Where are all the cool Olympic filters I was expecting?

It was recently published in Adweek that seven official brand partners are to run ads in Olympics content via Snapchat’s Live Story and Discover channels: Sony Pictures, Walmart, Dick’s Sporting Goods, Hersey’s, Dunkin’ Donuts, Finish Line and Ford. Other brands (non-official partners) will also be advertising on the popular app. NBC has agreed to allow Snapchat to show highlights from this Summer’s Games in its Live Stories section and the app currently has a dedicated channel curated by Buzzfeed. So, there is obviously great content being pushed viaSnapchat but, here is the thing… I don’t want your vertical snap ads.

I’ve said it before. These ads do nothing to entice users to interact with brands, or promote branded content. Furthermore, impression numbers are amazingly high, but essentially worthless when the user base within Snapchat just swipes the ad away to get back to their friends’ updates.

My first gripe is with vertical snap ads in general. For both advertiser and app user, these ads are not helping either. My second gripe is with the limited amount of sponsored filters available for my personal entertainment. I honestly thought something as monumental as the 2016 Summer Olympics would top the news headlines with a stunt similar to the filter takeover made by X-men in June. So far, I have seen a simple static filter from Chevrolet, and a slightly confusing filter from Beats by Dre.

One possible reason why there are limited branded filters on Snapchat, is the strict, Rule 40, created by the International Olympic Committee in order to protect the rights of Olympic sponsors to its intellectual property (read: buzzwords, hashtags, slogans and logos). Since the official partners each pay around $200 million for a sponsorship, it would make sense that rights to advertise around the Olympics would be exclusive. But, where are all the sponsors?

Furthermore, the rule was recently amended to allow companies who have ongoing contracts with Olympic athletes the opportunity to use those athletes in advertisements starting at least four months before the Games and running continuously. It isn’t yet clear if this new amendment will steer new brands to advertise on Snapchat during the Olympics, but I have yet to see anything close to impressive.

In fact, the best Olympic filters have no branding at all. The best filters I have seen so far are from Snapchat itself. There was one for the opening ceremony with fireworks, another for swimming and another for basketball. The Olympics is probably one of the biggest international events that happens, but brands are clearly not fully capitalizing on the power of user-generated content. A stationary branded filter with a phone floating in water? That’s only cool to people live at the swimming events in Rio. Making it look like my giant head is swinging through the men’s gymnastics rings? That is awesome, and more importantly for brands, 10x more sharable.

Just think if your brand were to initiate a mobile video campaign at the Olympics that included a compelling branded filter with a perk tied-in to further emphasize sharing. At the 2012 Olympic Games in London, there were 500,000 international attendees. Based on campaign statistics from previous Vivoom campaigns, there is typically a 10% participation rate for mobile video filter campaigns at live events. With a perk tied in to video views, based on Vivoom’s actual experience to date, we’d anticipate 200 views per video on average.

500,000 attendees x .10 participants x 200 views per video = 10 MM reach.

Too bad Samsung couldn’t integrate itself into something like that (hint to Samsung, maybe capitalize on this iconic Olympic moment, you’re welcome).