Payne, the keynote speaker at the Smart Cities & Sport Summit here, said he is convinced the South American nation "will stage a great Olympic Games" following a successful World Cup this summer but claimed he would give the country "a complete fail" in terms of selling itself to the masses.

"There's a lot of other stuff that's coming together but this is the last step in realising their potential," Payne, creator of the IOC's global marketing programme 30 years ago, told insidethegames.

"It's just very simple.

"President Dilma [Rousseff] needs to create a brands arm - somebody who's got overall responsibility and vision of how to use this opportunity.

"It doesn't need any more investment.

"You've got tourism, you've got each of these divisions,

"They've all got their investments in there but everybody's pulling in a different direction, as oppose to creating a clear message."

Michael Payne says the Brazilian Government is overly focused on "playing catch-up" with the construction of venues for Rio 2016 ©Getty Images



Payne, a long-time advisor of Formula One chief executive Bernie Ecclestone, warned the Brazilian Government is "so focused on playing catch-up" to complete the construction of the Olympic venues on schedule that it's neglecting what he considers to be an extremely important aspect of staging the two biggest sporting events in the world. 
 
"There is no central Government strategy of properly understanding and properly realising how they're going to develop and evolve brand Brazil as a result of hosting the World Cup and the Olympic Games," he said.

"It's a unique opportunity that the Government has failed to get any debate on."

Payne, an advisor on Rio de Janeiro's successful bid to host the 2016 Olympics and Paralympics, claimed that "brand Brazil" is doing "incredible things" from a business perspective but "nobody's talking about it".

He pointed to Great Britain, which has benefited from the legacy of London 2012, as a good example to follow when it comes to evolving a brand image and insisted there is still time for Brazil to rectify the situation, but not much.

The Korean Grand Prix was dropped from the Formula One calendar in 2013 ©Getty Images



As part of a wide-ranging speech at the Smart Cities & Sport Summit, Payne was also very critical of South Korea, hosts of the 2018 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games in Pyeongchang, for what he perceives to be a failure to back up its promises when bidding for major sporting events.

The Korean Grand Prix was dropped from the Formula One World Championship calendar after just four races in December 2013, which, according to Payne, was a direct result of the vision and strategy for the event not being fulfilled. 

"I think Korea is starting to score major own goals and putting so much effort to going and bidding for events, and then totally failing to follow through on their commitments," he told insidethegames.  

"It's starting to do a disservice to brand Korea.

"The previous generation had really understood how to use sport as a vehicle and if they don't change their focus, they're going to start undermining their international reputation."

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