Nike looks to bend it past Adidas

As an official sponsor of the 2006 World Cup, Adidas is getting a lot of marketing mileage out of promotions associated with the soccer tournament that begins today.

Germany, Adidas' home country, is the tournament's host nation. Adidas will provide the balls for all matches, guaranteeing that anyone who watches a game will see the company's three-stripes logo. No other sporting-goods manufacturer will be allowed to televise commercials on ESPN or ABC during U.S. game broadcasts of the monthlong series.

And if that weren't enough, visitors to Munich need only to drive outside the airport to spot the highway-spanning billboard of German goalie — and Adidas endorser — Oliver Kahn diving for a save.

But Nike isn't content to let its biggest rival have all the marketing fun. The company, based in Beaverton, Ore., is taking its own message to Internet communities, specialty Web sites, cellphones and soccer fields and will turn up the volume even more as the World Cup games begin, with a swoosh-vs.-stripes battle worth billions.

More and more, advertising's latest revolution is not being televised.

Nike, whose edgy commercials have established it as much in marketing as in shoe manufacturing, is finding that its new initiatives for the World Cup may be a model for connecting with consumers in the future.

"Gone are the days of just one big ad," said Trevor Edwards, Nike's vice president for global brand management, as he talked about a multipronged "360-degree" marketing strategy. "Now more than ever, we're not constrained to do things in 30-second bites."

Both Adidas, which runs its North American division from Portland, and Nike are spending more on their World Cup marketing this year than for any event in their corporate histories. No wonder. Held once every four years, the world's most-watched tournament in the world's most-popular sport makes for an unparalleled opportunity to reach consumers.

Under the banner of Joga Bonito — "Play Beautiful" in Portuguese, the language spoken in Brazil, home to the world's top-ranked team — Nike formed Joga.com, a community Web site similar to MySpace.com but with an emphasis on soccer. The site signs up a new user every eight seconds, Edwards said, and the company expects 1 million users by the end of the World Cup.

The company has JogaTV on its nikefootball.com Web site, where fans can view video clips of the Brazilian soccer team — which is sponsored by Nike — and former soccer great Eric Cantona.

It's a way to draw in consumers who are looking for entertainment and a story, not just a sales pitch, Edwards said.

And it's becoming more standard across industries, said Rick Boyko, managing director of VCU Adcenter, the graduate advertising program at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond.

"Lots of companies now are looking at engaging consumers in ways other than just TV," Boyko said. "There's a big movement in ... finding new ways to intersect with consumers and make it more entertainment and advertising than just sitting back and passively watching (a commercial). The more engaged and entertained you are by a brand, definitely your predisposition to liking the brand is going to be better."

Nike's not the only one experimenting with new avenues of advertising. Adidas' name and logo, for example, are showing up on soccer video games created by Microsoft's Xbox division — both for the console and for cellphones.

Adidas has even built in Berlin a replica of the Olympic stadium where 10,000 fans can watch a broadcast of the World Cup games. The company is sending out a fleet of semitrailers to soccer and other kids' sporting events in the United States where consumers can test the latest shoes, play an Xbox game or otherwise try out Adidas products.

"We think that if our competitor could, they would do what we're doing," said Adidas spokesman Evan Wiener. "Our brand will be everywhere."

In any event, Nike said, expect to see the multimedia approach to advertising continue to grow. While TV commercials remain effective in delivering an emotional message to a mass audience, it's only one way to reach a consumer.

"The consumer's in charge," Edwards said. "Anyone who doesn't pay attention to that does so at their own peril."