We scour the digi-verse every month to bring you the latest trends in the industry! This February, all eyes were on the Winter Games and the stiff competition on the slopes was matched by some epic marketing action. But seriously, who had time to keep up with it all? Luckily, we're here to answer all of your Sochi marketing questions!

1. TheBrandingGames:
Lessons in Sports
Marketing from the
2014 Sochi Olympics

2. MARKETING AT SOCHI
All eyes are on Sochi. Unlike a major sporting event like the Super
Bowl however; the games are imbued with a multitude of social
and political agendas, making sponsorship a risky move.
On one hand, the opportunity to gain immense visibility, cultivate
partnerships with potential influencers and athletes, sell product
and possibly conjure up a halo-effect for your brand are compel-
ling reasons to bite the sponsorship bullet. However, catering to
a global audience in a politically volatile climate comes with a
whole host of complications:
Lessons in Sports Marketing
from the 2014 Sochi Olympics

3. Lessons in Sports Marketing
from the 2014 Sochi Olympics
2014 WORLDWIDE OLYMPIC PARTNERS 2014 NATIONAL OLYMPIC PARTNERS
LOW ASSOCIATION:
10 of the 15 brands most associated with the winter games were not sponsors (Global
Language Monitor study), meaning that the benefit of taking on the sponsor title was
not even remotely worth the cost.
1.

4. Lessons in Sports Marketing
from the 2014 Sochi Olympics
2.
The cost for companies like McDonalds and
Coca-Cola was having their insignia emblazoned
on officials who represent a government and poli-
cies a large section of their consumers abhor.
These heavily Millennial-dependent brands might
have inadvertently cast the devil-effect on their
brand by visually aligning with a government that
promotes in their opinion, an archaic view on love.
THE DEVIL EFFECT:

5. Lessons in Sports Marketing
from the 2014 Sochi Olympics
These aren’t brands trying to build aware-
ness and recognition, they’re trying to
convey their personality and define them-
selves on the global stage. They’re trying
to speak to their consumers and position
themselves in a positive light.
ANY PRESS
IS NOT GOOD PRESS:
3.

6. As the recent upswing in emotional brand messaging and CSR-themed campaigns demon-
strates, consumers have begun to expect brands to be the vanguards of moral standards.
Sochi sponsors were either dragged through the mud for sponsoring the games or directly
challenged to take a stand.
Brands have often tried to avoid taking polarizing stances in order to prevent consumer
alienation. However, what Sochi has illustrated is that brands cannot afford to stay mum
when convenient anymore. Contributing to the public narrative and remaining relevant are
two essential pillars of brand management today. Companies can’t pipe in when it works for
them and throw up their hands and bleat a feeble “no comment” when it doesn’t. It makes
them seem inauthentic, opportunistic and hollow. If you’re stepping into murky waters, know
exactly where you’re standing.
Lessons in Sports Marketing
from the 2014 Sochi Olympics
4. FORCED TO TAKE A STAND

7. Brands can generally tailor campaigns to spe-
cific cultures and markets, but coming up with
one unified voice that satisfies all, is near im-
possible. Thus, while the international stage
affords visibility, it also compounds the prob-
lem for brands trying to walk the middle path.
GLOBAL AUDIENCE5.
Lessons in Sports Marketing
from the 2014 Sochi Olympics

8. The winter games have a distinctly youthful, trendy
element to them. This was the Millennial marketing
pot of gold. However, the decidedly archaic stance
of the Russian government made it difficult for
sponsors to effectively engage young viewers.
Lessons in Sports Marketing
from the 2014 Sochi Olympics
YOUNG MARKET6.

9. Lessons in Sports Marketing
from the 2014 Sochi Olympics
Hashtags in campaigns drive engagement. Brands
reap the benefits of their consumers doing a lot of
their work for them by way of increasing their earned
media, but this comes at a cost. Brand-consumer
communication today is defined by mutual conversa-
tion rather than a brand directed monologue. The di-
rection a brand wants its campaign to take is not
necessarily the direction it ends up taking. Aside
from the problem of spammers and bots hijacking
hashtags, the #CheersToSochi debacle demonstrates
that hashtags might actually be a dangerous game
for brands to play.
BEWARE OF THE HASHTAG7.

10. Lessons in Sports Marketing
from the 2014 Sochi Olympics
For companies like McDonalds, Coca-Cola and sponsoring the games was an exercise in
tying their own hands. Their extremely diverse cultural and geographic consumer bases pre-
vents them from taking a stance reflective of just one of the many markets they cater to, at
the risk of alienating the others. P&G, (Russia’s biggest advertisers according to the Wall
Street Journal), similarly, couldn’t have possibly taken a brazen stance on the issue without
taking a financial hit.
WHO MISSED THE PODIUM?

11. The company took a major hit for not taking a stand. Embracing an sponsorship also implicat-
ed Coca-Cola in the detention of a gay rights protestor, putting its logo at the receiving end of
LGBT activist angst. Aside from falling prey to many of the above situational factors, Coca-
Cola also committed a major tech blunder. Its “Customize Your Coke” interactive campaign did
not allow bottles to bear the word “Gay” on them.
COCA-COLA
SOCHI OLYMPICS 2014

12. #CHEERSTOSOCHI
Probably one of the most hilarious hashtag hijackings in
recent times, McDonalds’ innocuous “CheersToSochi” hashtag
became an irony-laden battle cry for human rights activists
protesting major brands’ sponsorship of the games. The com-
pany completely lost control of the narrative and floundered
when confronted with this surprising twist.
MCDONALDS
SOCHI OLYMPICS 2014

13. WHO TOOK HOME
THE GOLD?
SOCHI OLYMPICS 2014

14. Chobani is a prime example of a brand that controlled and redi-
rected the narrative in its favor when confronted with controver-
sy and uncertainty. The Russian government’s reluctance to allow
5,000 containers of Chobani across its border could have spelled
disaster for the brand looking to gain visibility among the elite
Sochi attendees. But instead, Chobani actually benefited from
the snafu.
Not only did Senator Schumer come out in support of the
brand, but team USA member and half-pipe skier Aaron
Blunck’s sound bite stamped the brand and its product
with a distinct sense of Americana. He spoke about the
importance of “food from home” and said “having the yogurt
there, that helps you, gives you protein, gives you nutrition." The
brand also racked up some good CSR karma by donating the
5,000 containers to charity. Its Sochi-themed rainbow stacked
ad (reminiscent of Oreo’s rainbow campaign) was subtle and
stood on the right side of the debate.
CHOBANI
SOCHI OLYMPICS 2014

15. While its campaign wasn’t exactly Sochi-themed, Chevrolet entered the dialogue right when it
needed to. The company capitalized on its ability to take a brazen stand (given its non-associa-
tion with the actual event) and showed up the mega-brands who refused to put their weight
behind the LGBT cause.
CHEVROLET
SOCHI OLYMPICS 2014

16. Another brand that did extremely well for itself outside the sponsorship umbrella, American
Apparel, had one of the most effective, revenue and brand-boosting campaigns this season.
The company collaborated with various social activist groups to market its line of “Principle
6” themed clothing, which indirectly critiques the Olympic Committee’s abandonment of its
founding values. The campaign does not make any direct reference to Sochi, but proceeds
from the line will be used to support LGBT groups in Russia. The online video already has
almost one and half million views.
Lessons in Sports Marketing
from the 2014 Sochi Olympics
The major winners then, were clearly the non-spon-
sors. Their campaigns and their ability to present a
unified stance were not hampered by many of the sit-
uational factors that bigger brands like Coca-Cola
and McDonalds had to contend with. They piped into
the conversation at the right time without risking a
potential brandisaster. One notable exception is P&G.
AMERICAN APPAREL

17. Despite its overall brand image facing a lot of the same
problems that its fellow sponsors did, P&G’s campaign
itself was spot on. The company’s “Pick Them Back Up”
spot, a repurposed version of its super-successful
“Thank You Mom” London Olympics campaign has
garnered over 18 million YouTube views.
By putting the human story front and center and draw-
ing from the emotional reservoir that the mother-child
bond represents, P&G played it smart. Russia’s biggest
Television advertiser stayed conspicuously low-key on
the LGBT controversy, but fortunately for the company,
its brand didn’t take as hard a beating as Coca-Cola and
McDonalds. Perhaps this has something to do with the
fact that its consumer base isn’t as Millennial-populated.
Lessons in Sports Marketing
from the 2014 Sochi Olympics
P&G

18. The last mega sporting event that caught brands’ attention was the Super Bowl. Despite
both events being sport-centric and commanding massive viewership, marketing at Sochi is
significantly different from catering to the Super Bowl crowd. A whopping 54-57% of the
Super Bowl audience tunes in as much or more for the ads than for the game. The ads are an
extension of the entertainment. Showy, hilarious spots often featuring celebrity endorsers
were not uncommon at the big game. At Sochi, however, campaigns embodied a more
somber sentiment.
While entertainment is what gets the American market to engage with a brand, it is not nec-
essarily what motivates consumers in other markets around the globe. Thus, campaigns
needed to maintain a degree of versatility and cross-cultural relevance, as opposed to focus-
ing on mere memorability.
The games have also come to represent the spirit of global cooperation, the honor of com-
petitive sport and the spirit of hard work and success. As a result, campaigns tended to
focus on sentiment rather than sensationalism.
HOW IS MARKETING AT SOCHI DIFFERENT?
Lessons in Sports Marketing
from the 2014 Sochi Olympics

19. Some of the Sochi boarding action just hit the VG
headquarters! Our friends and 500 Startups batch
mates at ZBoard shipped us a custom board this
month. Making a Snapple-run to the fridge or a
mid-afternoon trip to the ping-pong table has never
been this fun!
Aside from zipping around the MassChallenge head-
quarters on our swanky new toy, we’re speeding into
2014 having signed 11 Fortune 500 brands, and hit a
1,227 % YOY growth rate.
Lessons in Sports Marketing
from the 2014 Sochi Olympics
WHAT’S UP AT VIRALGAINS