With the Rio Games in the books, the IOC now moves forward with its next project, the launch of the Olympic Channel, which will see its first full day of programming today. Designed to serve as a digital-first, multiplatform global Olympic media entity, the network is poised to showcase live event coverage, highlights, magazine shows, news coverage and original programming with deals that include FIBA, FEI, the International Ski Federation, the International Swimming Federation, AIBA, IIHF, and more.
Fresh off of its first Olympics as an official TOP worldwide Olympic partner, Bridgestone was announced as the channel’s first Founding Partner of the Olympic Channel platform in a four-year deal and, at launch, serve as the presenting partner of network docu-series “Against All Odds.” Cynopsis Sports spoke with Michael Fluck, Senior Director, Digital Marketing & Strategy, about the brand’s use of the Games as a marketing platform and its expectations with the new Olympic Channel.
Fluck on going global with the IOC: Bridgestone is the largest tire and rubber company in the world and the Olympics are the biggest stage. So this was a natural fit for us to come out with our first global marketing platform. We’ve done some things with Formula 1, but that has limited appeal in some markets, so this was really our first attempt to take advantage of a global platform and build awareness on an international stage.
On Rio: We’ve spent over a year planning for it and we’ve learned a lot for our first time. We’ve had fantastic feedback and gotten some great exposure and interaction with various folks.
On the Olympic Channel: First of all, this is a natural extension of our partnership with the Olympics, but it also makes great business sense for us. The opportunity to have a true global marketing effort was too good to pass up and as we continue to focus more on digital regionally as well as globally, this was a perfect opportunity. We’ll be able to geo target our messaging around the world and we’ll be able to learn from it as we move forward.
On regionalizing: There are three components to our Olympic Channel sponsorship and all three of them have regional opportunities. The first is the traditional ad inventory, so we’ll have inventory on the channel that will be run in two ways. One way will be running some global Bridgestone Olympic creative that everyone will see. The other way will be geo targeted, allowing us to run branding or sales-specific creative. We’ll also offer and co-produce – with the IOC – content that will include regional ties that might look at a specific Japanese or Brazilian athlete as long as it is consistent with the content. While content will be globally of interest to fans, we have the ability to spotlight athlete X in Japan. The third component is that the IOC will be forming alliances with media partners that will, according to our agreement, give us the ability to activate on those partners whether it is CCTV in China or NBC in the US.