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Ambush Marketing -- A Threat to Corporate Sponsorship

October 15, 1996 | Tony Meenaghan | Marketing

While few of us can miss the evidence of company sponsorship at sports events like the Olympics or World Cup Soccer, how many can recognize which were the legitimate sponsors and which were competitors "ambushing" the effectiveness of the sponsor's message? Meenaghan traces the recent growth in corporate sponsorship of various sporting events as a marketing tool and elaborates on some of the complexities of gaining sponsorship rights. He reflects on some of the benefits that accrue to the sponsor, such as audience perceptions of patriotism, adventure, and quality.

Those benefits may be diluted, however, by ambush marketers that associate with major events without securing rights. For example, in the 1984 Olympics, Fuji was the worldwide sponsor, but Kodak became a sponsor of the ABC television broadcasts and the official film of the U.S. track team, thereby directing attention away from Fuji. Other examples abound, as ambushers create confusion in consumers' minds about who the "official" sponsor really is.

Meenaghan addresses the legality and ethics of ambushing. Frequently, ambushers do nothing illegal and do not use official logos or trademarks, but merely imply association with an event. Sponsors' only recourse may be to purchase all the rights to an event, including broadcast rights. Ethical issues are harder to define; does using an image of downhill skiing, for instance, imply sponsorship of the Winter Olympics? Meenaghan offers strategies for protecting against ambushers, particularly on the part of event owners. The International Olympic Committee's anti-ambush program protects all emblems, marks, and symbols and enjoins any city sponsoring the event to protect those symbols as well. In the end, awareness of the possibilities of ambushing is probably the sponsor's best protection.

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