The 2012 London Olympic Games have come to a close and so has this blog series, looking at which of the Top 11 Corporate Sponsors received the most news coverage.
Newsdesk played the leading role in our ability to quickly find and understand the news coverage for each of these sponsors. It is clear from our data that Visa (Gold), McDonald’s (Silver), and Coca-Cola (Bronze) were the winners in terms of highest volume of news mentions.
The coverage was not always positive. Each day there was backlash against the International Olympic Committee for allowing the sponsors to dictate the food, payment methods, and even logos that appeared on clothing worn by spectators and athletes at the Olympic Games.
It wasn’t all negative, though. Visa’s series of real-time congratulatory commercials for medalists were quite popular. Also, several athletes had their victory celebrations at McDonald’s after winning their medals, which was widely covered.
The primary goal of this blog series was to quickly find and report relevant data . To this end Newsdesk performed very well.
We built searches beforehand for each top sponsor and included variations on their brand names (e.g. Coca-Cola and Coke). The search results automatically fed into dynamic charts, which helped us visualize the leaders for the previous day. Creating these searches took a little time and thought up-front, but after that it was “set it and forget it”.
Each day we used our charts to identify the day’s leaders. Then we scanned the headlines to see which topics were driving coverage. This took us just a minute or two. From there, it was simple to see trends and find single articles that typified them.
We wrote the blog posts and were done. All-in-all, it was a very quick process and easily repeatable every day.
This is something you could do for your own blog. Tell us in the comments if you would like someone to show you how.
We are continuing a series of blog posts where we use Newsdesk to research corporate sponsorship for the 2012 Olympic Games. Today we are looking at non-sponsors and how they also benefit from the games.
There is a growing backlash against the International Olympic Committee and their chosen corporate sponsors. The IOC has locked down the Olympic Village and the surrounding area in order to prevent unauthorized sponsors from getting publicity. Looking back to the Atlanta Games, you might see why:
The classic case of “ambush marketing” was in Atlanta, Georgia for the 1996 Summer Games. Nike plastered the city with billboards and handed out Nike flags for attendees to wave at the games. When all was said and done, many people thought Nike was the official sponsor, when in fact, it was Reebok.
We’ve already seen how the choice to exclude all credit cards except Visa backfired at Wembley Stadium, when the system went down and caused long lines and unhappy spectators. Now the story of the day is the ominous-sounding and 18 page long Rule 40, which does not allow Olympic athletes to appear in advertising during the Olympics. Writes BrandChannel:
Beats, the headphones brand of musician Dr. Dre, set up a special brand center inside the a [sic] private club and invited athletes to get a free pair. Soon, Beats products were showing up on TV on Olympians heads as they amped themselves up for competition. One British soccer team member even Tweeted “Loving my new GB Beats by Dre #TeamGB #Beats.” Well, the IOC wasn’t going to let that fly. The IOC immediately warned the British contingent to knock it off. If the athletes wanted to listen to music pre-game, the IOC noted that “Olympians were welcome to wear Panasonic headphones.”
Uniforms and equipment are not the only place logos and slogans are coming under scrutiny. German gymnast Marcel Nguyen has brought special sweat-proof makeup to apply to his chest to cover tattoos. US star runner and the “Brad Pitt of track,” Nick Symmonds, has been forced to run with tape on his shoulder covering a temporary tattoo advertising the Twitter handle of Hanson Dodge Creative, a Milwaukee ad agency with which he has a one-year sponsorship deal.
Nike is also turning their lack of Olympic sponsorship into a plus, portraying themselves on the side of the little guy. Take this commercial, for example, set in London, OH (home of the cheapest gas between Dayton and Columbus):
How is it possible to strike a balance between protecting the value of an Olympic sponsorship with respecting the individual athletes and their sponsors?
We are continuingour coverage of the Olympics using Newsdesk to understand how the top Olympic sponsors at the London Games are benefiting from their advertising dollars and pounds.
The majority of our focus has been on how commercials or negative publicity have been resyndicated and have contributed to the coverage of the top 11 Olympic Sponsors. Proctor & Gamble became a bronze medalist yesterday by a different method.
Tonight at the P&G Family Home dads of Team USA were saluted with a guest appearance by Tyson Chandler, a center for the U.S. basketball team and a father of three. Chandler talked about how his grandfather helped him become the man he is today.
P&G helped Canadian athletes remember that they are not alone as they compete for the gold:
At the mid-way mark of the Olympics, Canadian Olympian and Secret brand ambassador Clara Hughes, along with Pantene brand ambassador Annamay Pierse today joined Procter & Gamble at Canada Olympic House in London for a “Home Away from Home” celebration. Hughes and Pierse spoke to fellow Canadian athletes and their families about the impact family support has had on their careers, and guests were treated to a surprise video of heartfelt messages from family, friends and fans back home. Classic Canadian treats, like poutine with a British twist, were on the menu.
Proctor & Gamble has also benefited from housing the families of athletes by being the site of interviews:
“When Dana didn’t qualify for the Beijing Olympics it was so disappointing but we all learnt from every disappointment and every injury,” Vollmer told Reuters at the P&G House, a centre set up in London for athletes’ families.
The other Top Finishers today were Visa and Coke, with Gold and Silver respectively.
What do you think of P&G’s family-centric approach to sponsorship? They seem to have dodged much of the negative publicity endured by the other top sponsors. Will this continue?
Since the Olympics kicked off on July 27th, we have been usingNewsdesk to track the news coverage of the Big 11 corporate sponsors to see who is getting the most coverage for their money. Today we discuss “News Monitoring: Important and Illuminating, but What’s Next?”.
Monitoring media coverage volume, market, source, etc… is part of a larger process of determining the value of marketing campaigns. More coverage can be great, but does it contribute to the bottom line?
The Motley Fool weighs in with a somewhat pessimistic view of the value of Olympic sponsorship. They give several reasons:
The Games are dominating media coverage today, but that will change shortly.
Chief executives love the pomp and circumstance, but it’s unclear whether shareholders really benefit from their investment.
For the next couple weeks, the Olympics will dominate our airwaves and brainwaves. Come September, though, the presidential election will be back in the spotlight.
Cost-benefit analysis may not bear out the wisdom of sponsorship:
Economist Alexander Molchanov found that expensive sponsorship bids erase almost all the benefit for Olympic partners. In other words, corporations are spending so much money winning sponsorships that they can’t benefit financially from the extra exposure. Perhaps companies like Lenovo (OTC: LNVGY.PK) and Eastman Kodak, which both bowed out in 2010, realized something that Coca-Cola and McDonald’s have not.
Sponsors may actually be helping their competition.
After the 1994 Winter Olympics, a team of researchers conducted a survey to find out if the average Joe knew who sponsored the Olympics that year. A mere 37% of respondents correctly identified McDonald’s and only 18% ID’d Coca-Cola. More astonishing, though, is that 57% incorrectly believed that Wendy’s (Nasdaq: WEN) was a sponsor and 7.5% thought that PepsiCo (NYSE: PEP) was doling out the drinks.
Do you think that the sponsors are getting their money’s worth out at the London Games?
Spending categories that experienced the greatest activity include “Services” (US$133.7 million) – including items such as shoe and jewelry repair and spas; “Entertainment” (US$95.5 million) – including theater tickets and other attractions; “Airlines” (US$82.9 million); “Other Retailers” (US$71.8 million) – including bike shops, book stores, antique shops, and drug stores and more; and “Hotels” (US$69.3 million).
Top Ten Contributors to Spend on Visa Accounts by Country/Territory During Week One of the Games (Throughout the United Kingdom)
Ranking
Country/Territory
Total Spend (USD)
% of Total
1
United States
$85.5 million
12%
2
Japan
$50.9 million
7%
3
France
$41.5 million
6%
4
Italy
$39.5 million
6%
5
Australia
$35.3 million
5%
6
Republic of Ireland
$32.4 million
5%
7
Spain
$31.1 million
4%
8
Germany
$30.9 million
4%
9
Canada
$24.1 million
3%
10
Sweden
$23.4 million
3%
The top 10 contributing countries accounted for 57 per cent of the total amount spent on Visa accounts in the United Kingdom during this time period.
This story has been widely distributed. Combined with another successful real-time congratulatory commercial, this lead to Visa having the largest news coverage of the Top Olympic sponsors.
The Medalists for yesterday are:
Gold: Visa
Silver: Coke
Bronze: McDonald’s
Will Visa, Coke, and McDonald’s continue to dominate the news coverage, or will another sponsor take the spotlight week 2? Check back Monday !
This week we have been exploringhow the top Olympic sponsors having been benefiting from their advertising budget using Newsdesk.
Yesterday, McDonald’s came out on top again with the lion’s share of Olympic coverage. Conor Dwyer and Ricky Berens, 2 Gold medalists from the US men’s relay swim team, made McDonald’s their go-to restaurant after their victory:
Swimmers normally eat very healthy stuff, Dwyer said, but a gold medal hanging around your neck leads you to venture into new caloric neighborhoods.
Dwyer ordered a Quarter Pounder, two six-piece chicken nuggets, french fries and a McFlurry ice cream sundae. Berens, according to his Twitter photo, went even bigger: Two Quarter Pounders, a Big Mac, a six-piece nugget order, two french fries and a McFlurry.
Adding to McDonald’s Olympic coverage in the Canadian media was the story of Brittany Rogers and the national gymnastics team placing 5th, their best finish ever. Brittany’s mother, Gina, wrote about the story which was re-syndicated across Canada:
After the competition, the team was whisked away in a CTV van taking them straight to the TV London studios. There, they all sat on the white couch and had a spotlight interview. From there, they quickly wolfed down a McDonalds salad as a 10:00 p.m. dinner, and were taken to the Canada House to finally celebrate with their family and friends.
The top sponsors for the day were:
Gold: McDonald’s
Silver: Visa
Bronze: Coke
Honorable Mention: Panasonic
Coke and Panasonic were neck-and-neck, but the soft drink giant’s numbers were just a bit higher.
Will going to McDonald’s after a victory catch on in popular culture?
After tallying yesterday’s news coverage, the results are in:
Gold: McDonald’s
Silver: Coke
Bronze: Visa
McDonald’s had the most coverage, driven largely by their being the official restaurant of the Olympics. All 3 of today’s medalist received negative coverage due to continuing public outcry over their monopolistic sponsorship agreements.
This week we have been exploringhow the top Olympic sponsors having been benefiting from their advertising budget. As a change of pace, today we’ll be looking at how Moreover Technologies is powering coverage of the Olympics through the BBC website.
The British Broadcasting Corporation(BBC) has some of the best Olympic coverage in the world and Moreover Technologies, Newsdesk and Search Engine Toolkit, help provide value to the BBC visitors.
There are 3 levels of Olympic coverage offered through the BBC website:
Countries
Every country has their own news page, listing key facts, records, medal counts, and more. The “Around the Web” news is powered by Moreover and is a part of every country’s page.
Just like countries, each sport being showcased in the Olympics has its own dedicated page. Moreover’s tools allow the “Around the Web” section to be populated with relevant news with minimal manual intervention.
Top individual Olympians also have their own pages supported by Moreover’s news. Hundreds of pages at www.BBC.co.uk showcase how information can be automatically displayed using a robust taxonomy to create value for visitors.
We are continuingour coverage of the Olympics using Newsdesk to understand how the top Olympic sponsors at the London Games are benefiting from their advertising dollars and pounds.
Visa is hoping that there is no such thing as bad publicity after a system malfunction left spectators unable to pay with their Visa cards at Wembley Stadium. Unfortunately, as a condition of their sponsorship, Visa is the only accepted credit card at the 2012 Olympics, leading to long lines for concessions and disgruntled visitors.
This mishap was the main feature on dozens of sites and gained a passing mention in many more.
[Visa] introduced a new congratulatory commercial celebrating Emilie Heyman’s bronze medal performance in women’s synchronized 3-metre springboard at the London 2012 Olympic Games. The spot, entitled “Congratulations Emilie,” aired on Canada’s Olympic Broadcast Media Consortium and features an image of Emilie on the podium in London.
Visa had more coverage than Coke and GE combined.
Our medalists for most news coverage on the 30th of July are:
Gold: Visa
Silver: Coke
Bronze: GE
After taking Bronze over the weekend, Samsung did not place in the top 3 today and GE won their first medal.
What is your opinion about Visa’s sponsorship? Even with the troubles at Wembley, was it still a good move to have a monopoly on payments at the games? Tell us in the comments!
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We built searches beforehand for each top sponsor and included variations on their brand names (e.g. Coca-Cola and Coke). The search results automatically fed into dynamic charts, which helped us visualize the leaders for the previous day. Creating these searches took a little time and thought up-front, but after that it was “set it and forget it”.
Yesterday it was announced that visitors at the London Games have spent almost 
