Blueprint for strategic sponsorship

A Blueprint for Strategic Sponsorship By Janus Kodadek

Blueprint for Strategic Sponsorship 2

Executive Summary

Given the authentic passion and loyalty that many consumers possess for sport, music, art, and entertainment, marketers have long embraced sponsorship as a means to develop brand equity.

Most early sponsorships were driven by ‘Chairman’s whim,’ and focused on gaining exposure and awareness, often through logo displays and branded signage. For many organisations, this is still the dominant approach, but more commonly, contemporary sponsorships attempt a more integrated approach, with a focus on consumer engagement and the achievement of multiple objectives, short and longer term.

Sponsorship remains an important option in a marketer’s toolkit, with new approaches that address and capitalize on the changing market context. Moreover, used strategically, sponsorship can offer a competitive advantage in the current market environment.

This report outlines a five-‐step blueprint to guide marketers in creating effective strategic sponsorship platforms. Drawing on diverse perspectives, this methodology offers a holistic approach that incorporates best practice principles from integrated marketing communications; experiential and digital marketing; service dominant logic; brand and sponsorship strategy; and real world insights from a range of senior-‐level brand marketing and sponsorship professionals, coupled with illustrative case studies of innovative sponsorship activations.

• Authenticate: Clearly define goals and objectives for the sponsorship, leading with strategic business objectives. Anchor the sponsorship in consumer insight to ensure that the sponsorship platform is relevant and authentic to the target consumer base.

• Correlate: A strategic sponsorship platform requires “fit for purpose,” that is, congruence between the strategic objectives set forth in the first step and choice of partner. Such “fit” will ensure the relationship will deliver the raw materials needed to achieve success. Foster a true partnership, ensuring that the strategic goals of both parties are viewed as equally important. Based on reciprocity, the sponsor-‐rights holder relationship becomes a marketing alliance rather than a transactional arrangement.

• Collaborate: Assets and activations that are created collaboratively between sponsor and rights-‐holder enable the brand to use the property as a conduit through which it connects with the target audience. This allows the brand to create a bond with the audience, rather than simply an association with the property.

• Activate: Having completed the planning process, activation is where the sponsorship comes to life for the consumer, offering the opportunity to innovate products and services, foster differentiation, communicate a brand’s proposition, stimulate consumer engagement and co-‐creation.

• Evaluate: In a strategic approach, evaluation should focus on determining if pre-‐existing objectives have been achieved.


Introduction

Given the authentic passion and loyalty that many consumers possess for sport, music, art, and entertainment, marketers have long embraced sponsorship as a means to develop brand equity.

Most early sponsorships were driven by ‘Chairman’s whim,’ and focused on gaining exposure and awareness, often through logo displays and branded signage. For many organisations, this is still the dominant approach, but more commonly, contemporary sponsorships attempt a more integrated approach, with a focus on consumer engagement and the achievement of multiple objectives, short and longer term.

Sponsorship remains an important option in a marketer’s toolkit, with new approaches that address and capitalize on the changing market context. Moreover, used strategically, sponsorship can offer a competitive advantage in the current market environment.

Since the mid-‐1990s, rapid innovations in technology and widespread access to the Internet have profoundly altered marketing communications, shifting power from the marketer and channel to consumers. This change has given consumers unprecedented control over the messages they receive and the ability to avoid those messages that are unwelcome. Traditional marketing communications tactics, where messages are simply pushed at consumers, have become increasingly less effective as consumers embrace the opportunity to be active participants in defining their relationship with brands. As access to information has democratized, media has become fragmented.

Many brands have embraced the concept1 that the perception (or value) of a brand is jointly created – based on both what the brand communicates about itself, as well as the consumer’s own experience of the brand. Also called “co-‐creation,” this occurs whenever consumers interact with a company’s touch points or products. Sponsorships can provide experiences and messages that can be used to enrich consumer‘s own interpretation (co-‐creation) of the brand.

Experiences are inherently personal and unique to each individual, subject to interpretation and affect based on that person’s collective knowledge and past experiences. If a consumer experiences a brand in a memorable way (positive or negative), he or she is more likely to share the experience and take action. An experience cannot be skipped over like a television commercial. The ultimate goal is to create marketing that does not feel like marketing, where the brand resonates as a relevant and authentic part of a consumer’s life.

Today’s sponsorship is both strategic and versatile; it can drive a brand’s entire marketing program, propel strategic value for an organisation, be centred at the heart of employee engagement programs and reduce costs through partner synergies.

The whole reason you go into a partnership is to do something different from the normal channels. The modern consumer has so much grasping his/her attention that you have to have added value,

and partnerships are a great way of finding that added value. Managing Director, Sponsorship Agency

1 Service Dominant Logic: Customers are no longer seen as buying goods or services, but rather products that provide a service. The value of that service is determined by and dependent on need and consumer experience. For example, a customer would buy a pen, however according to service dominant logic, the customer is actually purchasing an instrument to enable him or her (or another consumer) to write. The value of that instrument is dictated by both need (real or perceived) and the unique experience of using that instrument. This redefines ‘value’ as ‘co-‐created’ between the brand, product and consumer.


Brands first tried to talk to consumers while they were walking down the road. Then the savvier brands thought ‘we need to interact with these people.’ Now, it’s moved beyond that, where consumers are

deciding what brands do and how they operate. So, the savviest brands are looking first and foremost to their consumers and trying to understand their consumers through the medium of social media – which is even easier to do now. Then they can twist their own activities to that, to function to that, to co-‐create.

That’s why sponsorship is great – it’s great for co-‐creation. Managing Director, Marketing Agency

A Blueprint for Strategic Sponsorship The following outlines a five-‐step blueprint to guide marketers in creating effective strategic sponsorship platforms (Figure 1). Drawing on diverse perspectives, this methodology offers a holistic approach that incorporates best practice principles from integrated marketing communications; experiential marketing; service dominant logic; brand and sponsorship strategy; and insights from a range of senior-‐level brand marketing and sponsorship professionals.

The steps that follow should be considered fluid and not necessarily linear. As an organization goes through the strategic process, new ideas will likely arise, requiring that the organisation reiterate the relevant steps as needed.

Figure 1: Blueprint for Strategic Sponsorship


AUTHENTICATE

Lead with Business Objectives The organisation must clearly define goals and objectives for the sponsorship – a seemingly obvious step that is sometimes overlooked. A starting point would be analysing overall organizational goals, strengths, and needs in light of what outcomes the sponsorship could deliver (Figure 2).

Figure 2: Some potential outcomes of strategic sponsorship

By linking sponsorship objectives to delivering on overall organisational objectives, the sponsorship will directly support (and become a driver of) the organisation’s value creation strategy.

For example, if expansion of the brand’s global footprint is identified as an organisational goal, corresponding sponsorship goals might be gaining access to new markets or channels, and/or inspiring new product and service lines relevant to those markets. Partnering with another entity that has established equity within a desired target market may shorten or circumvent the process of developing brand awareness. Alternatively, having developed equity and expertise in those markets, the partnered entity could provide critical market intelligence. These advantages, in turn, may allow the organisation to expand more rapidly into this new

Through partnerships you can reach more customers than you would’ve done on your own. You can get into categories and pick up attributes that will allow you to

create future platforms. You can migrate to future areas and share knowledge, R&D, etc.

Director, Strategy Agency


market, providing inroads, incremental marketing exposure and ultimately gaining new customers.

The most cost-‐effective sponsorships platforms will achieve multiple goals for the organisation externally and internally. For example, Marketing might focus on building relationships with customers through the sponsorship, while Human Resources could use it to encourage employee loyalty, thereby improving workforce retention.

In order to achieve multiple goals, it is necessary to secure buy-‐in from a range of internal stakeholders (Board, management and employees), and commitment to use the sponsorship within their own functional area. Their departmental needs and concerns must be understood and addressed and, whenever possible, their requests represented in negotiations of rights and assets. By considering these opportunities from the very beginning, internal stakeholders can become key ambassadors for the sponsorship, thereby reducing friction, fostering support and encouraging ideas and utilisation from across the business.

Rights holders who have a strategic vision and want to achieve success in different parts of the world will look beyond the cash to certain brands, understanding the

value they bring over and beyond the cash. We have no representation in a lot of the markets in which we want

to grow. Partners are key to gaining access, fully aligned with our global marketing plan.

Marketing Director, Sport Rights Holder

Ground the Sponsorship in Consumer Insight Anchoring the sponsorship in consumer insight at the onset will ensure that the sponsorship platform is authentic and relevant to the target consumer base. Using deep knowledge about the target consumer as a foundation to guide sponsorship choices should inspire potential sponsorship properties and activation programmes to consider.

If a sponsoring organisation has truly intimate insights into the target market, it can develop initiatives that deeply engage consumers, fostering brand connection and loyalty. To get the needed depth of insight, brands will need to look beyond demographic surveys and syndicated research. Such insights include psychographics, an understanding of customer motivations, self-‐definitions, group norms, and peer influences; as well as an honest appraisal of the customer’s psychological relationship and experience with the brand, property and competitor brands.

Property Creation Property creation is an increasingly attractive and innovative alternative to a traditional sponsorship platform especially in crowded markets and with brands seeking to utilize their consumer insight to build customer intimacy or show that they are authentically entrenched in a subculture. Creating a proprietary brand property, such as a grassroots sport competition or ‘insider’ content series can be very resource intensive and may not be an appropriate or feasible solution for every brand. However, property creation offers a brand many benefits: total ownership over implementation; control over every element of the experience; potential to offset some of the financial liability by selling sponsorships to non-‐competitive brands; and reducing risk by allowing the brand to fully control the choice of other brands affiliated with the property, reducing access to non-‐compatible partners.

The most innovative ideas come, not from sponsorship, but rather property creation. Tapping into the

personality of the audience and creating a [property] that reflects that personality… Brands are moving more

into ownership, event creation and experiential. Creation, full stop. Not feeling the need for a traditional partnership to secure what they think they want to do.

Entertainment Director, Integrated Agency


Case Study | Gatorade REPLAY

Utilising Consumer Insight to Create Passion-driven Marketing Programs In January 2009, Gatorade created an event reuniting the original players of two rival American high school teams (now in their mid-‐30s) to replay the tied final game from their senior year, breaking a sixteen-‐year deadlock in a full-‐contact, regulation football game. The company’s aim was to reignite athletic excitement and rekindle product sales in men over thirty, 70% of whom do not exercise regularly.

They called the event REPLAY.

Bringing together the Easton Area Red Rovers (Easton, Pennsylvania) and the Philipsburg Stateliners (Philipsburg, New Jersey), Gatorade used the re-‐training of the amateur athletes as a visceral backdrop to seamlessly demonstrate the product’s functional benefit (fuelling athletic performance) and showcase its value proposition. The experience became a catalyst for athletic achievement through multiple, coordinated mediums.

Originally broadcast through a series of web episodes, fans all over the world watched as the teams experienced the opportunity of every athlete’s dreams: a second chance at victory. Capturing the personal struggles and achievements of various players, viewers were introduced to the Gatorade Sports Science Institute (GSSI) through a series of training camps and programs developed to get the players back into game shape. The GSSI included coaching from Eagles head coach Andy Reid and all-‐pro running back, Brian Westbrook, at the Eagles training facility. The training program, entitled ‘Eight Weeks to Glory,’ was available online, along with a Facebook application that helped followers reunite their own former teams.

As Game Day grew near, the culture of the two rival towns was further highlighted, with some of the original cheerleaders and marching band members joining to support their respective teams.

Tickets for the rematch sold out in 90 minutes, as 15,000 enthusiastic fans came out in unseasonably warm 32°C (90°F) weather to watch. The 104th meeting of the two teams was led by honorary coaches, Gatorade athletes and NFL quarterbacks Peyton and Eli Manning. The Phillipsburg Stateliners broke the 16-‐year tie, winning 27-‐12.

Based on a $225,000 paid media spend, the campaign reportedly generated over $3 million in media coverage, partially driven by frequent coverage in sports news roundups. Regional product sales grew by 63%. The original online web episode series was made into a documentary TV series broadcast to 90 million households on Fox Sports Net.

Winning two Cannes Lions, a Brand Experience and an Effie Award, the campaign inspired thousands of athletes to petition to be selected for future seasons. Two subsequent seasons pitted rival hockey and basketball teams for epic rematches. All told, the REPLAY series continued to affirm Gatorade’s significance to both professional and amateur athletes.


Brands will need to understand and capitalise on new channels of communication, methods of consumption, and expectations around when, where and how consumers buy and use products and services. Age, gender and location no longer offer reliable indicators of what a consumer may desire or purchase, nor of skill with digital technology.

Any success in a sponsorship campaign comes from simplicity. We can sit in ivory towers in West London

dreaming up wonderful plans, forgetting that our target audience is going to have three seconds of interaction

with our brand on a poster as they whip past in a car or a train. They’re not going to be privy to our brand

onions and things like that. I think that whatever you do needs to boil down to consumer insight so they just get

it and not be too complicated. Managing Director, Marketing Agency

CORRELATE

Ensure “Fit for Purpose”

Historically, the term “fit” referred to congruence of brand elements between property and sponsor or celebrity endorser and sponsor. However, a strategic sponsorship platform requires “fit for purpose,” that is, congruence between the strategic objectives set forth in Step 1, and choice of partner. Such “fit” will ensure the relationship will deliver the raw materials needed to achieve success.

A successful partnership will rest on a foundation of clarity around the brand’s and rights holder’s DNA, brand proposition and clear insight into the target audience.

The brand should make an honest appraisal of the target market’s present relationship and experience (positive or negative) with the brand, as well as the physical and digital assets needed to create engaging activations. These insights will help the brand assess the fit of potential partners.

In evaluating properties, the sponsoring organisation should consider all factors relevant to the successful outcome of the strategy. These include the property’s own brand, objectives, timeline and target audience. Most importantly, however, is whether the partnership will be able to communicate and activate the brand’s proposition, as the sponsored property becomes the vehicle for connecting with the target consumer.

Sometimes a brand, like RedBull, is already embedded in a subculture and the appropriate partner is obvious, while other times the organisation wants to develop new or deepen existing associations.

At this early stage, it is useful to consider activation plans and how to evaluate the success of the platform, that is, which metrics will be used; both activation plans and evaluation metrics will help ensure that the brand negotiates the required rights and assets.

Ultimately, whilst a partnership needs to sit very well alongside a brand strategy and be integrated into an overall marketing strategy, if your consumers don’t care about jazz music and you’re going into a jazz partnership, you’re not going to achieve anything.

Entertainment Director, Marketing Agency


Questions to help guide leveraging and activation

In her paper Last Generation Sponsorship, leading sponsorship expert Kim Skildum-‐Reid suggests that selection and negotiation of a strategic sponsorship is likely to be guided by answers to questions like:

• What do my target markets care about? Are there any events, sports, program, causes that they really care about or which form part of their self-‐definition? (e.g. snowboarding, volunteerism, the high arts, child safety)

• What are the ways that my target market consumes that event (stadium, at home with friends, reading about it in the paper?)

• What are the best things about this event experience to my target audience? What are the worst things about this event experience to my target audience?

• Is my brand part of the experience? Could it be? How can we improve that experience? • What are the ways that my target market consumes my brand and competitor brands? What is their

“brand experience?” • Could that experience be improved using the unique benefits of sponsorship?

http://www.powersponsorship.com/free-‐stuff.html?re=1/LastGenerationSponsorship.pdf

� Activation Plan

Activation is the execution or implementation phase of a sponsorship, in which consumers interact with the brand’s touch-‐points and the sponsorship comes to life. Every aspect of activation – from initial concept, to production value, to integration with the sponsored property -‐-‐ communicates a message about the brand and its commitment to the audience. Considering activation along with sponsorship goals at the very beginning of the planning process ensures that the proposed activities directly support the identified business objectives.

In crafting an activation plan, an integrated approach (360° activation) offers the opportunity to communicate through individual and coordinated touch-‐points over an extended period of time, addressing a degree of media fragmentation from inception.

While promoting awareness of the partnership may be an important component to the brand’s goals, ‘badging,’ or sponsorship leveraging that simply displays the brand’s logo on a club jersey, event collateral or on banners around the venue, should not be considered activation.

All too often, the environment and experience of a sponsored property is too frenetic for passive logo displays to make a significant impact on the audience, especially considering that the brand’s presence is only one amongst several. Badging is a disruption that diminishes the audience’s experience with the event.

The best partnerships are when both parties sign the contract and then put it away in a drawer and get on with activating it, remembering what the reasons for

the deal were in the first place.

Marketing Director, Sport Rights Holder

Youth is so much about doing it in a credible way – not being in their face or too commercial. Young people look at our partners who have been around since the

beginning as brands that “get” them and understand their lifestyle, music, sports. We work with our partners to come across in the most credible way possible, as brands that are helping support the sports that [youth] are into.

Head of Partnerships, Sports Rights Holder


Case Study | Carling Beer

Improving the festival guest experience through creative brand activation A long-‐standing presence at live music events, Carling created a unique way to weave the brand into the summer festival tradition beginning in 2003. Noting that an inevitable, but unpleasant aspect of the festival goers' experience was the warming of one's beer in the sun, Carling created a memorable integration called 'Beer Amnesty.'

The goal was simple: encourage product trial and conversion by getting as many ice-‐cold Carlings as possible into the hands of as many people as possible who are loyal to other brands, at a time and a place when they would consider a change. The concept focused on a beer swap at various summer festivals where Carling replaced attendees’ warm, unopened cans of beer (regardless of brand) with an ice-‐cold can of Carling – free of charge.

The campaign resulted in the distribution of nearly 4000 cases of beer per weekend, and reached over 250,000 people across a festival season. The campaign was so successful that it was repeated annually for years.

Building on the original concept, Carling continued to imagine unique ways to indulge fans. Starting in 2007, the company organized extremely intimate performances for a handful of lucky music lovers (approximately seven each session) from the back of a chilled Carling fridge truck prior to a band's festival performance. That year, The Maccabees performed a “Strike Cold Session” at Reading Festival. At the 2008 Rock Ness Festival, Carling staged a surprise live acoustic set by Andy Burrows of the band Razorlight.

After years of success at festivals, in 2008, Carling took the concept mobile for a tie-‐in at retail. Over the warm summer months, the Carling Beer Amnesty truck visited Asda stores, offering shoppers the opportunity to swap packs of just-‐purchased beer for chilled Carling as they left the store.


Furthermore, awareness of the brand name or logo has little value if the consumer is unfamiliar with the product or service, brand ethos or value proposition. The best activations weave the brand’s presence into the property in a way that showcases its value proposition, seamlessly engaging with consumers and making the best aspects of the experience better or reducing the negative aspects of the experience. For example, Carling recognised that one of the undesirable results of a beautiful sunny day at a music festival is the inevitable warming of one’s beer and used their sponsorship of various music festivals as an opportunity to ensure that guests always had a cold Carling to hand.

By considering the various means through which the target audience consumes the property (i.e. on site, at home, in print or online, broadcast or internet videos), a seamless narrative or experience can be created.

However, as with any campaign, not all marketing tactics will be appropriate and brands must choose those that best integrate with the property, meet the goals, budget and timeline.

� Establish Evaluation Metrics

At this early stage in planning the strategy, the organisation should also create evaluation metrics against the defined strategic objectives. From these metrics, the organisation can sketch out a rough roadmap for the sponsorship by clearly defining standards for success. These standards can be communicated to all involved in the sponsorship, encouraging shared momentum towards achieving goals. It will also be helpful to embed regular evaluation points, so that misguided or faltering efforts can be detected early, thereby allowing for responsiveness to changes in the strategy or market environment.

� Rights and Assets Negotiation

Rights and assets should be negotiated specifically to support the needs of the activation plan. This will guarantee the brand has access to the required raw materials to execute the plan; it will also allow the rights holder to sell unused rights and assets to other partners, rather than going unused entirely. As addressed in the next section, the most impactful assets will likely be those that are collaboratively designed.

Fit with a property’s other partners is important as well. Once a partnership is established, the brand should consider the ramifications of affiliation with brands that become connected to it through that partnership. If there is a collective fit, reframing the original partnership into a networked relationship may offer opportunities for multi-‐way value creation.

That’s really what partnerships are all about: giving someone the experience that they want, rather than the

one we think they might want. That’s what the partnership enables. There is a role to be played, but it’s

one that enhances viewers’ experience and enhances their view of the brand. If you can’t do either of those,

then just don’t go there. Entertainment Director, Marketing Agency

Encourage Reciprocity True partnerships are based in reciprocity. Reciprocity acknowledges that brand value – positive and negative -‐-‐ flows both ways and that both partners are responsible for and judged by the sponsorship’s outcomes.

A true partnership relationship ensures that the strategic goals of both parties are viewed as equally important. Partners are empowered to achieve their own goals by utilising the assets of the other partner or


collaborate to create new assets as needed. Based on reciprocity, the sponsor-‐rights holder relationship becomes a marketing alliance rather than a transactional arrangement.

Reciprocity also allows for flexibility. In the fast-‐paced and ever-‐changing market environment, the partnership must remain flexible enough to evolve its strategy and deliver resources as needed. By avoiding a rigidly defined set of available assets, partners can take advantage of appropriate opportunities swiftly as they arise.

Case Study | London 2012 Olympics

Lloyds TSB, Visa Europe and Samsung m-commerce three-way partnership The London 2012 Olympic Games offers an excellent example of a three-‐way strategic partnership between Lloyds TSB, Visa Europe and Samsung to pioneer mobile phone commerce (m-‐commerce) contact-‐less payments. The service was made available via a specific Samsung handset, linked to a Lloyds TSB bank account with transactions processed by Visa. Provided complementary to Visa-‐sponsored athletes, the handset was also available for consumers to purchase along with a Visa-‐enabled SIM card. The service was first introduced during the run-‐up to the games, and could be used at retailers in and out of the Olympic Village for speedy, low-‐value payments. In the ten weeks leading up to and including the Games, the number of contactless transactions in the UK doubled according to Visa Europe; during the Games, Olympic venues accounted for 15% of contactless transactions in the UK.

The three Olympic sponsors leveraged the 2012 Games as a globally relevant backdrop to showcase the power of mobile payments. The program positioned each brand as an innovator and key player in the transformation of retail purchasing and payments, while contributing directly to the divergent, but synergistic strategic objectives of each partner: Lloyds TSB supported the commercial launch of its m-‐payments service; Samsung continued to demonstrate its positioning as technological leader, while also supporting demand and sell-‐through of Samsung mobile handsets; and Visa Europe was confirmed as the go-‐to choice for customers interested in accessing pioneering products and services, while executing millions of transactions during the Olympic Games. By 2020, Visa expects that nearly 50% of all network transactions will be conducted via mobile.

All three partners centred their brand in the discussions regarding mobile innovation at a time when many organisations are looking to increase their brand awareness through mobile and Smartphone applications and associated products. The partnership also offered a natural launching point for dialogue in the media as each step of the partnership was developed and publically announced.


Sponsorship as a Marketing Alliance A marketing alliance yields benefits for both partners through collaboration and a focus on creating new value together. This is in contrast to a relationship existing solely for straight exchange of value, in which one or both organisations get back something in exchange for what they put in (for example, revenue exchanged for rights access).

Elevating a sponsorship relationship to a marketing alliance may offer a sustainable competitive advantage by providing:

• Mutual value through collaboration and access to the assets and capabilities of the other. Both organisations realize a contribution to superior customer value, advancement towards strategic goals, and/or reduction of costs.

• Durability created through mutual commitment, that is, the recognition by each partner that the other brings unique assets and capabilities (and those gained or created from the interplay between partners) that will enable the alliance to accomplish objectives neither can do alone.

• Barriers to imitation preventing competitors from duplicating these assets and capabilities because they are created by collaboration between two unique entities. Contributions from different entities would arguably create different assets/capabilities.

• First mover advantage created because alliance partners may be better able to respond to the quickly evolving market and intense competition, and can generate tailored resources to deflect challenges and capitalize on opportunities.

Marketing alliances can be particularly advantageous if strategic goals align, while competitive goals remain divergent. For example, a beverage company and a football club may have similar strategic goals (such as adding value to the consumer offering to drive sales) and can work collaboratively to achieve this; however, a beverage company’s market offering does not compete with that of a football club. Additionally, partners are able to learn from each other and apply learning to their respective businesses without jeopardizing any proprietary skills.

In order to develop a marketing alliance, the parties must ensure strategic compatibility (not just congruency between intangible brand elements) and convergence of goals. Further, the relationship structure must foster commitment, trust, and opportunities for both parties to gain value from synergies, moving away from a transactional, fee-‐and-‐ROI-‐driven relationship.

Equity – one looks to be more scientific about it. Is there a benefit to both parties in the partnership? Is there equity in Brand X that Brand Y could benefit

from and vice versa, because then we have the foundation of a partnership that works. Is there an

area of business that the two can collaborate on that allows them to reach people that they haven’t

reached before? Head of Partnerships, Financial Industry


COLLABORATE

Collaboration offers partners an opportunity to create shared assets and activations that are inherently unique and that neither could produce alone. This is a key advantage, because such assets provide a barrier to imitation.

Assets and activations that are created collaboratively between sponsor and rights-‐holder enable the brand to use the property as a conduit through which it connects with the target audience. This allows the brand to create a bond with the audience, rather than simply an association with the property. It also protects the integrity of the property, by ensuring that activations are a natural and seamless fit, enhancing the audience’s experience of the property rather than being disruptive.

If the platform is intended to have breadth, the parties should consider and design amplification methods in line with strategic objectives. Content creation and digital technologies (such as applications and social media) all offer opportunities to amplify or extend the consumer experience before, during, and after activation. Consumers have become a marketing channel of their own, sharing information, experiences and opinions through social media, blogging and other Internet channels -‐-‐ even across geographically and culturally divergent areas. A single brand interaction now has the potential to multiply into thousands, effectively creating reach and cost efficiencies.

Even if you’re a massive organisation, creating a brand that people are going to talk about and be

ambassadors for in the real world is key. If you have people talking about it, saying it’s amazing, and you

get five emails from people who don’t know each other talking about it in the same day, that’s when it gets

exciting. There’s just so much out there, I don’t think it can just be about media spend. It can be a small

campaign, but if it’s really clever, there you go. It’s harder, but it’s putting a lot more pressure on creativity and originality, rather than money.

Director, Marketing Agency

ACTIVATE

Having completed the planning phases, it is time to put the sponsorship into action. As mentioned earlier, activation is where the sponsorship comes to life for the consumer.

As discussed earlier, there are multiple outcomes that can be achieved through strategic sponsorships and that the most cost-‐effective sponsorships will be focused on achieving outcomes in more than one functional area or channel. Sponsorship activation can offer the opportunity to innovate products and services, differentiate from the competition, communicate the brand proposition and invigorate relevance to a particular segment of consumers, stimulate engagement with the brand and offer opportunities and raw materials for consumers to co-‐create brand meaning and value.


Case Study | LIVESTRONG (Nike)

Stimulating Consumer Engagement and Co-Creation at the Tour de France

Using Lance Armstrong’s 2009 return to professional cycling as a platform, LIVESTRONG and Nike developed a fully-‐integrated campaign to raise awareness of cancer and spread messages of hope and encouragement.

The partners utilized multiple mediums -‐ bought, owned and earned -‐ to communicate and engage with consumers.

A series of three short films entitled "It's About You" shared the stories of pro and amateur athletes and other inspirational people -‐-‐ all cancer survivors. The films aired to a mass audience, and culminated in a dedicated primetime episode of ESPN’s Sportscenter. Sixty-‐four million households tuned in.

Drawing on the tradition of writing inspirational messages with chalk along the course of the Tour de France to cheer on riders, LIVESTRONG and Nike encouraged a global audience to participate and contribute their own messages of support and encouragement.

At Lance Armstrong’s first USA competition, the Amgen Tour of California, and at all of Armstrong’s subsequent races leading up to the Tour de France, fans received packets of yellow chalk and were encouraged to write notes of support on the pavement.

Simultaneously, social media networks collected messages of courage, hope and action from an international audience. These were then added to the physical messages at the Tour via a chalk-‐spraying hydraulic robot called Chalkbot. Using the pavement as a canvas, Chalkbot drove in front of cyclists and printed messages on the course.

The vibrant yellow messages, standing out against the dark road, were integrated into the Tour de France broadcast coverage as the riders cycled over them. Each message contributor received a GPS-‐tagged image (with LIVESTRONG and Nike branding) of their message printed on the course. In all, 36,000 messages were submitted digitally with thousands printed along the Tour de France course. After the tour, the New York Times printed a full-‐page advertisement featuring messages printed by Chalkbot.

The campaign won a Cannes Lion award, and increased LIVESTRONG sales by 46% during the campaign period. In addition, the campaign increased the LIVESTRONG Facebook community by 95% and Youtube channel subscribers by 54%. Nike donated $4 million dollars to the cause.


EVALUATE

Sponsorships historically have focused evaluation efforts on tactics, examining how well a campaign was managed rather than the value delivered to the brand.

In a strategic approach, evaluation should always focus on determining if pre-‐established objectives have been met – that is, return on objectives (ROO) rather than return on investment (ROI). Poorly defined objectives will result in poor evaluation opportunities.

If the brand has established actionable evaluation metrics as suggested in Step 1, it will already possess a roadmap with clear measures of success at various points. Regular, unbiased evaluation offers the possibility of honing, re-‐directing, or eliminating efforts that are not on track to achieve the desired outcomes. In addition, this process offers the flexibility needed to respond dynamically to new information, feedback, emerging technologies and changing strategic or market conditions. Evaluation also helps gauge the effectiveness of a particular property or communication touch-‐point, and can be used to ensure that investments (rights fees, assets, talent, and product) remain in line with likely returns.

Conclusion

Sponsorship in today’s market environment is evolving toward a more integrated approach than has been used in the past. Strategic sponsorship both responds to, and capitalizes on, the dynamic current market context and offers a competitive advantage in this context.

The five-‐step methodology outlined above is designed to give marketers a flexible, integrative and responsive approach to designing strategic sponsorships. Based in solid research and illustrated with exciting real-‐world examples, this methodology is a practical process for marketers seeking to create innovative applications of a time-‐honoured marketing instrument.


Additional Resources and Further Reading

Service-‐Dominant Logic | Robert Lusch and Stephen Vargo | http://sdlogic.net/index.html Last Generation Sponsorship | Kim Skildum-‐Reid, Power Sponsorship| http://www.powersponsorship.com/free-‐stuff.html?re=1/LastGenerationSponsorship.pdf Co-‐creation: New pathways to value |Promise Communispace | http://www.promisecorp.com/documents/COCREATION_REPORT.pdf Defining Sponsorship | Shaun Whatling, Richard Gillis, Red Mandarin | http://www.amazon.co.uk/Defining-‐Sponsorship-‐Shaun-‐Whatling/dp/0956178405 Brands and Music Manifesto, Frukt Source | Frukt| Report available by request from Frukt, http://www.wearefrukt.com/source Additional resources available upon request from the author and listed in full research report.

Acknowledgements

The research outlined in this report is a summary of the findings reported in detail in “A Strategic Sponsorship Approach to Building Brands in a Service-‐Dominant Logic World,” Henley Business School, MBA Management Challenge (©2010), the result of research into best practice strategic sponsorship approaches. The qualitative research involved over 20 organisations, including leading brands, agencies and rights holders. The full research paper is available upon request from the author or the Henley Business School Academic Research Centre.

The author would like to acknowledge the contribution of the director and board level professionals who participated in this research, offering diverse perspectives into the challenges and opportunities of the industry from a variety of leading brands, agencies and rights holders, including:

Furthermore, the author would like to acknowledge Dr. Baskin Yenicioglu of Henley Business School for his support and guidance in completing this research.

chelsafc.com anomaly.com allisports.com aegworldwide.com 2cv.com

iris-‐worldwide.com sponsorship.com wearefrukt.com fasttrack.com essentiallygroup.com

nba.com mskmanagement.com london-‐irish.com lloydstsb.com jackmorton.com

redmandarin.com prismteam.com performanceresearch.com pepsico.com octagon.com

wolffolins.com visa.com unilever.com synergysponsorship.com


About Janus Kodadek

Janus Kodadek is a senior marketing professional with 12 years of experience in marketing and communications strategy in the sport, fashion and FMCG (consumer goods) industries. With expertise in integrated marketing, orchestrating offline/traditional and digital channels to build brands and engage consumers, Janus has worked with high profile brands including Nike, Glaceau Vitaminwater, Pepsi, Heineken and presently works as an Industry Manager for Google, where she develops brand and performance strategies for EMEA clients.

+44 7717 806 142 (mobile) | [email protected] | linkedin.com/in/jkodadek

Case study sources| Case studies included were developed from research respondents examples of’ ‘best in class’ and ‘innovative’ sponsorship campaigns

All creative assets, trademarks, service marks, intellectual property and copyrighted materials remain the property of the copyright owner and are provided within this report for reference purposes only.

Gatorade REPLAY

Agency: TBWA\Chiat\Day

http://www.gatorade.com

http://www.campaignlive.co.uk/analysis/1158391/

http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid1125919467?bctid=76509638001

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/jun/22/gatorade-‐ad-‐awards-‐cannes-‐lions

Carling Beer Amnesty

Agency: Cake

http://www.carling.com

http://www.cakegroup.com/music-‐pr/case_Study/Carling-‐Music.html

http://www.linkcommunication.co.uk/case_studies_office_workers_carling.html

http://www.campaignlive.co.uk/analysis/1127631/

London 2012 Olympics http://www.visaeurope.com

http://www.lloydstsb.com

http://www.samsung.com

http://www.visaeurope.com/en/newsroom/news/articles/2012/contactless_payments_at_london.aspx

http://www.mobiletoday.co.uk/News/14144/Samsung_and_Visa_unveil_London_2012_Olympics_mobile_payment_app.aspx

http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/2012/jan/19/contactless-‐wave-‐pay-‐revolution

http://www.engadget.com/2012/05/09/samsung-‐and-‐visa-‐olympic-‐payment-‐announcement/

Nike LIVESTRONG “Chalkbot”

Agency: Wieden + Kennedy

http://www.nike.com

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/jun/24/cannes-‐lions-‐cyber-‐nike-‐chalkbot

www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Jb-‐KT4r6NY http://www.deeplocal.com/projects/10