Bringing Sailing to the Masses - No Rules.

An Extreme 40 catamaran flat out is a spectacular sight. Even powerboats struggle to keep up with these racing machines and when things go wrong, they go wrong in a big, spectacular way. Put them in confined spaces in the middle of the city and you have a recipe for a sports entertainment property that satisfies the needs of sponsors, spectators and media alike.

The iShares Cup has broken out of the sailing press in 2007 and thanks to big names like Ben Ainslie, has started to appear on the radar of non-sailing sports fans.

Yachtsponsorship.com has published an interview with OC Events boss, Mark Turner about why throwing away the rulebook has created such a compelling product.

Nationwide Activate NASCAR Sponsorship

At Bristol last weekend, Nationwide, together with Nationwide Series team owner Kevin Harvick, launched its Switch and Save up to $500 campaign, with the grand prize an “Ultimate NASCAR Experience.”

“One of the things that Nationwide wanted to do when we came into the sport was to look for ways to engage the fan and to make this series as interesting or more interesting than it was in the past,” Aman said. “This is a way for the fan to engage in the Nationwide Series and also to get a much better price for their insurance.”

Fans can call (877) NW-SERIES (877-697-3743) and request a quote on their car insurance, as well as register for the grand prize drawing. By making the switch to Nationwide, fans can also save up to $500 on their car insurance. Fans can also visit www.nationwide.com/switch and do the same.

“This sweepstakes offers race fans the opportunity to be trackside at Las Vegas, in a fully loaded Camping World RV and spend some time with Kevin during the weekend,” Aman said.

“To come in and see all the activation that has been done, I’m proud to be part of the new campaign,” Harvick said. “It’s going to be a lot of fun to mingle with the winners at Las Vegas.”

For Aman, this first significant foray into activating Nationwide’s sponsorship entitlement has gone well.

“Nationwide is very pleased,” he said. “The coverage that Nationwide and the series has been receiving has been excellent. Our media partners have done a great job changing the name of the series to Nationwide and helping us say a little bit about why Nationwide got into the sport. Overall, we’re very excited about where we are right now.”

Aman said that Nationwide has run sweepstakes surrounding its sponsorship of the Nationwide golf tour, but this is the first for NASCAR. As such, response to this promotion will go a long way toward determining what kind of support the company has among NASCAR fans.

“This year, having this level of sponsorship, we’re feeling our way through to see what kind of response we can get with a three-month promotion, using a highly visible, well-respected driver as part of our effort,” Aman said. “We’re looking for 50,000 to 100,000 people to enroll in the sweepstakes and a number of them deciding that we should be their insurance provider.”

Aman said that there had been some surprises in his company’s first year of series sponsorship, but none that were really big.

“Having dealt with Speedway Motorsports for the past eight years, there weren’t really any surprises,” he said. “What has been a surprise is, I think, the interest of the team owners and team members wanting to get to know us, learning what Nationwide was about and letting us know about the sport they love and what they want to see changed in that sport.”

Harvick echoed Aman’s comments.

“When they came in, everything had kind of happened last-minute, and they were very anxious to get everything activated and get their name out there,” he said. “As we’ve gone on, the whole Nationwide team has been very active, asked a lot of questions of the teams about what we thought of the sport, working with NASCAR and where the series is going and what the series is all about. Once they got their feet on the ground, they’ve been very involved with the teams going forward.”

Chinese Sponsors Reviewed

Recognizing a gap in studies of Olympic marketing ahead of the 2008 Games, Asian marketing agency R3 and Chinese media research firm CSM Media Research launched an independent tracking and research division. Its quarterly studies have shed light on which Olympic sponsors are winning and losing on the ground in China. R3 Principal Greg Paull, who’s leading those studies, sat down with SportsBusiness Journal staff writer Tripp Mickle to talk about the results.

Which one of the TOP programs have been the most successful?
Paull: I think, for Coke, the torch relay has been a phenomenal success. Look at sampling. No one knew in China that Coke had to be cold. So what have they done for the torch relay? They’ve served up 100 million Cokes to people - one by one through 112 cities. That discipline is going to completely change the way Coke goes to market in China, and it wouldn’t have happened without the Olympics.

Any others that stand out?
Paull: J&J did a great setup in primary schools to teach them about the Olympics. You would expect the government to do that, but J&J came up with the training tools, the posters, the stickers and all of that stuff. They went into 400,000 schools across China to teach them about the Olympics with J&J-branded materials.

Who is winning the sneaker war category here on the ground among Nike, Adidas and Li Ning?
Paull: Our view is that if Adidas did not sponsor the Olympics, they would have been in a lot of trouble because Nike and Liu Xiang is a powerful combination together and if they had that sponsorship, they would have leveraged that. Meanwhile, Li Ning is Mr. Olympics, so if he’d had the official sponsorship he would have done a lot. Adidas did the right thing to invest because if someone else had it, they would have been struggling. They are, in fact, in first position in our study. (We have several clients in the sneaker war category and we do our study anyway regardless of our clients.)

How are some of the Chinese companies that people in the U.S. may be less familiar with doing?
Paull: A lot of local companies have done very well, better than the multinationals. Yili, Lenovo, China Mobile - all of these are in the top 10 in our studies, better than Visa, McDonald’s, J&J.

Which of those stand out most?
Paull: Yili, a local milk company, has done a great job. They’ve grabbed the right athletes like Liu Xiang and used them in a very creative way. They tried to do their own version of a torch relay. They ran a health tour that went to 100 cities around China, set up a booth and gave away samples. They also turned that into a TV show.

When the Olympics close, what will be the legacy for sponsors? Are sponsors going to be entrenched enough?
Paull: There will be winners and losers. We’re coming back in November to do the rest of our study. A lot of legacy also will be internal. The way they work will change. They’ll be better marketers as a result of it. You’re talking now about a competitive marketplace that has changed.

From Sports Business Daily

Amex US Tennis Sponsorship includes Personal TV

The Olympics aren't even over, but that doesn't mean it's not time to begin thinking about the next sports marketing event. American Express, which has backed the U.S. Open tennis tournament for the past 15 years, is once again prepped to help promote this year's event with several different efforts--including a print, outdoor and online advertising campaign and personalized programming at the event itself.

The advertising effort kicked off Thursday with out-of-home placements throughout New York City. The ads feature Venus Williams and James Blake, following the company's well-known "Are you a Cardmember?" theme.

"We know these players are well-liked and relevant to the NY area," says Jessica Igoe, director of global sponsorship marketing, tells Marketing Daily: "It's a way to connect with our customers. For us, it gives us a way to stop people in their tracks and say that's cool to look at, and then it highlights the benefits that fans and card members can get on-site."

Among other on-site amenities, the company will provide free personal televisions that American Express cardholders can borrow for a day at the Arthur Ashe Stadium and USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Grounds. Via the televisions, spectators can watch matches on all the courts, as well as access draws, live scoring and player bios.

Programming on the sets will also include a channel with Williams, Blake and Billie Jean King sharing their beloved moments of the tournament. Content for that channel will be updated with other players sharing their memories throughout the tournament, Igoe says. "The TVs will have these unique moments as well as be a guide to the Open," Igoe says. "Everything we do on-site is to enhance the fan experience. It's to make the experience better. "

For non-cardholders and those who are not in New York for the tournament, the company is also sponsoring Web programming on the USOpen.org site, which will feature hourly updates from the Open, as well as other athletes sharing their memories of the U.S. Open.

From: Media Post's Marketing Daily

Puma backs 'Bolt' to beat big boys.

Puma is watching its sales to go up another notch as the ‘Lightning’ Bolt wins the men’s 200-metre final in Beijing’s Bird’s Nest stadium this morning.

The German manufacturer’s sneaker sales were reported by the Financial Times to have increased by more than two million pairs just one hour after the world’s fastest man held up his Theseus II spikes before the flashing cameras after his perfect run.

“There definitely has been an increase in awareness,” said store manager Margaux Brown. “A lot more people are coming in, a lot more people are calling us. I even received a call from a lady in England a while ago.”

Puma’s investment might well have been worth the wait. The sports gear manufacturer has been a long-time sponsor of Jamaican athletes, claiming among its first, Jamaica’s sprint queen Merlene Ottey and double silver medallist Juliet Cuthbert in the 1990s. It has, however, only been a sponsor of the Jamaican track team since 2002.

Puma arrived in Beijing nowhere near rivals Nike and Adidas in terms of market value and sales, according to the Financial Times, trailing in the number of Olympic athletes contracted to wear its apparel, and behind in the race for a share of the lucrative Chinese market.

But Puma came out the star in the most anticipated showdown in the Olympics, and probably the most watched sporting event this year, when the Puma-clad Bolt defeated Nike-signed Asafa Powell. World champion Tyson Gay, signed to Adidas, failed to make it to the final.

Manchester United sign Saudi Sponsorship Deal

Saudi Telecom Co (STC) is set to sign a marketing deal with football club Manchester United that could be worth $18.6 million (9.3 million pounds), a spokesman said, its first-ever deal with a non-Saudi football club.

Football is a favoured pastime in the Middle East and telecom firms, including Emirates Telecommunications Corp, are often lead sponsors of sporting events.

STC has spent more than $6 billion in foreign expansion since June 2007 as it faces greater competition in its home market, where securing sponsorship deals with local football clubs helps telecom companies retain customers in a saturated market.

"We are at Manchester now. We will have a press conference tomorrow and the deal will be announced today during a Manchester United game," STC spokesman Mohamed al-Faraj told Reuters on Sunday.

The Sunday Times reported on Sunday that the five-year deal would grant STC rights to use Manchester United's logo and imagery in its marketing in Saudi Arabia.

STC would be able to offer its subscribers video clips of match highlights, the paper said.

"The arrangement is said to be one of the biggest non-shirt sponsorship deals in British football," the Times said.

STC competes in Saudi Arabia with Etihad Etisalat (Mobily) and Zain Saudi Arabia. The incumbent operator has paid $200 million for five-year sponsorship agreements with three Saudi clubs.

Its rival Mobily signed a 200-million-riyal (28.5 million pounds) sports-marketing deal with Saudi club al-Hilal last year -- then described as the Middle East's largest ever deal of its kind.

STC's first foreign acquisition was of a 25 percent stake in Malaysia's Maxis for $3 billion, opening markets in India, Indonesia and Malaysia.

Many leading names in the world of football finance, including Manchester United, have sought to develop strong ties in various Asian countries in recent years, through sponsorship, tours and links with local clubs.

UK's Golden Girl Set for Sponsorship Success

From the Guardian

Rebecca Adlington's double gold medal success will ensure her lucrative earnings from sponsorship and endorsement deals, with her potential boosted by the fact the Olympics are coming to London next, say experts.

Kevin Roberts, editorial director of sports-industry analysts Sport Business Group, said Adlington's success could not have been better timed. 'I don't think any British athletes since Coe and Ovett have had the same platform as these guys have as we build up to 2012,' he said. 'The coincidence of it being London's Games next means there is an enormous spotlight on these people.'

He added that sponsors of the 2012 Games would all be looking to sign up British Olympians as their ambassadors, and that Adlington was in pole position. 'She appears to be an extremely engaging and articulate person,' he said. 'And those are the qualities sponsors look for in a really big way. It's not just a question of being a winner in the pool, or on the pitch. The people who will really make money are those that have sporting prowess and a personality to match. So she has got more opportunity than any previous generations of swimmers have had.'