Adidas Euro sponsorship delivers biggest Impression Lift

Ted MarzilliCEO YouGov Direct
July 09, 2012, 4:07 PM GMT+0

Spain may have won the Euro 2012 tournament, but Adidas seems to have received the biggest U.S. consumer perception boost of all the event’s official sponsors.

Adidas’ perception improvement may help it pay off financially: it told Bloomberg News that it expects record soccer sales of more than $2 billion this year, heightened by the European championships in Ukraine and Poland.

Adidas’s perception was well ahead of the rest of the Euro 2012 sponsors when the tournament began on June 8th and increased steadily until its July 1st conclusion when Spain – coincidentally wearing all Adidas uniforms – took the final match. Adidas not only sponsored six competing teams, including one of the pre-event favorites, Germany, but also provided the match ball, the Tango 12.

The average U.S. perception levels of all the remaining sponsors remained steady and barely budged over the duration of the tournament.

Adidas, and an index comprised of Euro 2012 official sponsors including Canon, Continental, Hyundai, Kia, Coca Cola, McDonald’s, and Sharp were measured with YouGov BrandIndex’s Impression score, which asks respondents: "Do you have a generally positive / negative feeling about the brand?" Results were filtered for U.S. adults 18+ who are fans of soccer.

YouGov BrandIndex measurement scores range from 100 to -100 and are compiled by subtracting negative feedback from positive. A zero score means equal positive and negative feedback.

On May 21st, Adidas’s Impression score was ahead of the Euro 2012 Sponsor average by a healthy 15 points – 38 compared to 23. Once the tournament kicked off on July 8th, Adidas began a steady climb from 47 to 60 on July 2nd. In the same time frame, the Euro 2012 Sponsor average gradually moved from 21 to 23, making the gap a full 37 points in the end.