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Many PR people think that being assigned to a Super Bowl account (this year’s game will be played on Feb. 9), or the 2026 and 2028 Olympics, means that management has plans for their advancement. 

As the sports marketing guru at Advance Public Relations for 10 years, a well-respected national agency that went out of business when its founder died, and at Burson-Marsteller for nearly 25 years, during the days when it was the number one international agency, I can tell you that being assigned to a mega sporting event is not the road to advancement, although many junior PR practitioners mistakenly believe it is. Experience shows that successfully managing or playing a key role in important high budget corporate or brand accounts is. That’s why I also always found time to volunteer and work on non-sports corporate and brand accounts during my career.  

Being assigned to a mega sporting event can be akin to a double-edged sword

Because there are so many brands fighting for earned media, it’s difficult to demonstrate to management your creativity or expertise by gaining significant earned media for the client. But if you screw up, management will definitely hear about it from the client that spent countless thousands of dollars on the promotion. 

Also, mega sporting event promotions are short lived—maybe a few weeks prior to the event, and a few weeks after the event. (Don’t bother to pitch reporters the week before the event or for a few days after the event—they’re too busy filing hard news stories, and PR pitches about promotions are definitely not hard news, except to trade pubs. 

PR people should be upfront with clients about sponsoring a mega sporting event like the Super Bowl and Olympics and point out that there are so many sponsors of mega sporting events that it’s difficult for a client to break through the commercial clutter in a meaningful way. But most PR people are afraid to tell the client that there might be a better way. 

Some years ago when I managed, for eight years, the flagship account for a client that sponsored a major baseball promotion, it received more significant major earned media than any other baseball sponsor’s promotion. 

That’s why the client insisted to Burson-Marsteller management that I had to sign off on publicity programs, even when the agency relieved me of direct management of the account, because they wanted me to concentrate on Olympic and corporate accounts, which had substantially much larger budgets. So often, while in foreign lands, I was in contact with the client about the baseball promotion. Because internal polls by the client showed that because of the clutter of sports promotions, relatively few people could correctly identify which brand sponsored a promotion. The client dropped the promotion when Major League Baseball wanted to increase the rights fee. 

Because I always thought that a sports promotion was often not the best way for a client’s message to be remembered, when I was asked by a client my opinion about beginning a sports marketing sponsorship, I would give them this advice:

Ask yourself the following questions:

  • Have you considered other promotional vehicles for your product? 
  • Have you considered that your brand will be mixed in with numerous other brands during the telecasts of events—some hawking similar products—making it difficult to stand out from the clutter? 
  • Are you aware that products in direct competition with your brand that do not advertise will benefit from your mega-event association, when people search the web? 
  • Do you realize that unless you add an after-the-event aspect to a sports marketing sponsorship, it will have a short life?  
  • Will banking a sports marketing program materially affect your overall marketing budget? 

I crafted those questions a long time ago. But they are still relevant. 

Today, I would add the following question:

  • Do you think it is better for your brand to be one of dozens of sponsors in a big pond, or is it better to be the sole sponsor in a smaller one? 

Even though as a PR person, I’ve been involved in both Super Bowl and Olympics campaigns, I’ve always favored a more targeted, varied, less expensive approach than one that just counts eyeballs (like the Super Bowl and Olympics). 

In my opinion, the ideal would be for a brand to be the sole sponsor of a lesser or self-created-but-publicizable event and supplement it with a savvy PR publicity program that can continue indefinitely—unlike Super Bowl, Olympic and other sports mega-events that have a short shelf life. 

A major problem with Super Bowl and Olympic publicity programs is that they all look alike

In order to gain positive earned media coverage, PR people should develop programs that stand out from the pack—and that means replacing the much copied and hackneyed playbook programs with original thinking, which usually is done by ambush marketers.  

Today, I would advise a client to split the sports marketing budget on some of the fastest-growing sports in the U.S.—pickleball, volleyball, soccer, rugby and lacrosse—with the bulk of the budget being earmarked for a WNBA relationship. In addition to the WNBA, I would advise clients to consider affiliations with women’s NCAA basketball and the women’s FIFA World Cup. And now that Major League Baseball, the National Football League, the National Basketball Association and the National Hockey League are scheduling games outside of the U.S. it’s also possible to create an international sports marketing plan without the costs and restrictions placed on sponsors and athletes by the International Olympic Committee. 

Add in a well-constructed publicity program and sponsors of these sports can achieve major earned media year-round with sponsor identification, as well as the loyalty of a demographic that most brands want—young people. 

If you can successfully do the above, it’s sure to catch the attention of management, unlike a mega sports marketing client, which often is staffed by multiple account execs. 

And in our business, it’s necessary to show management that you are not just another employee number if you want to climb the corporate ladder.

Arthur Solomon

Arthur Solomon

Arthur Solomon, a former journalist, was a senior VP/senior counselor at Burson-Marsteller, and was responsible for restructuring, managing and playing key roles in some of the most significant national and international sports and non-sports programs. He also traveled internationally as a media adviser to high-ranking government officials. He now is a frequent contributor to public relations publications, consults on public relations projects and was on the Seoul Peace Prize nominating committee. He has been a key player on Olympic marketing programs and also has worked at high-level positions directly for Olympic organizations. During his political agency days, he worked on local, statewide and presidential campaigns. He can be reached at arthursolomon4pr (at) juno.com.