Page 129 - Introduction to Electronic Commerce and Social Commerce

118 • Sport, Media and Society

This chapter proposes that sport advertisements sell us something more than the product
advertised; they sell us ourselves by creating a structure in which we and the consumer
goods associated with sport become interchangeable. The chapter demonstrates how the
power of sport advertisements lies in the gaps between what is shown and the meanings
the audience supplies to complete the picture. The importance of difference for advertis-
ers selling their products is explored in relation to the way audiences seek social distinc-
tion through their consumption of advertising imagery. The case studies for the chapter
consider the narrative in a commercial created for Super Bowl XLII in the United States
and advertising sequences broadcast during the 2007 Rugby World Cup in the United
Kingdom.

The Pervasiveness of Advertising

Advertising is everywhere. Dyer (1982: 1) even claimed that the omnipresence of
advertising made it ‘the “official art” of the advanced industrial nations of the west’.

While the most recognisable form of advertising is commercial consumer advertis-
ing, which occupies space throughout the environment, from newspapers, magazines,
and cinemas to billboards, television and the Internet, techniques from advertising
are used by a multitude of noncommercial organisations and institutions to promote
themselves and their services. Increasingly, as individuals, we are asked to draw on
our familiarity with the principles of advertising to market ourselves to potential em-
ployers (or even partners using the plethora of online dating sites). Goddard (2002: 8)
suggested that we should adopt a broad understanding of advertising to ‘encompass
the idea of texts whose intention is to enhance the image of an individual, group or
organisation’.
The relationship between advertising and the mass media is very complex. Ad-
vertising does not just use the media to reach consumers; it is intrinsically integrated
into every aspect of it. There is a symbiotic relationship between editorial control of
media content and the advertising industry. Within the women’s magazine industry,
advertisers as well as readers are considered to be primary customers whose needs
and interests must be considered (Gough-Yates 2003). Gough-Yates (2003: 135)
used the term advertorial to capture the infusion of product promotion into editorials
and celebrity interviews as well as features on travel and food.
The media endorses a way of life that hinges on the consumption of products
being advertised. As early as 1974, Williams argued that advertisements are part of

the flow of television, rather than an interruption to it. Advertising has been just as
successfully integrated into the business of sport, changing its character irrevocably.
The ever-present imprint of advertising on sport equipment and clothing means that

it is difficult to engage in sport without encountering advertising. Advertising is also
the channel that brings the media into the live sport experience. As you sit in the