the ambush of a major event is far more effective than sponsorship of the actual competition.

Dutch brewer Bavaria hijacked to great effect the Holland v Denmark game last week. However the consternation which FIFA have kicked up has played into the hands of Bavaria, giving them a massive amount of prime time media coverage. Paddy Power are even happy to hijack an event which they themselves sponsor, such as the Cheltenham Festival.

Official sponsors of the World Cup have been fairing very poorly when it comes to association with the competition. A study by Nielsen found that Nike has created a significantly bigger "online buzz", based on an analysis of blogs, message boards and social networking websites, and association to the World Cup than any other brand.

Nike, which is not an official sponsor of the World Cup, had more than twice as many references in relation to the World Cup than official sponsor Adidas.Adidas had the second highest level of mentions, and therefore share of World Cup buzz, with official sponsors Coca-Cola, Sony and Visa filling out the top five slots.

Carlsberg, which recently launched its own star-studded "best team talk in the world" TV campaign, ranked sixth. The brewer is not an official World Cup sponsor. Official beer sponsor Budweiser did not appear in the top 10 in the report.
Adidas recently struck back with a TV ad featuring celebrities in a remix of the famous cantina scene from the 1977 Star Wars film. The ad launched on 5 June and given Nielsen's research only covers the period 7 May to 6 June the German sportswear giant will be hoping its digital buzz factor has significantly increased since the report.

These examples show that compelling, savvy marketing can establish this sort of connection in the eyes of consumers without having to write that expensive sponsorship check

Gavin McCarthy








Ad of the Week

McDonalds "Come as you are" Campaign

Following on from this mornings discussion in progress about McDonald's latest ad campaign "Come as you are" I would like your opnions on other ads featured in the campaign. The first ad below features two "silver-surfers" adopting new identities online and interacting with one another. The second ad features a mother and daughter and illustrates the similarities between the two as they both manage to lose their bags in the same day. The campaign sees its brand move away from its usual focus of the traditional family set-up to recognizing a wider clientele. Is this a good move in the right direction or should McDonalds revert back to the likes of it's happy easygoing "I'm Loving it" campaign??