The Tiger saga: how it is affecting his sponsors

It is sad to see, if circulating information is correct, that Tiger Woods and his wife Elin will divorce. Maybe that’s not such a surprise after all the revelations but what is astonishing is that the Nike TV advert, in which Tiger’s father wondered what he had learned from his mistakes, turned out to be the straw that broke the camel’s back. Crass was, apparently, how Elin described it and then she flounced off by private jet with her two kids. No question of a family show of solidarity at the Masters.

The Tiger saga has been fascinating from many angles but the relationship between sports marketing and branding and the world’s first billion-dollar athlete is illuminating indeed. Nike is the one company not to have jumped ship on Tiger and when they announced their continuing support on 30 November 2009 they received massive coverage. This was maintained and repeated as sponsor after sponsor pulled the plug. How they will have viewed Elin’s reaction to their TV ad, which was designed to underline Tiger’s rehab, has yet to be revealed but it seems to have backfired badly- unless, of course, they believe publicity is all.

I have been reading a most interesting piece of research by O’Leary Analytics on the coverage Tiger and his key sponsors received in the three months following the “accident” near his home. Gillette was the first to announce it was limiting Tiger’s involvement and it generated more than 10,000 articles in a week. Accenture then cancelled their six year sponsorship deal and generated 3,000 articles in a day but when Tiger’s press conference co-incided with the Accenture Match play they were linked with him in another 7,000 articles.

AT&T, the third major sponsor to dump Tiger, made the announcement on New Years Eve and, on what is regarded as a slow news day, it was covered by 2,000 publications world wide that day. Tiger clearly is big news. Each new cancellation was linked to the decisions of other sponsors and, like it or not, their relationship was re-enforced.

So what does this mean?

According to O’Leary Analytical- congratulations to them on an illuminating piece of work- research shows that more than 3 months after the story broke, the relationship in the media between Tiger Woods and his sponsors continues to evolve.

Tiger may not be on their website, may not be wearing their logo, may not feature in their advertising, may not be carrying their name on his golf bag but his association with these companies continues to be reported in the media.

Which leads to this irony: being instantly associated with the most recognised athlete on the planet was once the hardest thing for most companies to achieve- distancing themselves from Tiger in a time of scandal is proving even harder.

Thats all for now,

Bill