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4C Insights - Summer Games Impact Report

Olympics - 24 Aug 2016
   

Summer Games Week 1 Impact Report

As the Summer Games kicked off this week, the world’s attention turned to Brazil to watch the best athletes from around the world compete. Last week, we brought you a preview of the Summer Games, showing the building anticipation for more than two weeks of competitions. This week, we’ve been monitoring the moments creating the most buzz. 


The historic Men’s 4×100 relay earned the top spot for social engagement during the first week of the Games. The moment garnered over 600,000 engagements across Facebook and Twitter – over 100,000 more than the next most engaged moment. The highly-anticipated women’s Gymnastics all-around came in second, producing nearly half a million social media engagements.   

 

When it comes to social media engagements with countries participating in this year’s Games, the United States and Great Britain have received the bulk of the volume. However, when engagements are normalized to population size, Jamaica is the standout for social media engagements per million people, due to excitement surrounding the nation’s star-studded Track & Field team. Slovenia’s strength in Judo, Puerto Rico’s potential first gold, New Zealand’s surprise outcome in Rugby Sevens, and Qatar’s team recruitment strategy are also creating more than the fair share of buzz for their country’s teams.

The official sponsors of the Games are also starting conversations on social media. Samsung is generating buzz with its “The Anthem” ad highlighting unity well as its spot featuring Christoph Waltz and its humorous take on multitasking. Coca-Cola’s “Together is Beautiful” ad, first aired during the 2014 Super Bowl, is once again a conversation starter as the controversy around  “America the Beautiful” sung in multiple languages has seen a resurgence following its airing during the Opening Ceremony.
As we head into the final week of the Summer Games, there will be plenty more buzzworthy moments. Follow our continuing coverage in Adweek, and stay tuned for more Summer Games Impact Reports covering the top moments from the worldwide event.

Summer Games Week 2 Impact Report

The Summer Games are in full swing with an abundance of moments that have captured the world’s attention – check out the highlights reported in Adweek using 4C data.

Can’t-miss moments like the Games are important opportunities for brands to make genuine connections with consumers through tailored messages that resonate when their audiences are emotionally primed.

The 12 official sponsors are seeing their Summer Games support make an impact for their brands. Over the first part of the Games, the official partners increased their social activity by 50% and saw a total of 576,209 social media engagements – up 73% compared to the last two weeks in July. Additionally, loyalty, the fraction of people who are repeat engagers period-over-period, and positive sentiment both increased. This demonstrates the halo effect of being an official sponsor.


Atos, Omega (present at every start and finish line), and Visa achieved engagement lifts in the triple digits for their sponsorships. P&G’s Tide has tripled its loyalty during the Games while Bridgestone saw a triple digit lift in loyalty and garnered the highest lift in sentiment.
During the Games, 42 sport disciplines and 306 events will result in over 900 pieces of precious hardware. With so many potential opportunities, it can be challenging for brands to identify which moments are the right for them.
Further complicating matters, there are 11,000+ athletes and teams from 200+ countries so it can be difficult for brands to determine which ones resonate most with their audiences. Social media affinity and engagement data are the keys to unlocking these insights and extracting maximum sponsorship value.
In our Summer Games Preview, we demonstrated which sports over-indexed for the official sponsors before the opening ceremony. In our Week 1 Impact Report, we examined the most social moments, countries, and sponsors. Now let’s look at how things have played out with another week under our belts.
Social media data reveals that early in the Games, engagement with general events represented a higher share of Summer Games social media engagements. However, as the event progressed and interactions increased, people started engaging with more specific entities like countries and athletes while the general event engagements remained constant. The biggest peaks were the Men’s 100 meter sprint and Women’s Vault.

So far, the 2016 Summer Games have been historic. Check back next week for our complete wrap up of the worldwide event.

Summer Games Wrap-up Impact Report

Over the past two weeks, we’ve been following the Summer Games closely. In our Summer Games Preview Impact Report, we showed how anticipation for the Games was building on social media. In our Week 1 Impact Report, we looked into the moments, sponsors, and countries that were making a splash. Last week, we focused on the impact that an official sponsorship can have for an advertiser. This week, we’re wrapping up our series on the Games with a look into what grabbed the world’s attention throughout the competition.

Social media excitement surrounding the Summer Games ramped up steadily as the Games progressed. The greatest number of engagements occurred on August 20th, the penultimate day of competition, with the most engaged moment being the history-making Men’s soccer final. The second most engaged day, with less than 1 million total engagements separating the two, occurred on August 14th, following the viral meme-generating 100m relay.

While the USA received the most overall medals during the Games, Great Britain took home the gold in terms of social media engagement. With its first-ever gold medal, Puerto Rico earned a significant share of social as the country celebrated its historic achievement.

In our Summer Games Preview Impact Report, we found that basketball was the most anticipated sport by Americans leading into the Games. However, with an incredible overall performance by the Final Five, gymnastics was the most engaged sport in the USA during the Games, with a staggering 50% of total engagements. 

With more than twice as much volume as the next official sponsor, Samsung earned the lion’s share of social media engagement during the Games, thanks to its conversation-sparking ads featuring the blending of world anthems, South Sudan’s entrance to the world stage, and Christoph Waltz. For more on the brand impact for official sponsors of the Games, check out our Summer Games Week 1 and Week 2 Impact Reports.
Worldwide events like the Summer Games capture hearts and minds on TV and social media. As such, they are important opportunities for advertisers to connect with global audiences across screens. With our exclusive data covering social media engagement and affinities combined with TV programs, ad occurrences and viewership, 4C is uniquely positioned at the epicenter of pop culture. We hope you’ll continue to tune in as we cover the conversation – and marketing implications – around key athletic, political, and entertainment events.