The 2014 Winter Olympics are officially in the books and the quest for gold in Sochi has come to an end. We can now look back at the competition of the past two weeks and understand the victories not only among athletes, but some of the world’s top brands. Just as the Olympics provide the opportunity for athletes to showcase their true talents, the Games offer a premiere stage for brands to share their message and make a powerful impact in front of an international audience.
The Olympics engage an audience of 4.8 billion captivated viewers across more than 200 countries and territories. Pair this with the influence of social media, mobile marketing and product placement, and suddenly the Olympics become a dream of both marketers and athletes alike. But which brands took advantage of this global stage to truly make an impact in Sochi? This month we take a closer look at the Marketing Olympics and are excited to share three campaigns that struck gold at the 2014 Sochi Games:
1. #SochiProblems – “The first star of the Olympics was #SochiProblems,” said Craig Howe, sports social media strategist. Before Opening Ceremonies even took place, the hashtag #SochiProblems was making headlines as athletes and media began sharing firsthand accounts of their less-than-satisfactory accommodations. Photos of murky water, uncovered manholes, and trapped elevators were going viral and quickly elevated #SochiProblems as a trending topic on Twitter. The popularity of the hashtag gave way to the creation of the snarky Twitter account, @SochiProblems, by a Canadian student who used the profile to share humorous mishaps and jokes throughout the Games. Although no longer active since the conclusion of the games, the account acquired 340,000 followers, surpassing the English-speaking @Sochi2014 official account by more than 120,000.
2. Proctor & Gamble: Proud Sponsor of Moms – P&G’s ‘Proud Sponsor of Moms’ campaign originally debuted during the 2010 Vancouver Olympics making this the third games in which the messaging has appeared. The campaign uses the background of the Olympics to reflect upon the respective childhoods of Olympic athletes and spotlight the impact of mothers in guiding their children to achieve this elite status. According to Simon Mainwarning, CEO of brand leadership firm, We First, “By taking such an approach, P&G has transformed corporate advertising into a celebration of humanity. Each ad ends with a short life lesson, much like the ones we all received from our Moms, and in both cases the viewers’ comments speak to how the commercials left them ‘teary-eyed.” This year as part of the campaign P&G launched the “Pick Them Back Up” commercial earning the number one top in the Top 10 rankings for Winter Games TV spots. The video has over 18 million views on YouTube and continued to extend its reach through a social media hashtag and campaign landing page.
3. Nike – This year Nike extended its reputation as a prominent Olympic brand despite not being an official sponsor. Rather than paying roughly $100 million in sponsorship costs, the brand has developed a content marketing strategy to build awareness through product placement. Nike supplied apparel at the Sochi Games for Team USA, the Russian and Canadian hockey teams, as well as apparel for IOC Members and staff. “Nike cleverly leveraged the combination of their recognizable trade dress and logo to get Olympic-sized brand identification without an Olympic-sized budget,” Adam Hanft, CEO of marketing consultancy Hanft Projects, told NBC News. “It’s exactly the kind of guerrilla product insertion that makes marketers smile and the [IOC] nuts.”
Despite the backdrop of controversy at the 2014 Sochi Games, brands stayed true to their Olympic dreams launching nearly $900 million of advertisements in the US alone. This investment represents not only the international appreciation for the Games but marketers’ belief that controversy has the power to drive interest. With two years to go until the Summer Games, we look forward to seeing brands go for the gold one more time at the Rio 2016 Olympics.
