Why Sponsors Aren't Going To Run Away from FIFA

It wasn't so much rain that hit FIFA in Switzerland on Wednesday, but a flood that Moses would have been proud of.

14 FIFA people were indicted by the US Department of Justice on charges that included multiple charges, including fraud and racketeering. Sports marketing executives who paid more than $150m in under-the-counter deals for media rights were given the indictment treated.

A lot of people wanted FIFA President Sepp Blatter to be one of the names on the DoJ's list, but it didn't happen. It's funny, because he's favourite to be re-elected as FIFA President on Friday - his fifth-straight victory for the post. Blatter has faced wave after wave of scandal - including the awarding of the 2022 World Cup to Qatar ahead of the USA (although he apparently voted for the US), but still managed to hold onto his Presidential post. Why? Frankly, because he's made FIFA an awful amount of money over the years, and there's nothing more than football federations want than the chinking of coins. And he's been around a long time, so he knows how to talk to biggest names in FIFA's fiefdom: The sponsors. 

Of course, this has led the bigger scream: What will happen to the relationship with the sponsors?

The 2014 World Cup's premier partners were Adidas, Coca-Cola, Hyundai, Emirates, Sony and Visa, with other sponsors including Budweiser, McDonald's, Castrol,  and Johnson & Johnson, to name but a few.

You can be sure that every single one of them - who pays around $10-25m to be a FIFA partnership (according to Sponsorship.com), probably called Blatter to ask what in Pele's name was going on. After all, being a partner collectively cost a total of $1.6bn for the 2014 World Cup - and that isn't cheap (although you could say that the exposure to the billions of people watching the games on their TV, computer and mobile screens was worth the money). 

A lot of people looking at Sepp Blatter and the current situation want Blatter out. But it hasn't come from the sponsors.

The sponsors COULD throw their toys out of the pram, and demand Sepp Blatter's resignation or they cancel their sponsorship deal. A highly-paid lawyer could call the indictments 'breach of contract' and they could walk. After all, big consumer companies don't like to be associated with corruption, for fear that consumers will walk away from them in protest. No company likes a worse indictment than the Department of Justice - an indictment by Twitter.

But the sponsors won't. After all, their continuing payments to FIFA keeps their competitors away.

But they won't. Does Adidas really want to give up their sponsorship contract? You can guarantee that Nike - who does perfectly well out of making kits during World Cups as it is - wouldn't mind putting their toe into the ring to get even more World Cup exposure. Nor would Under Armour. Coca-Cola? Pepsi - already associated with the Super Bowl - would grab the chance to sponsor the event. Plus, they can sell a lot of Pepsi at football games. Continental Tires? Goodyear. Johnson & Johnson? Pfizer. McDonald's? Subway. Visa? Mastercard (or American Express). The list goes on.

The most likely sponsor to walk out would be McDonald's. McDonald's has had scandals worldwide over the last few years, which has hugely impacted the company. And now things are going so badly in the USA that it's no longer reporting monthly sales data. New CEO Steve Easterbrook may well want to reduce spending - and the chance of being 'guilty by association' - by cutting the relationship. That is, if Easterbrook doesn't consider the World Cup far too big a marketing opportunity. 

And the TV partners? No sane media organisation is going to turn down the monster ratings and the potential earnings that come from advertising revenues just because of a scandal. 

The sponsors have said that they are worried about a scandal....but they aren't leaving yet (thanks for the headline, CNN Money!).

And we don't think they will be anytime soon.

Me and Storify....

Storify is quite possibly one of the best social storytelling methods in years.

It basically collates posts from around the world about a certain subject, and all you have to do is give the story a headline, and add a description, and start adding things.

As you can see on the right hand side, every major social media player is represented, from Facebook, Twitter and YouTube to Instagram, Tumblr and yes, Getglue (the latter being a good measurement of people watching a program).

It's quick, it's fun, and you start learning about people's feedback on a certain subject. For example, when this writer did a piece on Sky Sports' F1 Adventure, we learned that the comments were overwhelmingly positive - which is sometimes different to one's own Twitter feed, where - if you're unlucky - all you stream are cynical people, all you get are cynical tweets, therefore making you hate life.

It went down a storm at South by Southwest - taking home the top social media prize. Storify also went a little nuts about SXSW itself, publishing over 1,000 stories from its users. That's really cool.

How's it going to affect the future?

In our opinion, Storify's going to let media agencies present how their clients' products have been in the social world in a fun way. Clients are going to love Storify's simplicity - and it could be a gamechanger. And on the other side, clients are going to be able to jump into Storify, start searching about what people are saying about the product, and be able to have a clear, unsold version of how everything's being received. And if you're Lionsgate Films , you're probably in heaven right now because your social media marketing drive helped The Hunger Games gross over $100m in the opening weekend's box office. (NOTE: Don't worry - we'll have a Hunger Games campaign Storify story up soon!!)

In the future (we hope), Storify's going to be able to tell people searching for a certain subject how many tweets/Facebook comments/Instagram pics etc there were on a certain subject. While that may not spell good news for the likes of E-Buzzing.com or Google Analytics, at least having all your social media comments all under one roof will be exceptionally helpful.

But Storify does have problems

1) There is no search activity for Storify stories. In other words, all you've got is this line at the top of the home page:

You can only click through on those featured topics, which is all well and good - if you wanted to research what the latest economists are saying about Greece. But what happens if you wanted to see how many Storify stories there are about Tim Tebow, Peyton Manning, or Jesus Christ (they are't one at the same, sportsfans!). 

2) There is no search facility for users. All you get is this:

This is well and good, but what happens if you just want a list of users - like you do Twitter or Facebook, or see if your friends are using it? 

And more's the case, what happens if you want people to follow you on Storify - or you follow other people? Why should you have to go with Storify's recommendations? And why can't you get recommendations about certain subjects (ie college football/ drinking/ Alcoholics Anonymous). 

3) Where are the recommendations?

Social media lives and dies on RTing and liking, but on Storify, it's hard to tell if someone likes or hates my story. Of course, I can try and spread a bit of buzz about the story using the 'Notify' button, which comes up after a story's complete (letting tweeters know that their piece has been quoted), but how can I get more subscribers to my stuff so more people can read it? And more's the case, is Storify relying on Twitter/ Facebook for feedback on articles - couldn't Storify have a 'comments' section all for itself.

The good news is is ....

In the future, Storify's going to be absolutely awesome. It just needs a couple of (big) tweaks!!

Oh, and here's a link to Storify story I wrote earlier...

The guys from Storify got back to me after reading my piece, and said this: "Great suggestions. Some of which are coming very soon".

I thought "very soon" was going to be in around 101 days, so imagine my surprise when I jumped onto Storify and saw this....

That's right! You can now put in any story you want to search, and Storify will come up with the stories. This should end up stopping complete duplication - but if you're really passionate about the subject you're Storifying, do yours anyway, publish it, and THEN go and search for another term. There's no point in having an idea, and getting down because someone else has already done it. After all, most ideas aren't original anyway!

We wait for the second part of our recommendations with (bated) breath....

But great work by the Storify guys - and good to see that this writer wasn't talking (complete) rubbish....