2012 Olympics Cause Endorser Frenzy

Image Courtesy of: London2012.com

The Summer Olympics only occur once every four years, and with the 2012 Olympic Games in London just around the corner America’s highest skilled athletes are enduring their hardest of training regiments. The world will be watching as the torch is lit in late July, and advertisers are taking notice of the future marketing potential these athletes have going into the summer games.  Before the 1970's endorsing Olympic athletes was completely illegal, however to better the image and interest of the games the Olympic Committee released some guidelines for endorsers to follow and it has since been marketing gold!

With swimming being the number one sport in television ratings during the 2008 Summer Games in Beijing, Procter & Gamble signed the most decorated Olympian of all time, Michael Phelps, to a seven-figure deal to represent their Head & Shoulders shampoo brand.  He is not alone in the pool though, other swimmers have cashed in too.  44-year-old Dana Torres is in the pursuit of making her unprecedented 6^th Olympic team and will have some help with her recent partnership with Ben Gay and McDonalds to name a few.  Ryan Lochte has increased his exposure with the help of Gatorade.  Lochte is touted as the "Fastest Swimmer in the World” in Gatorade’s new ad series “Win From Within” seen below.

TaylorMade Golf Promises 17 Yards With New Campaign

Image Courtesy of: taylormadegolf.com

The newest in social marketing campaigns have struck the PGA Tour!  The latest guerrilla tactic was used by TaylorMade Golf to promote a new line of clubs called RocketBallz or RBZ for short.  In this weekend’s WGC – Cadillac Championship TaylorMade sponsored golfers were asked to wear hats with simply the number “17” on the front.

After some research on the web one could find the “17” represents the number of yards the new Rocketballz 3-Wood would gain their respective users in a golf shot over the other leading competitors.  These hats also featured the hashtag “#RBZFactor” embroidered on the side for use on Twitter and other social media outlets.  With nearly every tour pro covered from head to spike in sponsor names and logos, TaylorMade is doing what it takes creatively to separate themselves from other brands.