The latest research from global brand and communications agency Hall & Partners WebWordtracker has revealed that Bavaria beer trounced (official beer sponsor) Anheuser Busch's Budweiser in the blogosphere during the World Cup by a whopping 558%, suggesting that sponsors for future sporting events may still need to adjust to living in the digital age.
Hall & Partners WebWord, a social media listening tool that listens to online conversations and noise in real-time, followed activity of partners, sponsors and ambush marketers during the World Cup.
Following the ambush marketing stunt on 14 June – involving 32 women dressed in orange mini-dresses - Hall & Partners tracked “Budweiser AND (FIFA or World Cup)” vs. Bavaria Beer AND (FIFA or World Cup)”.
Throughout the duration of the World Cup (June 11 – July 11, 2010), Bavaria garnered 371% more blog buzz than Budweiser.
Interestingly, Bavaria also outperformed all official FIFA Partners in the blog world. While Adidas blew away their official competition (Adidas, Coca-Cola, Emirates, Hyundai, Sony and Visa were the FIFA Partners), Bavaria still garnered 14% more blog coverage.
"Brand 'ambassadors' are now potentially everyone with a social media account - this is the first World Cup the Twitter universe has seen, after all - so it will be interesting to see the value of these types of grassroots and ambush efforts going forward in a digitally driven marketplace," commented Brigette Lytle, US Director of Innovation for Hall & Partners.
The world football's governing body is fiercely protective of its sponsors and did not take kindly to ambush marketing from brands which are not official FIFA partners.
However despite the potential cost of legal proceedings, these costs may be a pittance for the ROI for the PR they commanded on the world’s stage.
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