Background
Shibli, Gratton and Bingham (2012, p.280) pointed out that Olympic Games is the largest sports event in the world involving more than 200 nations with more than 14500 athletes and 26 sports. The sports event expects more than 70000 volunteers, 1.5 million spectators, and 20000 media. Olympic Games are held in summer holidays.
According to Konstantaki and Wickens (2010, p. 337), the United Kingdom will hold the London 2012 Olympic Games to boost physical activity throughout the country and the world making the country a success in promoting the health of its citizens and the rest of the world. London is the capital city and largest urban area in England and the United Kingdom. The city has many tourist attractions, such as the Palace of Westminster, the Greenwich historic settlement, the royal botanic gardens, and the tower of London. Moreover, the United Kingdom is the global leader in financial, business, cultural centers, and influence in education, politics, media, entertainment, art, politics, and fashion.
These achievements have helped the country become a popular tourist destination and an international hub in the world. The history of Olympic Games began in 1908 and London hosted the Olympic Games for the first time as the third country. The United Kingdom will also be the first country in the world to host Olympic Games for three times and the third time will be the London 2012 Olympic Games (Briggs 2001, p.8).
Mission
The United Kingdom aims to ensure that schools have sporting activities to encourage physical activity, to promote talents of the young people, and to create sustainable jobs for the young people not only in the country but also to the rest of the world. It will ensure that the Olympic Games have long-term benefits of creating educational programmes and community activities across the country (Crouch, Jackson & Thompson 2005, p.9).
Vision
The United Kingdom has the vision of becoming the global leader in sporting activities. The government wants to transform the heart of London and to inspire the young people to engage in sports. The United Kingdom will take advantage of the opportunity of hosting Olympic Games in year 2012 to create skills, jobs, businesses, and investments for sustainable living of its citizens and people around the world. The government will demonstrate the potential of the country in creativity, hospitality, and development during the London 2012 Olympic Games (Institution of Engineering & Technology 2011, p.3).
Current Strategies
The United Kingdom wants to increase their engagement in sports. The government plans to improve the table of the Olympic medals to benefit more people in the sporting activity. It will create more jobs and business opportunities for its citizens. The government has plans to build new and improve the existing parks and sports venues in London. It will improve the public transport and build homes for visitors’ accommodation in London. The government wants the young people to engage in the community activities and acquire sustainable jobs.
The government will promote the environment protection during the sports activity and show that the United Kingdom is a good place for visitors (Crouch, Jackson, & Thompson 2005, p.3). The government will therefore promote London 2012 Olympic Games to create a culture of sporting activities for the country in the future. The Olympic Games are important because they promote the economic and social welfare of the host country and the rest of the world. The government of the United Kingdom must decide on the media to use during the London 2012 Olympic Games, the organization, and location of the sporting event in advance to ensure successful coordination of the event (Konstantaki & Wickens 2010, p.356).
Microenvironment Factors
Customers
There are 1.5 million people expected in London during the London 2012 Olympic Games. This will mean parking restrictions and traffic congestions to be a major challenge for collections and delivery of services in areas surrounding the venues of the sporting event and roads. The government will ensure that these challenges will not affect the interest of the spectators in the sporting event. The government of the United Kingdom has high investments in infrastructure of accommodation and roads that provide visitors of the London 2012 Olympic Games with excellent life. Customer experience is important in creating future markets for the sporting event. This sporting event has the largest profits in sports investment in the world and improving its standard and quality of services to customers means higher profits in the future (Drummond & Ensor 2005, p.42).
Employees
The government and other sponsors of the London 2012 Olympic Games invest in training and development of its event employees to improve the skills, knowledge, and creativity in organizing the sporting event. The London 2012 Olympic Games is an important event because it has the attention of the world. Therefore, high standards of organization contribute to strong recognition and perception of the country. The government of the United Kingdom will prepare for the event in advance to ensure that everything is organized and that the government within its powers has employed the highest available technology to set standards for the world. The United Kingdom has a high economic stability in the world and hiring competent and quality employees will help show its potential to develop sporting events (Crouch, Jackson & Thompson 2005, p. 11).
Competitors
Olympic Games associates with high profits to the investors, improved skills, creativity, job opportunities, and economic boost to the host country. This makes the opportunity competitive. Any country would have the interest of hosting the sporting event. The 200 countries registered by the National Olympic Committees (NOCs) compete for the opportunity of hosting the sporting event. Many factors are considered when selecting the host country that include extend of development in infrastructure, media, marketing, and financial stability that can support the needs of the event (Institution of Engineering & Technology 2011, p.39).
Shareholders
The potential stakeholders of the sporting event include the British Olympic Association, Department Of Culture, Sport, and Media, mayor of London, Olympic Board, and London Legacy Development Corporation. The British Olympic Association leads and prepares the best athletes in the nation for the Olympics. The department of sports acquires the support of the government and major parties of politics in the sporting event. The mayor ensures that the host population derives as much benefits as possible from the event. The London Legacy Development Corporation organizes and prepares the surrounding areas and Olympic park for the event. The Olympic board is responsible for oversights, monitoring, and strategic coordination of the London 2012 Olympic Games. The stakeholders work as a team to deliver sports and maximize legacy of London and the United Kingdom (Drummond & Ensor 2005, p. 54).
Media
The IOC is responsible of the rights of global broadcasting for the Olympic Games. The organization recommends broadcasts on the Internet platforms, mobile, radio, and television. It also allocates the rights to broadcast Olympics to media companies globally and negotiates for any agreements made concerning the Olympic media. The government of the United Kingdom will fund the London 2012 Olympic Games because of the growth in the popularity of the sporting event. The media organizations will take advantage of the high global representation expected in the promotional efforts in the London 2012 Olympic Games to gain good reputation and public support (Institution of Engineering & Technology 2011, p. 34).
Suppliers
Bullough (2012, p. 41) identified the suppliers of the London 2012 Olympic Games as the Westfield, Trebor, Ticketmaster, Technogym, Riot Into, Populous, Nielsen, Holiday Inn, Rapiscan Sysyems, Nature Valley, John Lewis, Mondo, Next, Gymnova, Heathrow Airport, McCann Worldgroup, Holiday Inn, Aggreko, Airwave, Crystal CG, Glaxosmithkline, The Boston Consulting Group, G4S, and Eurostar. The organizers of London 2012 Olympic Games have to keep close contact with suppliers to operate efficiently and ensure high quality products and services. The sponsors must satisfy the suppliers to maintain them and achieve success in the sporting event.
Macro environment Factors
Political Factors
The mayor of London has the executive power over London, and the administration is by the Greater London authority (GLA). The mayor and the Greater London Authority have great impacts on the success of the London 2012 Olympic Games through acquiring the support of the politicians. London has 33 boroughs making the city a potential market for Olympic Games. The London Olympic Games have attracted high commitment and support throughout the country and the national government. This helps the sports activity to grow fast (Drummond & Ensor 2005, p. 61).
Legal Factors
The government of the United Kingdom facilitates the organization of London Olympic Games by cooperating in supporting and passing legislation on sports. The Act requires that new methods of funding the infrastructure of Olympic Games should be in place to improve the sporting activity. In 2003, the government of the United Kingdom signed a memorandum of understanding with the GLA to fund USD 3.8 Billion to finance the government services and infrastructure projects of Olympic Games. Foreign spectators are issued with accreditation and Olympic identity card to allow them to have an official access into the country. The foreign worker serving at the Olympic Games acquire work permits free from any taxes or duties. Any imports into the country for the sporting event, especially food is free from any duties but for any other purpose is subject to available restrictions (Smith 2012, p.4).
Social Cultural Factors
The Olympic Games provides a good opportunity for building and improving capabilities and skills among the young generation and the host population. The United Kingdom will host the London 2012 Olympic Games becoming the center of attention of the world and a show of developments in technology and promotion of creativity, organizational skills, and talent. Individuals and volunteers receive education and technical training improving their knowledge and skills. Olympic Games are strong motivators of engaging the young people and adults in physical activities promoting their health and talents.
Countries and individuals acquire the chance of building respect and value for its capabilities. The sporting event also brings people together boosting coordination, peace, and unity throughout the world. When the government is creating the marketing strategies in the Olympic Games, it has to consider the different tastes and preferences of consumers, the social status, and behavior of its customers. This is because culture and social status differs from an individual or country to another. The government of the United Kingdom will improve its satisfaction of spectators by providing the needs of the different consumer groups (Drummond & Ensor 2005, p.27).
Economic Factors
The United Kingdom has a strong and stable economy. In 2003, the country was ranked the fourth position among the largest economies globally with domestic price inflation of 2.9% and an annual growth rate of 2.2% (Shibli, Gratton & Bingham 2012, p.287).
Environmental Factors
The London Olympic Games aim to create a strong legacy for the environment, community, and sports. The sporting event takes place in an Olympic park to create environmental solutions to energy management, water, resources, waste, sustainable development of buildings, and water. The management of Olympic Games established program, such as the OCOG management scheme to educate on the environment, energy, green areas, and waste protection to improve the standard of the city and the image of Olympic Games.
The London Olympic Games allocates more than USD 700 million for investment in the environmental protection. Actions, such as legislation on emission of pollutants in the air and water maintain satisfactory quality of air and water during the Olympic Games. The OCOG management system ensured cooperation and coordination of environmental issues and related programs with the public authorities to improve the environment of Olympic Games. The management system sustained the environment to measure up to the global standards of the environment to attract and maintain customers to the sporting event (Davidson & Rogers 2006, p.143).
The Use of Technology in the Government Marketing Strategies of Olympics
The IOC entrusted the BT with providing communication services during the London Olympic Games. The BT has the potential of attracting more than four billion people in the world to the event. The selected company will provide the most connected game ever in the world using advanced technology. BT will ensure that communication of the sporting event reaches to potential spectators and attracts the attention and interest in the public.
The technology used will create a strong image of the event, carry out the commentary requirements, deliver reports of the sports activity and create access to the game web sites along with millions of countless e-mails, calls, text messages, and online chatting. BT will implement and design infrastructures that create experience to the spectators using the highest available technical standards. The government supports and commits to these strategies to provide the United Kingdom with the best sporting events in the future Institution of (Engineering & Technology 2011, p.12).
There will be more than 22000 media people in the London 2012 Olympic Games with more than 80000 connections that will cover the television and broadcast, mobile, applications, Internet protocol telephony, fiber-to-the-premises, services, area networks, and support. The government strategies will achieve reliability, security, sustainability, flexibility, cost-effectiveness, manageability, and scalability of communication during the London 2012 Olympic Games. The diagram below shows the government’s strategy in ensuring quality communication during the London 2012 Olympic Games (Engineering & Technology 2011, p.15).
.
The games network will provide information on the results and information of the athlete. The company will have a LOCOG system of administration that will create access of its workers with office automation, finance systems, and internal emails. The company will provide the Olympic family with telephony handsets to acquire information directly from the Olympic park (Bullough 2012, p.54). The organizations that deal with communication will be supplied with services of rate cards to acquire connectivity of the sporting event through the Internet. The televisions of the game community will acquire a variety of 40 channels of programming Olympic television from the center of international broadcast.
The marketing strategy of the United Kingdom government is to increase the standard of technology and communication services in the sporting events. The government will take time to prepare for the event to improve the credibility of the country in reliability and accuracy during sporting events. The government wants to show its advances in technology to the world to improve its image and reputation to potential investors. This builds the economy of the country in future. The diagram below shows how the logical service model will deliver flexible and scalable communication of the London 2012 Olympic Games.
Communication Tools
According to Bullough (2012, p.45), London 2012 Olympic Games will carry out advertising on billboards in London through long-term contracts with large organization, such as British Airport Authority (BAA). The organization would take control of the sites in the sporting event, and this creates a discount advantage from the advertising owners up to 6% reducing the costs of operations. The current government legislation of the United Kingdom will protect the intellectual rights, Olympic marks, street vending, and advertisement programs to provide a coordination of the promotional activities and products of the London Olympic Games.
This protection of marks, emblems, mascots, and logos will also eliminate and control ambush marketing and outdoor advertising of Olympic Games. The Olympic Games have a significant coverage in the media, such as television, Internet, and radio to build strong support and national profile from the public. These advertising programs develop educational programs and communication initiatives to create strong reputation, awareness, recognition, create prestige, and influence potential spectators to purchase and follow up the sporting event.
This has helped the sporting event to be the largest in the world. The government of the United Kingdom has established innovative marketing strategies to communicate the sporting event. The government has long-term plans to develop and maintain the interest of the public and atmosphere of sorting activities at the London Olympic Games (Copley 2004, p.245).
The government of the United Kingdom will establish programs to promote sporting activities. It will invest more than $75 million in social marketing programmes to promote healthy living and healthy weight in adult and young people through engaging in physical activities and encouraging parents to support good diet for the children. The program makes advertisements and uses other marketing activities to communicate to people and attract more than two million participants. The government has a program for targeting the least active in the society. It investigates on the efforts of the health professional on encouraging the patients to engage in physical activities. The government allocates more than $ 7 million in this program (Bullough 2012, p.34).
The government of the United Kingdom through the mobile industry forecasts the demand of phone use and media consumption using data traffic, web use, new devices, visitor numbers, and the needs of those supporting the games. This management helps the spectators acquire information they need fast and with reliability to the providers of the information. The Olympic Games also use Facebook, twitter, and websites to communicate to the spectators.
The communication tools are used to create a consistent experience to users in access of the sporting event from the media, tablet, mobile, portals, computer, television, and game console. The communication tools also create a constant experience of the users building interest and satisfaction to funs of the sporting event. The fans are assured of a full-time and reliable way of acquiring information anywhere and anytime they want (Institution of Engineering and Technology 2011, p.7). The diagram below shows the integration of social media in the sporting event.
Communication and information cannot function without the use of ICT in the sports events. Social marketing provides solutions to the event organizers in creating access and sharing knowledge and information. There is a close relationship between media and sports in that they develop each other. They promote the use of technology in the communication sector. The government of the United Kingdom will build strong marketing strategies in the London 2012 Olympic Games to make use of the new and developed technological devices to create new ways of viewing the event.
The government invests in audiovisual production, verification of data, new information sources, records achieved, and any other information and communication required in the sporting event (Fyall & Garrod 2005, p.6). The spectators and athletes also advertise on the clothes they wear during the event. The clothes carry the brand names of the advertiser facilitating improved performance and movement of the advertising message to large numbers of people at the same time. In the Olympic Games promotion, advertising, and marketing are targets for economic development.
The entrepreneurs at the event have to ensure maximum persuasion of customers to purchase equipments and the advertisers to purchase the commercial time for the sporting event. The Olympic Games has become the largest profitable event to the media events in the world. The Olympic Games have acquired the most powerful function of advertising to attract people globally. The sporting event is important because it creates experience, cooperation, and unity of people in the world (Smith & Stevenson 2009, p.101).
Recommendations for Future Marketing Communication Strategies
According to Shibli, Gratton and Bingham (2012, p.274), Olympic Games have had problems with efficiency in creating higher prospects from sponsors of Olympic Games. The sponsors need to increase communication efficiency to attract potential audience and support of the public. The government intervention in the events is important in improving the image and reputation of the sporting event. Olympic advertisements should be done differently in different regions or countries to target the tastes and preferences of different consumers.
The sponsors of Olympic Games should utilize Olympic logos and media advertising to communicate the sporting event. Marketing strategies should consider the different lifestyles and culture across the world. The advertisers of Olympic Games must develop better techniques of advertising and promotion to attract more customers and make higher profits. The use of television advertising and advertising on billboards is not enough to benefit the sponsors of the sporting event.
According to Smith and Stevenson (2009, p.98), there is need for the United Kingdom to fill the gap on the promotional strategies by introducing new advertising, sponsorship, and promotion approaches, and methods. The government has the potential of creating these strategies because of its influence and large capital to invest in large events. The communication tools should take into account the increase in complication of instruments of marketing and new technologies to ensure flexibility and reliability of the experience that attracts more fans to the event.
Lists of References
Briggs, S 2001, Successful tourism marketing: a practical handbook, London: Kogan Page.
Bullough, S 2012, ‘A new look at the latent demand for sport and its potential to deliver a positive legacy for London 2012’, International Journal of Sport Policy, vol.4, no.1, pp.39-54.
Copley, P 2004, Marketing communications management, Elsevier, London.
Crouch, D, Jackson, R & Thompson, F 2005, The media and the tourist imagination: convergent cultures, Routledge, London and New York.
Davidson, R & Rogers, T 2006, Marketing destinations, and venues for conferences, conventions, and business events, Elsevier, London.
Drummond, G & Ensor, J 2005, An introduction to marketing concepts, Elsevier, Oxford.
Fyall, A & Garrod, B 2005, Tourism marketing: a collaborative approach, Channel View Publications, Clevedon.
Institution of Engineering and Technology 2011, Delivering London 2012: ICT enabling the games.
Konstantaki, M & Wickens, E 2010, ‘Residents’ perceptions of environmental and security issues at the 2012 London Olympic games’, Journal of Sport & Tourism, vol.15, no.4, pp.337-357.
Shibli, S, Gratton, C, & Bingham, J 2012, ‘A forecast of the performance of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in the London 2012 Olympic Games’, Managing Leisure, vo.17, no.2/3, pp.274-290.
Smith, A & Stevenson, N 2009, ‘A review of tourism policy for the 2012 Olympics’, Cultural Trends, vol.18, no.1, pp. 97-102.
Smith, N 2012, ‘Getting Into the Games’, Scholastic News-Edition, vol.74, no.23/24, p.4.