Key lessons from the Olympics

Medal trays for the 2024 Summer Olympic Games in Paris by Louis Vuitton

The 2024 Paris Olympic Games was a major cultural event, reversing the sharp decline in viewership that had hit a low during the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics.

Whether you like sports or not, the Olympics are more than just an entertainment event or a source for viral memes.

The event catalyzed important discussions on social topics like inclusivity, nationality, or gender.

It also had a significant impact on the stock market. Recently, Amer Sports, which owns brands like Wilson, Salomon, and Atomic, reported major gains. Nike and Lululemon continue to grow in the footwear and apparel sectors.

The reason is simple: people are inspired to take up sports and they want to feel good while doing that. The Olympics and the wider discussions around sports have made consumers’ needs more salient. Today, these lucrative gaps are being filled by brands that finally recognize people come in many different sizes and shapes—and that women do sports too.

The Olympics also teaches us how to choose the right marketing partner. Snoop Dogg single-handedly owned the event by resonating with a younger audience through humor and an informal approach. It was such a big success that Solo Stove launched a second campaign with Snoop Dogg after the Olympics, even though the first one “did not lead to the sales lift that [they] had planned.”

The key takeaway for brands is a no-brainer, really: know your audience. Not only sports but many other industries often fail to address the diverse needs & wants of their (potential) customers. Internal team biases and data blindness have to go.

Tools & Tactics

We select helpful tools and useful new ways of working. Find a signal in the noise of software.

01 TextBrew

Turn EAN codes into product descriptions & reduce your content creation time by up to 90%. TextBrew extracts product features from the web (text, reviews, and images). Seamlessly integrate it into your existing workflow and generate high-quality content for Amazon, bol.com, or Shopify. Test it out yourself.

02 UX Sniff

Improve your website's UX and boost conversions with UXsniff, an AI-powered tool that autonomously analyzes session recordings and identifies abnormal click patterns.

03 Told

Told is an easy-to-use survey tool that lets you collect user feedback and understand your data in seconds. It adapts to your communication channels and is available in over 15 languages.

Trends & Strategy

Curated content from the information overload we call the Internet.
Insights and inspiration on business, e-commerce, and investing.

Game Face: How Beauty Brands Are Scoring Big with Women's Sports

15 min read

Future Commerce

“Female Athletes drive twice the social media engagement of their male counterparts. Fans of women's sports are deeply invested in the athletes' lifestyles and values, often following their journeys both on and off the field.”

Full article

What Do Your Running Clothes Say About You? These Brands Bet a Whole Lot

10 min read

The Wall Street Journal/Photo by Simon Caspersen for Sasky

“As running becomes more popular, its outfits have evolved to suit a more diverse community. Today’s runners aren’t just looking for function in their performance apparel; they want a kit that expresses who they are outside of the sport, too.”

Full article

Snoop Dogg and Solo Stove Reunite in Even Blunter Campaign

10 min read

Photo by Pete Dovgan

“The campaign incorporates learnings from the first effort that sparked an industry debate. Hot on the heels of his gig at the Olympic Games in Paris, Snoop stars in “Blunt Marketing” for Solo Stove, a maker of premium firepits.
The campaign is a follow-up to the brand’s “Snoop Goes Smokeless,” which went viral and sparked an industrywide debate about the effectiveness of celebrity-driven marketing.”

Full article

Visually appealing

An installation designed by Random Studio at Nike’s House of Innovation in Paris tracked users’ breath using AI.

As you step into the experience, a small thermal camera measures your changing breath rate, reflecting it back in the form of a unique, glowing ‘Aura’ portrait and light installation. As if breathing with the visitor, the space itself changes in sync with the Aura portrait. ⁠