A Stalled Race: Olympics Advertising

Image above from Salesforce ad.

The opening ceremonies for the 2022 Winter Olympics are set to start Friday evening. That may come as a surprise to some, because the advertising buildup to the games has been so muted.

Partially, that’s because a worldwide COVID pandemic has caused the Olympics to be delayed. Recall that the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo were pushed back to 2021, so the Winter Olympics are coming just six months after the Summer Olympics wrapped.

The start of the Winter Olympics also comes right in the midst of Super Bowl preparations, adding to the discordance of the marketing preparations.

Those are among the reasons that Procter & Gamble and Coca-Cola have not yet announced their plans. For its part, Coke is expected to forgo an Olympics campaign, according to reports. 

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In part, this is because of the controversial nature of the Olympics host country, China. Activists have called on advertisers to avoid the Olympics since Beijing was announced as the host city  in 2015.

One of the few sponsors to advertise in conjunction with the Olympics is Salesforce, which has released a counterintuitive campaign urging viewers to focus on the state of the earth rather than looking to escape it. The ad, starring Matthew McConaughey, shows him in astronaut gear, but instead riding a hot-air balloon.

The ad also makes a pointed reference to the metaverse, the much-hyped phenomenon championed by Meta (nee Facebook). “So while the others look to the metaverse and Mars, let’s stay here and restore ours,” says McConaughey.

Other advertisers include Delta Airlines, Toyota and Samsung. Brands who are sponsoring the games, but still haven’t released ads, include Airbnb, Bridgestone, Panasonic and Visa.

Dan Tunna, a former Discovery marketer, told Marketing Daily that a combination of factors makes this Olympics a low-key affair for marketers.  “It's just purely due to the host nation of these particular games,” he said. “If this game was taking place in another city, without the kind of political issues that obviously China has to deal with in respect to its view by the rest of the world… I think you'd see far more activity.”

Tunna added that if COVID keeps retreating, he expects future events to be more engaged. “You've got the World Cup coming up in Qatar. So, I expect that brands will ramp up activity around that event. But also there's other major sporting events that are happening in the remainder of 2022 -- and then looking ahead into 2023, as well.”

"Advertisers have numerous reasons to be cautious about this year's Olympics. Ratings have been declining, which reduces incentive to buy ads. The Super Bowl is coming soon, and due to the delay of Tokyo Olympics, there have been numerous high profile sporting events quite close to the winter Olympics," eMarketer senior analyst Ross Benes said. “Many advertisers who want to spend a ton of money to launch splashy campaigns around sporting events have already done so with the Tokyo Olympics and Super Bowl, which leaves less interest for the Beijing Olympics.”

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