Enough bashing already of Canada’s Own the Podium (OTP) strategy. It was the right thing to do and elevated Canada’s performance in Turin and will likely lead to the most Gold medals ever for Canada at an Olympic Winter Games. So which marketers raised their performance during the Vancouver 2010 Olympics?
While I usually don’t weigh in on things like this … I have watched so much of the Olympics on TV and online … that I thought I’d share my picks:
Podium Performances
- The best piece of marketing comes from GE for sponsoring the SuperBodies series narrated by Dr. Greg Wells. This segment has been highly instructive and entertaining. GE’s healthyimagination initiative is a perfect fit for this placement. The supportive campaign by GE also hits the mark.
- Bell Canada’s The World is Here is a cleverly scripted campaign. I particularly enjoy the Canadian-German exchange. Bell has run numerous spots throughout the campaign, each tying in nicely to its visual look that took so much heat when it was first launched. Best piece of original Canadian advertising work in this Olympic campaign goes to Bell.
- Another winner is Air Canada’s Go Far campaign. Set to snappy music, it’s inspired advertising. My favourite clip is of the young lady dressed in black out for a night on the town in London wearing a Canadian toque.
Honourable Mention
- Bombardier for its design of the Olympic Torch
- Purolator. It’s media strategy was highly sound, leaving a strong impression pre-Games where it was not lost with the bigger advertisers (disclosure: Purolator is a client)
- Molson for its online efforts for the Made from Canada campaign
Off The Podium
The biggest disappointment comes Chevrolet. Talking cars just don’t cut it. Especially talking cars with lousy scripts. Also disappointing is the effort from McDonald’s. They had a clever pre-Olympic campaign with Cindy Klassen and the McWorker … but failed to deliver anything inspiring during the games themselves.
There you have it. Now back to the Games!
