ABN AMRO has chosen for sponsoring for the Volvo Ocean Race because in their eyes it was the perfect way to bring their brand under world-wide attention. The corporate values of the bank, namely integrity, teamwork, respect and professionalism were compatible with the project.
They invested sixteen months in developing, testing and building of two boats. They paid an amount of 40 million euro to invest in the boat, the crew and the marketing campaign. Against these facts they had a world-wide public of 1.5 billion viewers.
Despite the fact that the risk of sponsoring an individual athlete is more risky than sponsoring of a team, there are enough situations to think of where a sports team comes negative into publicity. But negative publicity does not always have to have a negative effect..
An example here is Hans Horrevoets, he belonged to the crew of the ABN AMRO II. During the seventh stage of the Volvo Ocean Race from New York City to Portsmouth he fell overboard due to a strong storm. It happened 1300 miles out of the coast. The crew tried to revive him, but they were too late.
In Holland there has been a research accomplished to investigate what the effects of sports team non-performance on the corporate brand image of the sponsoring company were. The research is not finished yet, but they can already conclude that in the situation of ABN AMRO it did not had a significant negative effect on the corporate brand image. It even can help, sometimes unintentional and in this case not that proper, realize your communication goals.
Because in the end, negative publicity is just a form of publicity..
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