ESPN 3D to show soccer, football, more
- Sports broadcasting will enter a new dimension in 2010…the third dimension, as ESPN will unveil the industry’s first 3-D network.
- ESPN 3D will showcase a minimum of 85 live sporting events during its first year beginning June 11 with the first 2010 FIFA World Cup match, featuring South Africa vs. Mexico, ESPN and ABC Sports president George Bodenheimer announced.
(www.espn.com)
Visa Launches ‘Olympics For Life’ Sweepstakes
By Karl Greenberg
- On Tuesday, Visa launched a sweepstakes that offers one customer the chance to go to the Winter Olympics every four years for life.
- In the Visa Olympics Winter Games Trip for Life Sweepstakes, running through Feb. 28, every time U.S. cardholders use their Visa cards, they will automatically be entered.
- Visa — which has sponsored the Olympic Games since 1986 and is the exclusive payment card of the games — says that starting with the 2014 Olympic Games in Sochi, Russia, the grand prize winner and one guest will get round-trip airfare and accommodations for two, tickets to and transportation to and from Olympic events.
(www.mediapost.com)
NBA Teams With Taco Bell In Fitness Effort
By Karl Greenberg
- The National Basketball Association and Taco Bell are running an online program called “Driving Better Choices,” focused on health and fitness, that touts Taco Bell’s “Drive-Thru Diet Menu,” comprising seven menu items with nine grams or less of fat.
- As part of the NBA program, Taco Bell has a “Driving Better Choices presented by a Taco Bell” microsite on NBA.com that has health and fitness insight from NBA players and trainers. There are also videos, training information, and NBA-related nutrition tips.
- The campaign is timed with the first annual “NBA FIT Week,” which started Monday and runs through Jan. 11. The program has teams and players participating in health-related programs that are intended to get children and adults to be more physically active.
(www.mediapost.com)
Google Runs Multimillion-Dollar Ad For Nexus One
By Laurie Sullivan
- Google began running a one-line blurb on google.com Wednesday to promote the Nexus One mobile phone that the Mountain View, Calif. search engine unveiled the day before. The link goes directly to the Web site set up to sell the phone.
- Gene Munster, research analyst at Piper Jaffray, pegs the value of the home page takeover at between $15 and $20 CPMs, or $4 million to $5 million for a buyout per day.
- In November, Google’s home page in the United States had 147.7 million unique visitors and 452.6 million average daily page views, according to comScore Media Metrix.
- Google, which takes pride in keeping the home page uncluttered and clean, ran a Droid ad for about 18 hours when the phone launched in November, estimates Trip Chowdhry, managing director at Global Equities Research. He calls the ad “priceless, worth about a trillion dollars,” because no one else has the “privilege” of running an ad on that page.
(www.mediapost.com)
Sony Punctuates A Unified Global Brand Message
By Aaron Baar
- Sony is looking to position itself as the connector between inspiration and perspiration with a new global positioning theme, “make-believe.”
- The “make-believe” theme marks the first time in Sony’s history that it has had a unified global brand message across all of its businesses, from electronics to entertainment to network services.
(www.mediapost.com)
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