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The biggest show on earth is coming to town. The London Olympics in 2012 provides enormous potential for brands, to drive sales, consolidate their market standing, reposition themselves and possibly create a once-in-a-lifetime brand association. But it all comes at a risk.

Alongside the huge level of investment necessary, any sporting success, as England's long-suffering football fans can attest, is not guaranteed. Then there's the danger that a team or individual players will behave unpredictably and go off message.

The Tour de France, once a shining example of Corinthian spirit, is still reeling from a string of recent drug scandals, and horse-racing - the so-called sport of kings - continues to face allegations of race-fixing.

With the London Games still more than five years away, brands need to start acting now to gain the full benefits of any Olympic link-up. However, that leaves plenty of time for plans to go awry and cause a brand serious trouble.

Any company thinking of a sporting tie-up first has to select the right sport with which to get involved. Is football's Premiership a must, or can niche activities do more for you for less of an outlay? Do you back a team or an individual, or are you better off looking at involving the wider community by driving a promotion at grassroots level?

Picking the right sport entails basic but vital rules, yet David Farrow, managing director at 141's sports and entertainment division, says many people still ignore them. "As well as the activity itself, you have to closely consider the promotional brand awareness you can get - whether it be POP, digital messages etc - and be absolutely clear that you are getting the most out of the property for the price you are paying," he says. "Never buy expensive rights you don't need."

Farrow says the key to success is to find a link with the target audience's passions. His outfit does that by using its Sport Z research tool (a spin-off of parent company WPP's Brand Z), which takes information on sports and competitions, along with conventional data such as interviews with fans, and crunches them with statistics from TGI to show brand fit.

Farrow cites a campaign that 141 created for Vodafone when the telecom giant was sponsor of Ferrari's Formula One team. "Formula One is fantastically popular, but can be distant from fans in terms of geography, accessibility and expense. We wanted to bring it closer," he explains. "We created the Vodafone Ferrari Racetrack, for which we got four Ferrari F1 cars and turned them into virtual racing machines using racing programmes from EA Sports. We put the cars on a flatbed truck and toured the country. Vodafone customers texted for the chance to "race" Michael Schumacher and win a range of Vodafone/Ferrari-related prizes. It proved extremely popular."

Once a company or brand has completed its research and secured the access it wants, there is still much more work to be done, warns BD-Ntwk group account director Sarah Bentley. "You have to be careful - it's not just about getting the right fee for the rights, you have to ensure that you have the right execution budget."

Bentley joined the agency from the commercial department of football's Team England, and one of BD-Ntwk's most high-profile clients is long-time soccer supporter Coca-Cola. The soft drinks giant's campaigns have included sponsoring the World Cup with a month-long ticket giveaway, but it has also supported the other end of the footballing scale, and backed the Football League with campaigns such as Win a Player. It's no surprise then that Bentley believes a well executed lower-profile sport campaign can punch above its weight.

BD-Ntwk won the account to drive Norwich Union's sponsorship of athletics late last year. Although Bentley remains tight-lipped on the work her agency will be creating, Norwich Union has been an impressive supporter of track and field since it became the sport's headline sponsor in 1999. Last April, the insurance company signed a six-year, £50 million contract, the biggest sports sponsorship deal outside the Premiership.

Lower profile sports often cost less to support and provide a less crowded market. However, if only the big names will do, there is plenty of scope for unofficial work. Dave Lawrence, director at The Promotions Practice, says: "The cost of sponsorship is huge and sheer presence is not enough. Consumers often struggle to name official brand partners and misattribute them to non-official brands. Nike, for instance, often gets greater mention than Adidas for World Cup sponsorship."

When bakery brand Kingsmill approached Dynamo ahead of last year's World Cup, the ensuing promotion focused on mums and TV viewing. Dynamo planning director Jules MacIntyre says: "Roll on Summer was about shared family time and offered mums the chance to deliver a supporters' kit to her "family of fans" making them the heroes of the people watching big matches."

Once you've decided which sport to back, you will need to consider whether to back a team, such as England, or attempt to piggyback on the appeal of individuals, such as David Beckham or Wayne Rooney.

"There's less of a risk with a team, but you aren't able to capitalise on an icon," says Momentum business development director Simon White. "Then again, secure an icon and you run the risk of infamy. The key driver is the type of campaign you intend to run. Do you want to support a single event or acquire an asset to front a brand. And how much longevity do you require?"

Promotions can suffer if the face of the brand gets injured. "Rooney had a variety of sponsorships ahead of the 2006 World Cup and he was injured before the tournament," says BD-Ntwk's Bentley. One of his deals was Coke's ticket giveaway, but the brand stuck with Rooney who eventually did play in the finals. But other campaigns linked to the player were shelved. "Asda decided to pull a lot of its creative. Then they brought in Michael Owen and he got injured too," says Bentley.

Teams come with their own issues too. The work you do with sport stars can be limited by their own deals and teams operate rotation systems so each player gets equal exposure.

Football may be the world's biggest sport, but the amount of money in the game attracts widespread criticism and even some hardcore fans are cynical, according to London agency Space, which interviewed 1,500 fans during the last World Cup. "We asked if fans felt that sponsors care about football and 52.3 per cent said no," says Space managing partner David Atkinson.

A community-based promotion is one way to silence the cynics. Space marketing manager James Ralley says fast-food giant McDonald's has worked hard to build sporting credibility. "It identified a shortage of football coaches and has recruited more than 10,000 in three years. This resonates with McDonald's target market, and creates believability and brand affinity."

As Britain prepares to welcome the world to the 2012 London Games, the opportunities for marketers are clear. An Olympic title is the highest sporting accolade and its champions are feted as heroes. Despite the risks, it's a once-in-a-lifetime chance for UK promoters to capture the spirit of taking part and bask in the reflected glory of the ultimate sporting bonanza.

CARLSBERG WORLD CUP 2006 - CASE STUDY
Brand: Carlsberg
Client: Carlsberg Breweries
±±¾©Èü³µpk10: 2006 ... Probably
Agency: Billington Cartmell
Timing: Summer 2006
Budget: Undisclosed

Objectives

Carlsberg aimed to capitalise on its status as official beer of the England football team with an integrated campaign for the off and on trade.

Strategy

Designed to tap into fans' desire to show their support for England, the push took Carlsberg's famous slogan, "Probably the best lager in the world", and translated it into a message of belief: "2006 ... Probably".

An on-pack text-to-win promotion offered one million specially-produced Carlsberg pint glasses, embossed with the official England Three Lions badge. The glass appeared on all point-of-sale activity held proudly aloft to suggest the winning team holding the trophy.

Reflecting the on-trade sales emphasis during the World Cup, initiatives included giving out stamps in pubs on match days to get the branded glass, external signage, live match posters, gamecards, prize draws and POS support in the form of displays on taps, known as font wraps. The campaign also featured national and regional press with the latter used to name the Carlsberg pubs where England fans could congregate to show their support.

Results

Sales of on-trade Carlsberg grew 33 per cent faster than the draught lager category as a whole during the World Cup, according to AC Nielsen. In the off trade, the sales uplift of Carlsberg multipacks was 48 per cent greater than the rise in sales during Euro 2004. And Carlsberg enjoyed its biggest overall sales rise in the total take-home market, 30 per cent up on the sales increase during Euro 2004. Carlsberg marketing director Darran Britton said: " Sales surpassed our high expectations. This fantastic result is testament to our integrated marketing campaigns."