Multinationals kick off Olympic ad bonanza

BEIJING: Nike, PCCW, Coca-Cola and McDonalds are among the first companies to piggyback on Beijing's successful Olympic bid in their advertising. Their campaigns mark the beginning of the expected surge in marketing activity in the long lead-up to the games. Coca-Cola produced a new gold can to mark the win, distributing it to retailers around the PRC within hours of the announcement. McDonalds used the cans as part of a special Olympic meal, sold for RMB20.08 (US$2.43), the price referring to 2008, when the games will be staged. The promotion was advertised with a poster campaign featuring the number "2008" written upside down, signifying in Chinese that the Olympics were on their way to China in that year. Hong Kong's telecommunications provider PCCW's "Dreams of 1.2 Billion" TV campaign, by McCann Erickson Guangming, positioned the company as sharing Beijing's Olympic dream. PCCW's campaign appeared on CNN, CNBC and the Discovery Channel thoughout Asia, Europe and North America. Nike created a poster campaign, featuring an image of Mao Tse Tung smiling. The Olympic marketing rollercoaster started with a textbook piece of communications - the Beijing bid itself. The city won by a landslide, polling 56 votes, against 22 for its nearest rival Toronto, despite widespread reservations from International Olympic Committee members about human rights and democracy issues such as China's treatment of Falun Gong members and Tibet. Ad agencies predicted that the campaigns are the start of an advertising and branding frenzy that will grow the Chinese market, injecting more sophistication into it. Multinationals will be training their full armoury of branding weapons on the Chinese consumer, with General Motors reported to have signed up as the first official sponsor of the games. They will also allow local category leaders to strengthen their positions, said John Woodward, regional planning director of Leo Burnett, which produced the Coca-Cola and McDonald's work. "In the past, the Olympics has tended to offer an opportunity for strong local brands to cement a dominance locally, and become regional and global brands," said Woodward. "It happened with the Seoul Olympics, with companies like Samsung and the country's reputation for technological excellence. There's an opportunity for the fledgling leaders of fragmented categories in China to solidify their advantage. "The challenge for local brands is to learn how to be an Olympic sponsor. Everybody will do it - there will be 500 brands that will manage to be associated with the games in some way. "People will become really bored, and brands will have to show that they add something, rather than just putting their name next to the games."

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