Gold's forever, ads aren't

Gold medals might last forever, but ad deals don't.

With four gold medals, two bronze, and two events to go, US swimmer Michael Phelps has reportedly earned millions of dollars in endorsements. His Speedo sponsorship -- complete with a $1 million incentive to topple Mark Spitz's record seven golds in 1972 -- set the media abuzz. And anyone watching NBC's prime-time coverage is sure to have seen his Visa and AT&T Wireless ads.

But a month from now, those ads will most likely be off the air, and to many, Phelps will seem a distant memory -- at least until the 2008 summer games in Beijing. Companies like General Motors Corp., AT&T Wireless, Coca-Cola Co., and Visa pay millions of dollars to become official Olympic sponsors. But for the athletes, advertising professionals said, commercial stints tend to be fleeting, coming once every four years and lasting little more than two weeks.

Even during the Olympics, some advertisers, like the Boston insurance company John Hancock, emphasize the ideals and heritage of the games rather than individual athletes. Unlike professional athletes, who are in the public eye a good portion of the year and whose wealth transforms them into celebrities, Olympic athletes are often unknown and unproven. They're rarely seen by the general public outside of Olympic competition. And out of sight often means out of mind.

''We won't keep running our Olympics ads," said Mark Siegel, spokesman for AT&T Wireless. ''If you do an ad tied to the Super Bowl, it's not going to have a big shelf life. It's the same for the Olympics."

Though the exception rather than the rule, certain Olympic athletes either make comebacks like Spitz has this year or become Olympic-year favorites. Rival cellphone company Sprint PCS brought back gold medal winners Spitz, Mary Lou Retton, Jonny Moseley, and Kristi Yamaguchi for ads showcasing its fair-and-flexible plan and its camera phone.

Athletic shoe and apparel maker adidas blended past and future together. In the ad, 14-year-old Junior National Champion Nastia Liukin performs an uneven bars routine dovetailed with footage of Romanian gymnast Nadia Comaneci's perfect 10 performance from the 1976 Olympic games.

But even the few who remain darlings of the advertising world are typically only trotted out in the weeks immediately before, during, and after the Olympics.

''Phelps will have some marketability for a year," said Bob Hoffman, of Boston ad agency Gearon Hoffman Inc. ''But it's cyclical. Advertisers bring them out for the Olympics."

Visa, an official sponsor of the Olympic Games since 1986, hosts a long roster of US Olympians, including gymnastics individual all-around gold-medal winners Paul Hamm and Carly Patterson. The company featured the women's hockey team in ads for the games at Nagano, women pole vaulters in Sydney, and a female bobsledder at Salt Lake. This year, Visa made an advertising splash at the Super Bowl with top-seeded beach volleyball duo Misty May and Kerri Walsh. The credit card giant plans to run ads promoting the 2006 Winter Games.

''We're proud that we have long-term relationships with these athletes," said Michael Lynch, senior vice president of event and sponsorship marketing for Visa USA. ''But part of what makes the Olympics special is that it happens once every two years, that it's not out there every day in the marketplace."

Though Olympic glory may strike many as nobler pursuit than professional athletics, people develop a deeper relationship with pro athletes, said Cindy Laidlaw, president of The Laidlaw Group, a Boston ad firm.

With an athlete like golfer Tiger Woods, people see his trials and tribulations over a career. People see him fail and return to win again.

The best ads involving Olympians are the ones that introduce you to the athletes and the sport in a more meaningful way, Laidlaw said, such as a Rolex campaign that follows US equestrians beyond the Olympics. ''In Olympics, you don't see a process," Laidlaw said. ''You see a finished product. You see a moment."

Some capitalize on their Olympic glory without the glare of advertising. Mike Eruzione, who scored the winning goal against the Russian hockey team to clinch the gold for the United States in 1980 at Lake Placid, has done a few endorsements, namely when he and his teammates were on the Wheaties box.

But today Eruzione, a Winthrop resident, makes his living as a motivational speaker, primarily addressing corporate audiences. He's paid as much as $25,000 per engagement, and is as sought after today as he was 24 years ago. He imagines Phelps and Hamm will have plenty of advertisers wooing them after these Olympics.

''I would love to do endorsements," Eruzione said. ''The money is good. But it's a short window endorsement-wise, and a longer window speaking-wise."

Naomi Aoki can be reached at naoki@globe.com.