LONDON--As we enter the final month before the London 2012 Olympics, Lord Coe’s rallying call for sponsors to promote their role might just be getting through.

In the last week alone, both EDF Energy and McDonald’s have announced campaigns designed to activate their sponsorships. Both brands have been languishing at the bottom of Sociagility’s London 2012 Social Scoreboard since tracking began in April. But have they left it too late to catch up?
 
If British Airways’ performance is anything to go by, perhaps not; it launched its #HomeAdvantage campaign last week and has already taken 4th spot on Sociagility’s leaderboard, leapfrogging BP – which switched its focus from the practical to emotional aspects of its sponsorship this week. More importantly, the airline’s Potential score has increased significantly, a clear indicator of the engagement suggested by the use of the hashtag.
 
For EDF, the problem is that it’s hard to know exactly where to look. A search for the newly announced strapline, “Helping London 2012 Shine Brighter”, returns just a summary on its corporate website with the rest of the results pointing to news articles announcing the campaign.
 
Other searches reveal that the energy supplier also has a “Feel Better Energy” campaign and a “Thank Yous” website. Dig a little deeper and you eventually find the properties that Sociagility has now added to its tracking: a dedicated London 2012 website in French and English; a Team EDF Facebook page (in French only); and a Live Sport EDF Twitter account (French only again). For those really determined to find it, there’s even a Team EDF YouTube channel. Who knew? One must wonder when the consumers EDF is trying to reach would have just given up looking.
 
Then again, the spray-and-pray online approach of EDF may yet work better than McDonald’s, whose activation – so far as we can tell – has still to take shape online. The burger chain has had a few pages on its UK website for a while, but a search for the “We Make The Games” strapline shows that the £10m campaign has no clear online destination associated with it; or at least not yet. McDonald’s promises that “the digital activation and mood-o-meter will be live throughout London 2012 across Facebook” and the brand’s UK website, so is perhaps keeping its social media powder dry for a while longer.
 
Even so, early indications show a substantial improvement for both brands simply by beginning to use a limited number of social media channels. EDF has shot up the table to take 11th place, whilst McDonald’s has gained six places, up to 16th position.
 
 
At the top of the table P&G and Cadbury continue to battle it out, although there’s still a mountain for the chocolate challenger to climb if it’s to knock the FMCG supremo off the top step of the podium. As Cadbury begins to devote more of its Facebook timeline to its London 2012 sponsorship, it may not be too late for them either.
 
The London 2012 Social Scoreboard tracks all the main London 2012 Olympics sponsors’ social media performance on a daily basis. To find out how the scores have been calculated go to http://www.sociagility.com/olympics/about