Loving the 2012 London Summer Olympics, TDS Torch Trivia Sweeps and Nike stealing some Gold

By Guest Blogger, Donna DeClemente, Donna's Promo Talk

With the Games of the 2012 London Summer Olympics still in full swing this week, it's just natural for me to continue writing about them. I've been watching the tapped events every night in prime time and some live during the day and loving it all. Over the weekend I had the TV turned on to NBC Olympics that was showing a field hockey event while my iPad was on the kitchen counter just underneath the TV streaming live the beach volleyball game that gave Misty May and Kerri Walsh another win. Today the two champions go for the Gold against the younger USA team. This game I want to try and follow live which starts at 4pm ET today.

According to some stats that were released earlier this week, NBC is doing very well with capturing viewers through the live video streams. Those using the NBC Olympics Live Extra app, like me, have totaled 7.0 million users (I'm so glad I bought my iPad before the Games started). NBC says 6.2 million phone/tablet devices have been verified for the games. Five Olympic events had over 1 million live streams which were last Tuesday’s women’s gymnastics team gold medal final with nearly 1.5 million. Last Thursday night two swimming events pulled over 1 million, one when Michael Phelps won the gold in the men’s 200 individual medley with 1.2 million streams. All-around U.S. gold medal gymnastics winner Gabby Douglas had almost 1.1 million streams.

I've been writing about some of the marketing efforts from the official Olympic sponsors that have launched various campaigns around the games. There has also been, as there always is, a huge amount of advertising and marketing from those who are not sponsors, otherwise known as Ambush Marketing.

Nike, who is not an official Olympic sponsor, has recently released a new TV ad that promotes athletes in towns around the world named “London". They have not actually stated the words "2012 London Olympics", but of course with the timing you can’t avoid linking the brand to the actual events. Adidas paid around $60 million for their official Olympic brand sportswear category partnership. The Nike "Find Your Greatness" ad now has almost 4.5 million views on their YouTube channel! So is this great marketing or ambush marketing?

I actually just assisted one of our clients with running a sweepstakes campaign on their Facebook page that could fall into this category. TDS Telecommunications is a telcom provider offering Internet, TV and phone services in 31 states, so if you are a customer of theirs you can stream the live events. They are running the TDS Torch Trivia Sweepstakes now through August 12 for their Facebook fans. Each day they post a Trivia question on their Facebook page and a fan can enter the sweepstakes every day and answer the question. We are randomly drawing one winner a week, for a total of three winners who will each receive $250.

Here's today's question: "Allison Felix, who runs in the final of the women’s 200M today, is coached by a track and field legend. He has produced at least one gold medalist in track and field in every Summer Olympics since 1984. Name him."

TDS Telecom has seen over a thousand new Facebook fans since the promotion started and the page continues to gain new Likes. Many people are engaging with the page everyday, which is really the key measurement. I set this up for them again using the Shortstack App which provides a mobile friendly link that TDS has put in their daily posts, therefore enabling people to also enter from their Smartphone or Tablet. BTW, Shortstack just announced that you can now embed the same app on a website as well which is pretty cool.

I'm going to wrap up my marketing coverage of the 2012 Olympic Games today. I would like to congratulate ALL the athletes who have participated in the games. Yesterday we saw a local Western New York woman, Jenn Suhr, win the Gold in the Women's Pole Vault. It's the personal stories like Jenn's that keep us so engaged with these games. Some of the athletes, like Michael Phelps, have now become legends and some others, like Missy Franklin and Gabby Douglas, have become household names whose lives will change significantly going forward. I will miss them all and wish them the very best. Thank you for sharing your stories and lives with us all.