Digital marketing helps Adidas cut ties to sports bodies

The ever-increasing emphasis on sports stars, heightened by social media, is set to further leach cash from athletics.

Even before the doping scandal, it was struggling to compete for funding with other sports; apart from the Olympics, it lacks regular high-profile events that can turn athletes into household names beyond their home countries.

"Athletics isn't a merchandising machine like football is," said Pratt.

Although still far off, the Rio Olympics has a tiny fraction of the followers on social media of the World Cup, the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) and the Tour de France, according to sports marketing research group Repucom.

Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt, sponsored by Puma, is the only really global track and field star of the moment and is set to retire in 2017.
http://news.yahoo.com/digital-marketing-helps-adidas-cut-ties-sports-bodies-125157893--sector.html