Sponsorship Philosophy: Lining'S Magic Weapon For Building A Brand

Lining's idea of "saving the country from curves" has existed since the founding of Li Ning Co. "Sponsorship philosophy" seems to be a magic weapon for building brand in Lining's view.

At the 2008 Olympic Games, Lining, a former gymnast champion, took part in the competition of Olympic sporting goods sponsors as a businessman, but eventually lost to Adidas, the world sporting goods giant.

20 years, one cycle.

Recalling the 1988 Seoul Olympic Games, Lining accidentally lost in the last match and fell off the ring.

Though he walked down the court like a smile, as usual, his heart was full of frustration and sadness.

Faced with the Olympic defeat again, Lining, a businessman, has not felt so sad that he has had a more rational and calm response.

January 3, 2007 was a day for Lining to lose because he lost the Olympic Games again.

But this time, his competitors are not other gymnasts, but Adidas, the international sporting goods giant.

The 2008 Olympic Games will be held at its own door, but Li Ning Co failed in the competition of Olympic sponsorship. Adidas, a well capitalized Adidas, finally defeated Li Ning Co and became the seventh partner chosen by the Olympic Organizing Committee.

With sporting goods companies and world famous brands, the encounter between Li Ning Co and Adidas has become a common occurrence.

In 1999, Li Ning Co reputation day long, in the Munich Expo, known as the world sporting goods industry "Olympic Games", the representative of Adidas, a world sports giant, suddenly discovered that a brand that had never heard of China's "Lining" sporting goods was next to its booth.

With such a "giant" shoulder to shoulder, the newly born "Lining" people are just beginning to hang in the air.

Fortunately, this ominous premonition did not become a reality.

Dealers who have been in the world for many years respect the prestige of world famous brands and believe in their hot eyes.

They carefully watched the clothing and sports shoes produced by Li Ning Co, looked at the styles, the fabrics, checked the workmanship, and surveyed the technological content. Some careful businessmen also looked at them with a pinprick. Finally, Li Ning Co's products finally convinced them.

Merchants from Europe and Western Asia signed hundreds of thousands of German Mark's orders on the spot, and many businessmen rushed to fight for the right to sell agents.

Some people do not know the exact details and ask the Lining company people: are you Japanese?

Korean?

Taiwanese?

After a series of NO, Lining people proudly told them: "we are Chinese, from the mainland!"

These knowledgeable businessmen now exposed their ignorant side: they could not believe that such excellent products and brand images they saw would come from the hands of mainland Chinese enterprises.

Today, despite the encounter of "Waterloo" in the competition of Olympic sporting goods sponsors, Lining was not discouraged. He adopted the strategy of "saving the country through curves" and carried out the strategy of "atypical marketing" related to the Olympics.

Lining obviously had a long way to go.

On the third day after the defeat, Lining signed an agreement with CCTV sports channel. The agreement stipulates that the hosts and reporters who broadcast the columns and events from 2007 to 2008 must be dressed in Lining's clothing when they appear.

This means that during the Olympic Games in Beijing, as long as the CCTV sports channel is opened, Lining's Logo will jump into the audience's eyes.

This is an ingenious "steal" and cleverly evade the Olympic intellectual property barrier and make a new approach to the Beijing Olympic Games.

A week later, the Li Ning Co played a new role and signed an agreement with the Argentina Basketball Association that the last Athens Olympic champion Argentina men's basketball team will appear in the Beijing Olympic Games in Lining's robe.

By the early May 2007, Lining had built up his own brilliant Lining delegation for the Beijing Olympics with limited money, including the Chinese shooting team, diving team, table tennis team and gymnastics team.

According to the results of the 2004 Athens Olympic Games, the four teams won more than half of the total gold medals of the Chinese team.

In addition, there are Sweden Olympic team, Argentina basketball team, Spain basketball team, Sultan track and field team and so on.

They all wore Lining sportswear at the 2008 Olympic Games.

In November 15, 2007, Li Ning Co Ltd listed in Hong Kong announced on the 15 day that it would spend 305 million yuan on the acquisition of 57.5% of Shanghai red double happiness Group Limited.

The red double happiness company is a famous table tennis equipment manufacturer. It occupies the first place in the domestic market and has a high reputation in the world. It is the partner of the International Table Tennis Federation (ITTF) and will provide most of the equipment for the 2008 Olympic table tennis competition.

In order to welcome the Olympic countdown for 100 days, in April 27, 2008, 100 athletes from all over the place gathered in Beijing, together with 2155 volunteers to form a huge Postcard sent to the world, inviting athletes from all over the world to share the 4 year sports event.

On the massive postcards of thousands of people at the scene, athletes and volunteers spelled out letters in English, meaning "to the athletes and brothers and sisters all over the world: This is our stage. Now we are on the stage. The movement brings us together, and now we are on the stage to make this match."

All athletes and volunteers wore Lining sportswear.

Lining's idea of "saving the country from curves" has existed since the founding of Li Ning Co. "Sponsorship philosophy" seems to be a magic weapon for building brand in Lining's view.

In 1998, when the sponsors were watching the domestic volleyball league matches, Lining went crazy and dressed up for "3 years" with the volleyball. He invested more than 16 million yuan to build up 16 high-quality professional equipment and eat the task of sponsoring the strong teams in one breath.

The equipment was so great that even the cast members had to praise: "Lining has armed us to the teeth!"

"It's called a new philosophy of sponsorship."

Lining said.

1992 Barcelona Olympic Games, 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games, 1996 Paralympic Games, 2000 Sydney Olympic Games, 2004 Athens Olympic Games...

Lining is the provider of the Chinese delegation's award-winning equipment. On these grounds, Chinese athletes wearing "Lining" clothes can be seen everywhere. Lining also embarked on the road to build a strong sports brand.

In the short period of a few years, Lining invested nearly 80 million yuan in various sports businesses in China in the short period of several years.

What is the reward?

Lining laughed without answering.

Of course, not only let the world see Lining's brand, but also be able to successfully buy Lining's products.

So Li Ning Co has started flagship stores around the Olympic Village, and flagship stores in other Olympic cities such as Qingdao, Tianjin and Qinhuangdao are in the process of preparation.

Lining went all the way and tried every means to infiltrate and encircle the 2008 Olympic Games.

Lining plan will use 16%-18% for two years in 2007 and 2008 for brand building including the whole Olympic strategy.

Lining has a clear timetable for the globalization strategy: the first stage ends in 2008, and the second stage is 2009-2013 years.

In these two stages, Li Ning Co will take the Chinese market as the most important strategic market and predict that the turnover will remain at 35%-40% growth every year.

The 2013-2018 year is the third phase, when Li Ning Co will become the world's top five sports Brand Company.

But Lining seems to have achieved this goal ahead of schedule.

By the beginning of 2008, according to the market ranking table released by the US market research institute sports goods information (SGI) for the global sporting goods industry company, Li Ning Co surpassed Asics in the ranking, becoming the fourth largest in the world, and the top three were Nike, Adidas and Puma.

In the Hurun 2007 rich list, Lining ranked sixty-fifth in the personal status of 11 billion yuan.

All past achievements are history.

The 2008 Beijing Olympic Games will become another new starting point for Lining.