Adidas China Advertising Promotes Nationalism

Adidas (Adidas), the sports apparel industry, has spent three years presenting the concept behind its Olympic TV advertising.

But most viewers do not see these commercials on television.

Adidas's Olympic advertising is dominated by Chinese athletes, full of nationalism, because the company has invested almost all of its Olympic TV advertising budgets in China, and may not broadcast these advertisements in heavy markets such as the United States and Europe.

The German company is trying to take advantage of the Olympic opportunity to make its market share more than rival Nike (Nike).

Its Olympic advertisements are not only played in China, but also by Chinese athletes such as diver Hu Jia and basketball woman Sui Feifei, who are proud of the Chinese people's holding the Olympic Games and winning the games.

One group of advertisements depicted the scenes of Chinese athletes playing local athletes in the form of computer animation. They blocked in the volleyball match, passed the ball to the basketball players, or made concerted efforts to throw the divers into the air.

In another advertisement, the Chinese women's volleyball team talked about the tremendous pressure brought by the expectations of the Chinese people, and how they won the gold medal in the 2004 Olympic Games.

The outdoor advertisement of the publicity campaign won the Omnicom Group's Shanghai based company TBWA/Shanghai winning the Cannes International Advertising Festival award in Cannes.

Later this month, Adidas will also unveil the last TV advertisement featuring the Chinese sportswear wearing Adidas sportswear on the podium.

Adidas's Olympic advertising campaign, including television, outdoor, retail, mobile phone and Internet marketing, is one of the largest publicity activities launched by the company in a single country.

The TV advertising strategy that specializes in China is a big change for Adidas. As a sponsor of the Olympic Games and World Cup, Adidas usually broadcast a series of TV commercials around the world for such world-class sports events.

As radical activists are constantly protesting against China's human rights record and environmental problems, other Olympic advertisers avoid explicitly mentioning China, while Adidas vigorously advocates the spirit of nationalism in China.

For example, Visa's TV commercials in the United States focus on the fact that the Olympic Games provide a common stage for different countries.

There is hardly any mention of advertisements in China depicting scenes of athletes and sports fans gathered around the world.

Kevin Adler, director of Engage Marketing solutions at New York sports marketing company, said that every brand will face certain risks in Olympic publicity. Will Adidas be more aggressive than other companies because of its marketing strategy with Chinese emphasis? Marketing

The answer is yes.

Adidas said it had long known that focusing on Chinese national pride is the best way to influence the Chinese consumer market by the Olympics.

Bi Baoyuan, vice president of marketing in Adidas Greater China, said that we found that the Beijing Olympic team embodies strong nationalism and sportsmanship in the Paul team of the Olympic Games in.

Although to some extent, every host country is no exception, Adidas's market research finds that 90% of Chinese care about the Olympic Games.

Adidas, the more important task of this advertising campaign is to help Adidas and Nike compete for the Chinese consumer market.

Adidas executives say the company's market share will exceed Nike by the end of this year.

Adidas plans to open 6300 stores in more than 650 cities in China, including a 10 thousand square foot super store in Beijing, and expects to achieve sales of about 1 billion euros (US $1 billion 580 million).

Meanwhile, Nike's sales in China in 2008 jumped 50%, more than 1 billion 100 million dollars.

China is Nike's second largest market after the US.

Sports marketing experts said that Chinese consumers linked the two brands to the Olympic Games.

Adidas is the official sponsor of the Olympic Games and the Beijing Olympic Organizing Committee (BOC), while Nike provides Olympic sponsorship for 22 of the 28 Chinese sports associations.

Nike chief executive Mark Parker (Mark Parker) said at a conference call with analysts that Nike is China's strongest, most famous, respected and most popular sports brand.