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KETCHUM'S ONLINE MAGAZINE YEAR 2008    ISSUE 5

BREAKING THROUGH: GETTING YOUR MESSAGE TO YOUR AUDIENCE

Hitting a Home Run With Sports PR -
These two articles shine a spotlight on sports marketing at the Summer Olympics

Breaking Through With Sports Marketing:
An Interview with Ketchum Sports Network's Ann Wool

Talk about an Olympic-sized task. Getting marketing messages to stand out among all the noise surrounding the Olympic Games is a major challenge, but the effort is well worth it. In the U.S., NBC declared this summer's Beijing Games the most watched television event of all time, with more than 211 million viewers tuning in. And the China Network Communications Group, which provided fixed-line communication for the games, has said that more than 4 billion people around the world had access to coverage.

Even a slice of that audience is a worthy target for almost any company. And Ann Wool has years of experience in helping clients reach it. Ann, who heads Ketchum's sports marketing specialty, has worked on communications programs around every Olympics since the 1992 games in Barcelona. She and other members of the Ketchum Sports Network spent most of August in Beijing executing programs for clients and observing the communication landscape. Perspectives recently interviewed Ann about her reflections on breaking through at the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games.

Perspectives: You have extensive experience working with the Olympics. What are some general guidelines that companies should keep in mind when considering a marketing or communication campaign tied to the games?

Wool: The Olympics offers many points of entry and many levels of sponsorships. Understanding what any one point will get you is important. For instance, some publicity efforts start about six months ahead of the games, so companies that launch a campaign "early" need to be sure they can maintain the news momentum throughout the games. Companies that are new to the Olympics also need to be aware that many corporations already "own" programs that they have been doing for a while, so you have to steer clear of other people's territories. For smaller companies especially, competing for space can be extremely challenging.

To succeed, it is important to work with a partner who is really good at counseling clients on creative ideas and developing strategic approaches that are going to break through. One technique we've used that has been especially successful is what I like to call "layering." We help clients decide on a few key focal points, but we make sure that those points offer multiple ways to generate publicity.

Perspectives: Given the global nature of the games and of many of today's corporations, what are your thoughts on how the Olympics measures up against other sporting events for PR effectiveness?

Wool: The only sporting events that can compare to the Olympic Games from a global nature are the FIFA World Cup for soccer and Formula One auto racing. But they are extremely different marketing platforms. The Olympic Games has a unique halo and distinct spirit that demands extremely careful handling. Companies are easily accused of over-commercializing the games. The nearly 11,000 athletes from all corners of the world make the Olympics truly special. Brands that align with the right athletes, or make the athlete experience better, can enjoy great PR success. That said, it's a very competitive space to work in, and the 10 days leading up to it can be the toughest. That's when marketing and PR programs are rolling out thick and fast, and programs are being tweaked and refined leading into the Opening Ceremonies.

Perspectives: Was there anything new in terms of communication programs or particular opportunities at this year's games?

Wool: One of the greatly publicized challenges facing the PR teams for the sponsors of the Beijing Games PR was the efforts of anti-China activist groups. It was difficult to compete with that media coverage. But the worst period ended when the Torch Relay entered China on May 2, 2008. As for opportunities at the games, one of the expectations people had was that there were going to be 12,000 to 20,000 members of accredited media there and that an additional 15,000 reporters would be there just to cover Chinese culture. I don't think the actual numbers reached anywhere near the projections, but there was still an amazing number of media in Beijing. And there was incredible competition among sponsors for their attention.

In terms of what was new, it was a challenging environment to operate in because we often had to operate with less advance notice than in previous games. Everything from media access, to access to athletes and access to venues was decided at the last minute – and even changed during the games. For example, we didn't find out until about two weeks prior to the games that we would have only five day passes for entry to Lenovo's iLounge. The passes had to be shared among Chinese and worldwide media. We had long expected that more passes would be available and had planned around that, so everything had to be refined at the last minute. Another challenge was that people learned soon after arriving in Beijing that the Olympic Green – the Olympic Park that was built for the games – was not accessible to most non-rights-holding TV crews, and that put a dent in PR possibilities for the costly sponsor pavilions. Overall, these unexpected challenges tested PR teams and provided an opportunity for teams to show how quickly we could think on our feet and sometimes develop significant new programming on the spot. It also reinforced the value of great media relationships as PR teams were more valuable than ever in helping media get access to the stories they wanted to cover.

Perspectives: Can you sum up some of the best public relations or marketing programs that you observed in association with this year's Olympic games?

Wool: Some of the best things that I saw were done by Lenovo, Bank of America, Visa, Coca-Cola and McDonald's – the usual suspects – except Lenovo, which was making its debut at this summer's games. These companies represent the best in class. Their programs broke through the clutter and also made sense for their brands. For instance, Lenovo provided all of the technology and hardware for the games, and they built Internet lounges, called iLounges, for the athletes in the Olympic Village. Thousands of athletes and media used the lounges, providing great visuals and user experiences for Lenovo.

Similarly, Bank of America rented out a two-story building that served as a gathering place for athletes and their families. The media were there every day and whenever anyone interviewed an athlete, the reporter opened or closed with the message that they were broadcasting from the Bank of America Home Town Hopefuls Family Center. Also, Visa's eight-year sponsorship of Michael Phelps paid off and demonstrated the value of deep partnerships with the right athlete when the company was able to host one of his first major post-competition press conferences.

Johnson & Johnson also had a program that got lots of notice. The company has had a long-time partnership with China's Qin Shi Huang Terracotta Army Museum, so it placed five terracotta soldiers from the museum on display at the pavilion. This gave people at the games an opportunity to see a rare exhibit of precious relics, and it also reinforced the company's ties to communities around the world, including in China.

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Sports Marketing: Lenovo at the Olympics
Interview with Bob Page, Program Director,
Corporate Communications, Lenovo

One of the clients that Ketchum Sports Network accompanied to the Beijing Games was Hong Kong-based technology provider Lenovo. Lenovo was a first-time Olympics sponsor this year, and Perspectives is honored to feature the company in our discussion of sports marketing. Here, Bob Page of Lenovo's corporate communications team discusses his firm's global sponsorship of this summer's Olympics.

Perspectives: What do you see as the major benefit(s) of being a worldwide partner for the Beijing Games?

Bob Page: Lenovo's two central objectives for partnering with the Olympic Games on a worldwide level were to position the company as an international brand within China and to introduce the brand in the rest of the world.

Perspectives: Do you expect to be able to leverage Lenovo's role as technology provider for the games beyond this summer? If yes, in what ways?

Page: Yes, serving as the technology provider of the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games – the most complex sporting event in human history – is an outstanding case study that will live on for years. Lenovo will reference both its technology support of the games and its marketing activation to build the brand.

Perspectives: As a technology provider for the games, can you share your thoughts on how the role of new media helped shape publicity during the games?

Page: Lenovo's deployment of new media made historic changes in how athletes communicated about their experiences in the Olympic Games, and in how fans connected to athletes and Olympic events. These were the first Olympic Games in which athletes could blog during the competition time period, and Lenovo created a blogging program called "Voices of the Olympic Games" that fully leveraged this historic change.

Stories on CNET.com and The Wall Street Journal Online described how Lenovo led these historic changes. The headline on the CNET story is impressive – "How Lenovo changed our Olympics experience." Beyond this program, Lenovo and the Ketchum Sports Network also created another new way for fans to connect with athletes and with the games – a philanthropic Olympics memorabilia auction with the athletes' organization, Right to Play. This online auction enabled fans to connect to athletes and the games by purchasing a piece of Olympic history, with proceeds going to philanthropic organizations.

Perspectives: We understand that Lenovo had PR representatives from both your company and the Ketchum Sports Network on site in Beijing; what PR programs executed during the games did you see as major successes? And what made them successful?

Page: Lenovo and the Ketchum Sports Network executed seven major PR programs at the Olympic Games. We promoted press visits to Lenovo Internet Lounges in the Olympic Villages and to other Lenovo Olympic venues, such as the Showcase on the Olympic Green. We hosted 400 reporters every day in the Internet Lounge in the main press center. We trained executive spokespeople and aggressively promoted interviews with them on broadcast and major news media. We created video, print and online news and events daily with a news bureau operation, both before and during the games. We hosted dozens of journalists on four separate half-day familiarization tours to the Lenovo Research and Development campus in Beijing. We prepared for contingencies. And we shaped a comprehensive story around the launch of the Lenovo brand.

Each of these seven programs was successful in different ways, but executed simultaneously they created a regular and unstoppable story about Lenovo's involvement in the Olympic Games. This resulted in positive stories on an hourly basis from news media in various parts of the world.

Perspectives: How does Lenovo measure the success of the partnership overall?

Page: Lenovo is measuring the success of the partnership in impact on the Lenovo brand, in how coverage was generated, how Lenovo visibility and awareness compared to other sponsors, and how connections between consumers, athletes and Lenovo representatives were created.

Initial measurements conducted during and immediately after the conclusion of the games have been extremely positive. For instance, according to the Global Language Monitor, Lenovo's media awareness increased more than 2,100 percent after the Olympics, compared to the end of 2007. Lenovo will continue to gather and evaluate these measurements throughout the fall.

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