In less than a few days, the 2012 London Summer Olympics will be dominating most, if not all the air waves: print and broadcast media, social networks and more and despite all the festivities, your business will still be going and most likely fade into the background. Perhaps you have some important company news or a product or event launch and it will only get lost in the Olympic shuffle. It’s probably better NOT to share anything too important during this time, but if you must, leverage will be your best friend. Here are some ways in which you can keep your business relevant and top-of-mind with your customers during the 2012 London Summer Olympics.
Leverage
Think about some ways in which your business, product or service relates to the Olympics. Can your news relate to any news in London, the history of the Olympics, the Olympians the history of the Olympians or former Olympians or the overall theme of the event? Perhaps one of the current or former Olympians is from your city which presents an opportunity for you to create an ‘in’ for your story. Visit the London 2012 website and start browsing for ideas.
Contribute
How can you help the media tell their stories on the Olympics? Can you be a source or provide stats and facts or is there some uncovered story that you can help them to break? Remember working with the media is not always about you. It is a mutually beneficial relationship that is about give and take. Find ways in which you can help contribute to their stories, then call and let them know your available for quotes or comments or interviews if need be.
Tell your “Olympian” Stories
Did you or someone in your company take part in track or any other sports? Using their story and tieing it in with the Olympics is another way in which you can keep your story and company relevant and top of mind with the media and your customers. In fact, if you can find a few former athletes, you can create your own company Olympic team. More on that below.
Create your own Olympic Team
Perhaps you have plans to celebrate the Olympics at the office as part of an internal communications initiative. Share that initiative with your social networks and get them involved with voting for the best Sales or Customer Service rep. Don’t be afraid to take your initiative externally too. Create a contest where the customer who sends the most referrals gets a ‘gold medal’ or some similar prize or recognition on your Facebook page or Twitter feed.
Create your own Olympics Coverage
If you have a place on your site or in your social networks (i.e. your twitter feed) where you can post regular updates about what’s going on at the Olympics, readers will check back often for updates and possibly come across any other company news that you might have posted. Twitter is doing something similar where they will be creating a page where all tweets on the Olympics will be curated. Click here to read more about how Twitter Embraces Olympics to Train for the Big Time.
Again, I would recommend that you hold on reporting anything too important over the next two weeks as it will most like get moved to the bottom of the everyone’s priority list, but if there is something you really need to announce, hopefully you can use some of the above suggestions to get people to pay attention.
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