“They’ve stopped doing that, but they’re still associated with it. In their case, they went from focusing their sponsorship on the sport to focusing on the athletes. That helped the lag effect. Why sponsor an entire sport when you can sponsor two or three of the big names. It sure brings costs down.”
Brand recognition on the cheap: Ambush marketing can be creative, cheap and effective
When so many companies can get such great value out of events without being an official sponsor, maybe the days of high-profile sponsorship deals are numbered anyway.
If there’s a takeaway message from Olympic advertising over the years, Hughes says, it’s that you don’t have to be a sponsor to create engaging, creative and cheap Olympic-themed marketing campaigns.
Famously, the 1996 Atlanta Olympics were stationed in the same city as Coca-Cola’s global headquarters.
“Coke poured money into those Olympics, even by today’s standards,” Hughes says.
“But then at the athletic games, Pepsi went to the stadium and gave out free bottles. All you could see on televisions was shots of people drinking Pepsi.”
Locally, Holden flew a blimp bearing its logo at the AFL Grand Final.
“The AFL had $20 million sponsorship deal with Toyota,” Hughes says. “Holden’s spend was probably $100,000 for the day. Their return on investment would have been very, very high.”
“And it was a positive association. People were like ‘oh, that cheeky Holden’, calling them ‘good Aussie larrikins’. They probably got millions of dollars of exposure.”
“The AFL tried to lobby the Victorian parliament afterwards to change the laws preventing that sort of things. But what it shows is that if you’re creative, you can get away with it.”
These Olympics saw Nike take the cake for ambush marketing. It ran ads highlighting the sport played in all the different cities called London across of the world (not just the one in England).
Nike owned its lack of sponsorship. In summary, its ads said, greatness isn’t about sitting on a coach watching the Olympians. It’s not just something that happens in London (though the word ‘London’ does appear 17 times in the ad above). It’s what happens every day when people push themselves, hopefully while wearing Nikes shoes.
“Nowadays ambush marketing is linked to viral marketing, because of its cheeky element,” Hughes says. “Gen Y and X love that stuff. They love it when you’re cheeky with your brand.
“It’s amazing what you can get away with if you’re clever and willing to do it.”
Myriam Robin is a reporter for SmartCompany and its sister site LeadingCompany. She has degrees in economics, international studies and journalism. She likes writing about businesses taking risks and doing new things.
