Consumers Dont Really Know Which Companies Sponsor the Olympics

As a civilization we love sports. They are diverting, energizing, inspiring and fun.

So whether it is justifying the expenditure of tax funds for a new stadium, the expenditure of owners' wealth for a new player - or a client's budget for Olympic sponsorship, we tend to let the emotional overcome the rational.

Which is nice to know, but probably not going to mollify the corporate executives who green-lighted the many millions required for sponsorship of the London Olympics only to find that surveys are reporting the average TV viewer has little idea - and little care - about who the official sponsors really are.

In fact, it's even worse than that. Many survey respondents seem to think that the arch rivals of the actual sponsors are providing the cash.

To be fair, the battle of advertising dominance was honed on the playing fields of Atlanta, Sydney, Salt Lake City, Beijing, Vancouver and a host of other Olympic venues. Those who could not afford to be sponsors - or did not think the returns justified the investment - perfected the art of 'ambush marketing.' Which meant running Olympic-themed ads during the Olympics to gain reflected glory and make some sales. And it works. Well. Just ask Nike (an image from whose ad is above - and may be the most memorable Olympic ad to date, even though they are not a sponsor). Or Pepsi. Or Burger King. Or other major corporations who have employed the tactic to tweak their sponsoring competitors while deflecting the advantage sponsorship is supposed to convey.

It is a game, but a deadly serious one. Resources that might be more effectively applied to other marketing efforts are squandered. The Olympics organization is embarrassed and faces a harder time raising rates for the next one. And the advertising industry is left wondering - again - just how to capture the hearts, minds and attention of an easily diverted public. JL

Laurel Wentz reports in Advertising Age:

Marketers spend hundreds of millions of dollars around their Olympic sponsorships, but consumers often don't appear to be aware of who has paid to attach their name to the games. Worse yet, they often think that honor belongs to a major rival.

In a survey, respondents incorrectly cite Nike, Pepsi and Even Google as brands behind the Games.
In an online survey of 1,034 U.S. consumers last week, 37% of respondents identified Nike as an Olympic sponsor, and just 24% said, correctly, that Adidas is one. That may be partly due to Nike's success in identifying its brands with serious athletes of all types. Nike is also a master of ambush marketing, breaking a global campaign today -- the opening day of the Olympic Games in London -- that features ordinary athletes competing around the world in places outside England that happen to be called London. The campaign, from Wieden & Kennedy, is called "Find Your Greatness."

Coca-Cola was cited by 47% of respondents as an Olympic sponsor, more than any other brand, but 28% incorrectly believed that Pepsi is a sponsor. One of the most-cited brands was McDonald's, correctly named by 40% of respondents, but 19% of those surveyed believed Burger King is an Olympic sponsor. (It's unclear whether respondents understood that marketers pay for category exclusivity and so Coke and Pepsi, for instance, can't both be sponsors).

Respondents who identified brands as sponsors, whether correctly or incorrectly, were then asked if that Olympic sponsorship makes them feel more positive about that brand. Some of the highest response rates were for brands that aren't sponsors -- 54% of respondents said Olympic sponsorship made them feel more positively about Nike, 52% said the same about Burger King and 48% about Pepsi.

In one of the oddest findings, perhaps influenced by what a pervasive presence Google is in the everyday life of internet users, 16% of respondents incorrectly identified Google as an Olympic sponsor. And 60% of those asked the second question about their feelings toward Olympic sponsors said that the sponsorship made them feel more positively about Google.

The responses were part of a Toluna Global Omnibus Survey conducted July 16-18 by Toluna, an online panel and survey technology provider to the market research industry