Sponsorship accounted for $17.2 billion of marketing expenditure in North America in 2010, a 3.4 percent increase from the previous year. More than 70 major U.S. companies are each investing more than $15 million per year in sponsorship deals alone. As more brands increase their investment in sponsorship, some key questions about how sponsorship works and how it can more effectively be measured remain.

The full article is published at Quirk’s Market Research Review.

http://www.quirks.com/articles/2011/20110926-2.aspx

Some of the key questions should be answered by research include:

Q. How many target consumers have been engaged by the sponsorship?

A. We know that 15.4 million target consumers are passionate for this property and that almost 10 million can recall our sponsorship. We also know that 6.3 million consumers are delighted that we sponsor it.

Q. Did it impact on our key brand metrics of brand trial, brand advocacy and brand used most often?

A. There are significant lifts on brand performance metrics. These are strongest with passionate fans and those delighted that our brand is associated with the property. The are all directly linked to the sponsorship itself which will be tracked over time to see how they change.

The webinar will provide a case study on measurement approaches.

- Setting measurable objectives
- Case study for motor sport sponsorship ROI
- The role of the the automotive customer and fan
- What to measure and how to measure it
- How to demonstrate the direct link from sponsorship to increased car sales and customer satisfaction.

For sponsors this provides an easy to understand example of approaches to make sponsorship ROI measurement. For properties and those involved in motor sport it provides key information on delivering sponsorship ROI.

Registration is free.

For Tuesday February 1st 2011 the scheduled times are: North America 4.00pm to 5.00pm EST Time.

To register for the webinar simply register on our webinar page. http://www.sponsormap.com/webinars/ 

If you cannot attend this webinar but would like to view it in the future you can simply join our mailing list and check back to see the schedule of webinars dealing with the specific issues of measuring sponsorship ROI.

Sponsors had claimed that they need a better sense of ROI for their investments that media measurement or other claims of ROI that properties were providing to sponsors. In short, sponsors were demanding that the properties be responsible for providing the ROI to the sponsors. The issue has manifested itself in several measurement approaches that by default let sponsors not become involved in the measurement process. In no way are the sponsors clearly sharing their objectives to the properties, yet at the same time demanding better measurement of the ROI.

The fundamental problem is that sponsors need to take ownership of their own objectives. They need to ensure that their sponsorship objectives are clear and align with the companies overall marketing objectives. This sounds obvious but it is the critical point to which the issue and challenge of sponsorship measurement revolves. If a sponsor lacks clear sponsorship objectives, then they place the onus of measuring sponsorship ROI onto the property. They would therefore expect a property to provide sponsorship ROI on their behalf. This immediately puts the property in a position where it needs to second guess a sponsors key business objectives and motivations for their investment.

How would a property know the business objectives of a sponsor? Virtually no sponsors include properties in their company strategy meetings or in a company plan. Properties simply do not have the insider view of a sponsors objectives and it is unrealistic to expect them to know the sponsors business.

Given a lack of clear objectives, the default measurement approach has been to traditionally use media valuation and sponsorship scorecard systems. Both these methods can be easily used as they are not based on the sponsor’s key business objectives. Hence, properties use these methods in providing sponsorship ROI to sponsors.

The main criticism of the sponsorship ROI by sponsors is related to these measurements not being sufficient to demonstrate sponsorship ROI. The sponsor wants to know if a sponsorship is selling more cars or beer for example. It is a big ‘so what’ if all the sponsorship ROI is about is about counting a logo or rating the sponsorship on a scale of 1 to 10.

It has to come back to the ownership of the ROI measurement process. Only sponsors can really measure their sponsorship ROI, as they know the business objectives and are in a better position to ensure that any ROI justification is in a language that demonstrates a sound understanding of their business. Properties are not in a position to really provide the insight that a sponsor needs, instead they should be focused on doing what they do best which is engaging with fans and providing a marketing opportunity for a sponsor.

Sponsors need to step forward and take ownership of the measurement process as this is not something that a property should have to provide to a sponsor. The methodologies are available for market orientated sponsorship ROI but this is only something that the sponsors can drive forward, never the properties.

Importantly, SponsorMap is applied for to provide meaningful measurements of deliverables from a sponsorship.

Unfortunately, many arts organizations do not highlight many of these key elements when seeking sponsorship. Many of the sponsorship proposals from arts organizations are well thought out and have a good sense of style about them but there is often something missing in terms of the value proposition. The value of the arts sponsorship is not ‘consumer-centric’, instead it is focused on a sales package incentives as if they were selling to sponsors the same messages as what you would use to sell to the audience. Too much about selling a sales package and not enough about a potential sponsors marketing and corporate objectives.

The value of arts sponsorship is that it can achieve results for sponsors in ways that cannot be achieved from other forms of marketing. The best advertising, digital media or public relations campaign is often unable to achieve the same type of results. The unique aspects of arts sponsorship simply cannot be replicated with other types of marketing or sponsorship types. This is evident from a measurement perspective, especially in understanding the sponsorship ROI itself.

When looking at value arts sponsorship from a ROI perspective, the attraction of arts sponsorships is related to several key factors.

The Target Audience

Firstly, passion for arts properties is very specific to a target audience. It is highly targeted and more often than not, this particular segment of the market is a hard to reach by conventional marketing methods. The key aspect is the passion. Now with SponsorMap, we use a benchmark called the PassionIndex to measure the level of emotional engagement to properties. The stronger the passion, the higher the level of engagement.

In the example below are results taken from a national sample of adults 16+ that was representative of the the general population. What is shown is the specific analysis of the high income, female segment of the national market. This segment obviously is very appealing for many businesses that wish to build relationships with existing or prospective customers. Whether it is financial products, fashion or prestige cars, this target audience is a key market segment for many companies.

Passion Index Ratings Arts Property in a Segmented Market

Looking at the PassionIndex slide it is clear with this consumer segment arts properties strongly engage with them. Hence, if there is a high level of emotional engagement then that by itself is attractive as corporations can build relationships through sponsorship with these types of arts properties. It is important to remember that the market needs to be segmented to identify opportunities for consumer engagement and this process does often highlight good opportunities in the arts area for sponsorship that can be missed. Not every type of consumer is open to arts sponsorship, but the key consideration is that there are segments of the overall general public that are receptive.

Sponsor Fit/Brand Alignment
Is the partnership between the sponsor and the arts property a good brand alignment? Does it enhance a sponsor’s brand image? This is often mentioned as a key deliverable of all types of sponsorship. It is actually something that can be fairly easily measured as it is just a matter of asking the right questions. A good quantitative survey can be used to do this. Typical results from arts sponsorships are shown in the slide below.

Brand Enhancement of Sponsorship

It shows the image attributes of the sponsor and how the sponsorship is enhancing them. In this case, it is about the arts sponsor property influencing the image ratings of the brand. Ideally, we would demonstrate this with a control sample or a pre and post measurement, but this will often suffice for most sponsorship evaluations for the arts.

Sponsor Appreciation
This is a very strong feature of arts sponsorship. Sponsors of arts properties tend to rate very highly on this measure, meaning there is a strong level of overall appreciation to sponsors for their involvement. They are seen to have done the ‘good thing’ and helped something that is of importance to people. This influence is what as known as Balance Theory, it is the change in attitudes to a sponsor/brand that occurs due to the direct involvement with the property. People will adjust their attitudes to a corporation because they are perceived to have done the right thing. (Not everybody feels appreciation, some feel in more than others and some do not feel it at all.) In the example below, brand advocacy is strongly influence by the appreciation felt towards the sponsor based on gratitude, as measured by the Gratitude Index.

Sponsor Appreciation Enhances the Value of Sponsorship Itself

With arts sponsorships, this influence can deliver major dividends for sponsors and is an influence not generated from other forms of traditional marketing communications such as advertising. Hence, when measuring the value of an arts sponsorship it is essential to demonstrate the gratitude to a sponsor for their involvement as arts sponsorship perform very well on this measure. This is a unique feature that should be emphasized as the impact can be quite dramatic.

Survey methods are highly recommended to measure the contribution of an arts sponsorship. There are several reasons, namely sponsorship is about attitude and behavior change for a sponsor, without this there is no ROI. Sponsorship’s impact is only felt if it achieves a modest amount of attitude and behavioural change. Other measures are also useful, but should be viewed provides additional metrics of overall contribution. If you have them then that is terrific as they build the overall case for the value of the sponsorship overall.

It should be remembered that demonstrating the appeal of the arts sponsorship to prospective sponsors and subsequently linking it to the sponsor’s own objectives in a measurable way provides a strong case for sponsorship. Likewise, for corporations considering sponsorship of the arts, there are ways in which a well planned sponsorship can drive marketing and business results much more effectively than traditional marketing communication methods.

Overall it is the consumer-centric approaches to sponsorship that is the best way to measure value. What is important how audiences emotionally engage with a brand/property partnership in the arts. That is the foundation of the business case for arts sponsorships and the reason why it can be a power relationship building tool for any Marketing Director or CEO looking at the arts.

Current list of attendees include:
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It’s an interesting result as it does underscore the key differences between sponsorship and other forms of marketing communication. Advertising is communicating to consumers in an interruption mode wheres sponsorship communicates to people in a passion mode through a property.

In terms of consumer behaviour, a property will have higher trust from a fan than a company. People are passionate about their teams and heros and have a much higher level of trust towards them. A golf fan is going to much more likely to let Tiger Woods into their house than a complete stranger. When brands associate with properties (such as Tiger Woods) they borrow some of that ‘trust’ through association.

Trust is something that is earned from both a brand and a property. It is a rare commodity in today’s saturated marketing environment. Certainly, these survey results do highlight that in terms of sponsorship ROI and effectiveness one of the key dimensions for sponsors that can be improved is consumer trust.

The webinar is free and is for those properties, sponsors and agencies seeking to learn more about sponsorship measurement. A presentation is conducted via the internet with a conference call and IM to allow for interaction from participants.

The main areas covered include:

• The Business Case for Measuring Sponsorship
• Understanding Sponsorship Theory and how it relates to measurement
• Developing a measurement plan based on clear sponsorship objectives
• An explanation of the various methods for measuring sponsorship
• Examination of some case studies from both sponsors and properties
• Issues particular to properties, sponsors and agencies
• Q&As

The following schedule for is for June:

US/Americas Zone

• June 23rd Tuesday US ET 2.00pm to 3.30pm

Asia/Pacific Zone

To register your interest please leave your registration details. Once registered we will send a reminder email with more information on the webinar.

The question often asked about sports marketing and sponsorship itself is how effective is it? It is a fairly straightforward question and it really is a something that is a key issue any CEO, Marketing Director, Finance Director would be expected to question. Answering this question does generally require market research as a key component of the evaluation process. This is because both attitudes and behavior metrics are usually part of the overall business objectives. (See the Sponsorship Research & ROI presentation for more details on objective measurement).

Looking at the results of SponsorMap evaluations we can take a deeper look at what tends to drive a high performance sponsorship as opposed to one that is less effective. (A high performance sponsorship delivers above required business and marketing objectives).

In the attached diagram involves results based on various types of sponsors and property types from sports through to TV sponsorship and looking at different categories of sponsors as well. They include variety of evaluations that have conducted for sponsors in more than 18 markets.

One the left axis we measured the Passion Index, or passion that the target audience feels towards the sponsored property. The higher the emotional bond to the property, the higher the Passion Index. Generally, this means that the property (eg., sporting team, league, event or personality) that has the high rating has the strongest appeal to a target audience. Properties with less emotional appeal have a lower Passion Index rating. Sponsors generally, seek properties that have the highest appeal to the target audience itself and naturally these properties themselves tend to be more valuable.

On the horizontal axis we measure sponsor appreciation (Gratitude Index). This is a measure of the level of appreciation that a targeted audience feels towards the sponsor based on their sponsorship itself. Appreciation has be influenced by activation strategy, goodwill and general sponsorship fit itself. Some sponsors do not create a lot of appreciation if it is simply a logo viewing experience, but others that activate the sponsorship and engage consumers can create appreciation with consumers in the process. A well planned sponsorship integrated into a variety of marketing activities can certainly improve this rating.

Now the diagram below shows the Passion Index and Gratitude Index ratings from sponsorships where people were able to recall the sponsor itself. So we are looking at all those being aware of the sponsor, so it is a sponsorship related impact we are examining in detail.

What is interesting is that the high performance sponsorships have often involved both a high level of passion to the property and strong appreciation to the sponsor itself. The are the sponsorships most likely to achieve the best results.

There are always exceptions to the rule, but the implication for sponsorship itself should be a focus on effective property selection together with effective sponsorship activation. Many in the industry would already know this, but if anything, our research does tend to confirm good industry best practice. Nevertheless,  we are continuing to develop useful benchmarks for industry performance that should better answer the question on how to measure sponsorship effectiveness.

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