Individual athletes are having a particularly tough time during the economic slump – last week French pole vaulter Roman Mesnil resorted to running naked through the streets of Paris to raise his profile after losing his Nike sponsorship. Karim Bashir of Catch Sport Ltd appeals to sponsors to begin the sports star creation process by putting athletes at the centre of sponsorship campaigns. Catch Sport provides a free online portal introducing athletes to sponsors and providing British Athletes Commission-approved contracts for those who agree deals.
Just under 1,500 Lottery Funded athletes have put their “real” lives on hold to train full time in an attempt to win Olympic medals in 2012 and beyond. How many can you name?
Not many, right? There’s nothing wrong with that until you ask the question, “Why?” Why, for example, did few know of Rebecca Adlington outside the swimming world before the Beijing Olympics?
There are a couple of easy answers to this question. Firstly, swimming, along with most other Olympic and Paralympic sports, gets very little media coverage. Secondly, the general public aren’t drawn to Olympic/Paralympic athletes unless they do something spectacular on the field of play – like Sir Steve Redgrave’s five Olympic golds, Dame Kelly Holmes’s double, Chris Hoy’s triple – or do something outside their sport that captures the public imagination – like James Cracknell rowing across the Atlantic, the French pole-vaulter running naked through the streets of Paris.
Whilst such publicity stunts may alert sponsors to the existence of athletes, it is a high risk option – there is the danger that an athlete’s bid for sponsorship could bring their sport into disrepute, something I would not like to see happening.
So how can we change this lack of recognition for our athletes?
With just over three years before the greatest sports show on earth comes to London, I believe the sports marketing industry and sponsors must act now to turn our unknown athletes into our new superstars. By financially supporting our elite athletes, sponsors provide them with the back-up and security that the working population get from their employers. This is significantly complemented by the sense of self-worth that an athlete gets from the recognition a sponsorship deal represents.
Most contracts, quite rightly, include image and branding rights along with appearances and possibly endorsement. These rights can be used by sponsors to create a public platform for our future Olympians/Paralympians and Olympic/Paralympic medallists, and in so doing increase the return on investment for the sponsor. We all know what Chris Hoy has for breakfast!
So here’s my idea for sponsors and it’s not rocket science. Make the athlete the centre of any sponsorship deal. Spend money training them so they can handle the media and are “on message”. Once that is done, promote them everywhere that you can. Provide them with the platform to become a household name.
There is simply no downside to this for a sponsor. In the worst-case scenario and the athlete does something silly then you invoke your get-out clause, à la Kellogg’s and Michael Phelps. However I believe that turning athletes into superstars is more likely to generate a higher return on a sponsor’s investment, a better training environment and standard of living for the athlete which will only contribute to better performances. Furthermore it will help to promote the unseen Olympic and Paralympic sports.
Given time this has the potential to make the national governing bodies of these sports more attractive to sponsors and move some way to plugging the well-documented £50 million shortfall in athlete funding.
So, in short, athletes: keep working hard at what you’re good at; NGBs: help all your athletes get recognition and you may get sponsorship yourself; sponsors: put your athletes at the centre of your sponsorship.
