Ambush Marketing by Athletes on Social Media During the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games: A Cross-Cultural Examination of Eight Nations
This study examined social media posts by athletes from eight nations (Australia, Brazil, Germany, Iran, Japan, South Africa, United Kingdom, and United States) with varied applications of the International Olympic Committee Rule 40 during the Tokyo 2020 Summer Olympic Games. Guided by the concept of ambush marketing, we sought to determine to what extent Olympic athletes followed or violated Rule 40 during the Tokyo Games and what impact that had on engagement with their posts. Our quantitative content analysis of 9,387 Instagram posts from 622 athletes revealed that 4.32 percent of posts violated Rule 40, and these posts received significantly less engagement than non-violation posts. Theoretically, our findings contribute to the ambush marketing literature by offering confirmation that athletes from several nations engage in ambush marketing via social media, and athletes developed a new way to circumvent Rule 40 by tagging their personal sponsors within images.