Date: Monday 2nd March 2015

Sport Sponsorship and its Use and Effectiveness in Business

Strategic Sports MarketingPresented by Kelissa Brockett (13398109)

Lecturer: Dr. Dave Arthur

Sport Sponsorship

✤ - Definitions of Sponsorship- How does sponsorship work?- Sponsorship within the communications marketing mix - Differentiation between advertising and sponsorship- The Consumer Behaviour Theory in the context of sponsorship

- The effectiveness of sponsorship- The Advantages of Sponsorship- The Limitations of Sponsorship

- Case Studies- Tim Cahill- Lance Armstrong- Nike- Weet-Bix (Sanitarium)

- Summary

✤ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qah52PvNlxo

Sponsorship

“Any commercial agreement by which a sponsor, for the mutual benefit of the sponsor and sponsored party, contractually provides financing or other support in order to establish an association between the sponsor's image, brands or products and a sponsorship property in return for rights to promote this association and/or for the granting of certain agreed direct or indirect benefits”. ICC Code of Sponsorship (2003)

Definition of Sponsorship

✤ - Sponsorship is a major marketing tool.- Companies can sponsor sport, social, educational or environmental projects.- Sport is the most popular type and a very important aspect to the industry.

Sponsorship within the Communications Marketing

Mix- The marketing mix is made up of the 4 P’s; Product, Place, Price and Promotion.- The marketing communications mix is what we use to describe the ‘promotion’ category.- Importance of incorporating the other elements of the marketing communication mix with the

sponsorship in order to achieve the best results.

Lance Armstrong’s Sponsors

Differentiation between Advertising and Sponsorship

Advertising uses mass media to communicate a standardised message to a broad audience. Sponsorship gives prestige to the company through association with a sport, sports person, club or event.

There are two types of marketing in the sporting environment. Marketing of sport which is the advertising of sport itself Marketing through sport which is leveraging the emotional connection and fan base to advertise non sport related products and/or services through events or athletes and teams otherwise known as sponsoring

Companies can either sponsor an individual athlete, a sporting team or an event. When sponsoring through individual athletes whom fans often idolise, companies have the opportunity to attract media attention, provide ‘cut-through’ visibility and differentiate from competitors.Often chosen for their expertise, attractiveness and credibility, athletes usually wear the brand.Sponsorship works closely with endorsement

The Consumer Behaviour Theory in the Context of

Sponsorship

Applying McCracken’s meaning transfer process, the relationship associated with an athlete or team should transfer to the sponsor’s product. Consumers often sub-consciously transfer this meaning of the sponsor’s products on to themselves through consumption. 

Sponsorship can enhance self-esteem via BIRGing and identification. BIRGing - “The intention to buy a sponsor’s product will be greater when a sponsored team is perceived to be a winning team than when it is perceived to be a losing team.” (Beech and Chadwick 2007)

Ultimately, this is why sponsors aim to sponsor predicted winning teams or athletes.

- Factors influencing consumer purchase; - Psychological Factors- External Factors- Situational Factors

The Effectiveness of Sponsorship

The Effectiveness of Sponsorship

Sponsorship Advantages

✤ Corporate Objectives

✤ - Public Awareness- Corporate Image- Public Perception- Community Involvement- Financial Relations- Government Relations- Employee Relations- Compete with other companies

✤ Marketing Objectives

✤ - Business Relations- Reach the Target Market- Brand Positioning- Increase Sales- Sampling

✤ Media Objectives

✤ - Generate Visability- Generate Publicity- Enhance ad Campaign- Avoid Clutter- Target Specificity

(Buhler and Nufer 2010)

Sponsorship Limitations

✤ Trouble with Athletes personality- performance- reputation- drugs and alcohol allegations- social media accounts- marital infidelity and sexual misconduct- on-field actions ...

✤ Disengagement

✤ Ambush Marketing

✤ Only Transfers a limited message

✤ Requires a significant marketing budget Tennis Player - Bernard Tomic

(Beech and Chadwick 2007)

✤ ‘Bizarre exposure has captured many viewers, for example the Tour de France, where doping has been a big part for many years it has just been heightened by Armstrong, however in the end it increased viewership and

the emotional connection with fans seem to help with forgiveness”

✤ - Bob Stewart, Interdisciplinary Colloquium Bond University

The Effectiveness of Sponsorship

Australian Swimmer - Eamon Sullivan

Tim Cahill

Captain of the Australian Socceroos player. It is evident fans, sponsors and the Australian public love Cahill. On his Twitter account, not only does Cahill wear branded clothing, he also promotes his team, the sport and himself in the public area.

Cahill has many sponsors including Adidas, New-Balance, Foxtel and Weet-bix. Currently he is a perfect idol for many aspiring adolescents and soccer players and a great target for sponsors. Cahill also gives sponsors ample opportunity for international coverage and to act as a positive identifier to stimulate consumer purchase due to his international status.

Lance Armstrong

✤ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=juBmC4w7NQ0Armstrong won The Tour de France 7 timesFought cancer publiclyEstablished of the LiveStong charity that generated millions of dollars Armstrong’s legal disputes over doping.

World class athlete in the spotlight and having wins behind him, Armstrong had many sponsors however, once accused he lost his sponsors, fans and trust

Examples such as Armstrong, shows how heavily the personality of the athlete heavily influences their sponsors. Even though there were many years of sponsor success, over this huge allegation Armstrong lost everything including his credibility and ultimately, the sponsors also suffered.

Lance Armstrong

Nike

Nike is one of the biggest global sporting brands and has the buying power to sponsor the top global teams and athletes across most sports. As seen in the graph Nikes’ revenue from footwear from 2011 to 2013 was significantly higher then Adidas and over seven times more than Puma.

- “You have to spend money to make money”- Nike focuses on brand image, increasing sales and

internal communications.

- As well as sponsoring many events and teams, Nike does an excellent job at sponsoring individual athletes.

- For example, tennis players and golfers as well as athletes playing in team sports such as basketball and soccer.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R3z_DWZqW8I

Weet-Bix (Sanitarium)

Sanitarium created Weet-Bix breakfast cereal and marketed it as an individual product. Weet-Bix that is now a so called “an Aussie icon” and has a very popular slogan of “How many do you do?”.They have utilised this slogan while sponsoring athletes, who endorse the product saying they do X amount creating competition between athletes and children/adolescents.

Weet-Bix sponsor athletes such as Gilmore, Cahill as well as teams for example The Wallabies to endorse their productThe position them self very well for their target market; children and the aspiring athlete. Created and now encourage and sponsor Kids Tryathalons around Australia.

Weet-Bix (Sanitarium)

✤ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pyOjTixHfps

✤ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1WGy0HoHmV8

Summary

✤ Athlete sponsorship is a very effective marketing tool for businesses to connect their brand or product to their target market. With high reward often comes high risk.

✤ This presentation focused on the effectiveness of sponsorship discussing with it the advantages and disadvantages supported by the case studies. In summary, it is imperative that companies choose wisely on which athletes they sponsor as this strategy can abruptly fail and brand damage can occur as it is often closely linked to the public perception and reputation of an individual.

✤ Marketers need to utilise athletes as a public figure and use sponsorship in conjunction with other promotional efforts to maximise their return.

✤ Thank you!✤ Questions...?

Reference ListAbiodun, O 2011, The Significance of Sponsorship as a Marketing Tool in Sport Events, viewed 28 February 2015, http://www.theseus.fi/bitstream/handle/10024/24945/Student_Abiodun_Oladunni.pdf

Asshad, S 2014, Nike’s Top 10 Highest Paid Endorsement Deals to Sports Players, viewed 28 Feburary 2015, http://www.tsmplug.com/richlist/nike-highest-paid-endorsement-deals/

BBC 2015, Lance Armstrong interview: An abridged transcript, viewed 28 Feburary 2015, http://www.bbc.com/sport/0/cycling/30955902

Beech, J & Chadwick, S 2007, The Marketing of Sport, Pearson Education, Essex, England.

Blaney, J, Lippert, L & Smith, S 2012, Repairing the Athlete's Image : Studies in Sports Image Restoration

Buhler, A & Nufer, G 2010, Relationship Marketing in Sports, Sports Marketing, Uk.

Day, H 2010, Sponsorship and the Funding of Grassroots Sport, The European Sponsorship Association, viewed 28 February 2015, http://ec.europa.eu/internal_market/services/docs/sport/conference20100216/7-contribution_of_sponsors_and_trends_in_sponsorship_en.pdf

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Grantham, A & Thiesen, K 2009, A theoretical approach to sport sponsorship, viewed 28 February 2015 http://pure.au.dk/portal/files/7546/Afhandling

International Chamber of Commerce, ICC International Code on Sponsorship, viewed 20 February 2015, http://www.abfi.ie/Sectors/ABFI/ABFI.nsf/vPagesABFI/Responsibilities~sponsorship/$File/ICC+International+Code+on+Sponsorship.pdf

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Ngan, H, Prendergast, G & Tsang, A 2011, Linking sports sponsorship with purchase intentions, European Journal of Marketing, Vol. 45 Iss 4 pp. 551 - 566.

Statista 2015, Global sponsorship spending by region from 2009 to 2015, viewed 28 February 2015, http://www.statista.com/statistics/196898/global-sponsorship-spending-by-region-since-2009/

http://www.statista.com/statistics/269783/total-worldwide-revenue-from-sports-sponsorship/http://www.statista.com/statistics/278834/revenue-nike-adidas-puma-footwear-segment/

Stewart, B 2015, Interdisciplinary Colloquium on the Integrity of Sport, Bond University.

Stock, K 2014, Is Nike Spending Too Much on Superstars?, viewed 28 Febuary 2015, http://www.bloomberg.com/bw/articles/2014-03-20/is-nike-spending-too-much-on-superstars

Weet-Bix 2015, viewed 28 Feburary 2015, http://try.weetbix.com.au.