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The 2006 FIFA World Cup - A sponsorship war.April 5, 2006 on 12:06 am | In Consumer Relations, Event Management | No CommentsMore than a million visitors are expected in Germany for the 2006 FIFA World Cup and around 30 billion TV viewers will watch the 64 games played between June and July 2006. This breadth and the exciting image of football makes sponsorships for the World Cup very attractive. 85% of all sponsorships is for sports (opposed to arts or culture). In a World Cup year it rises even to 95%! Therefore 10% of the whole sponsorship budget in a World Cup year goes to the least. But is it really worth it to paying for an official partner status? According to research by factiva between March 2005 and March 2006, 661 articles mentioned a company in association with the 2006 Winter Olympic Games in Turin. Of the top five companies, only one - Samsung - was an official sponsor. McDonald’s, Coca-Cola, Visa and Gereral Electricall succeeded in getting more press coverage in connection with the Games than any official sponsor. Almost the same tendencies can be seen for the 2006 World Cup. PRweek showed, that from Sept. 05 to March 06 the Airline Emirates (official Sponsor) generated 44 World Cup corelated articles in Europe, Lufthanse as a non-sponsor generated 35 articles. Non-sponsor arilines totalled 90 press mentions in all. This shows that sponsorship rights alone are not worth their money unless there is a good creative exploitation around them. Experts think that you need to spend at least twice as much money exploiting the rights as you do on acquiring them. Sponsors have a better chance to get their message across this year because FIFA is implementing a rigorous clampdown on “ambush” marketing and PR. However, not everyone believes FIFA’s new rules of marketing conduct will ensure that sponsors will be favoured over non-paying rivals. Read more about PR and the World Cup in ”Brands got to war for World Cup glory” in PRweek, 31.03.06, p. 25-27
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