IN THE NEW SPONSORSHIP PARADIGM, AUDIENCE DATA, COMPELLING CONTENT AND CONNECTION TO BUSINESS. OBJECTIVES ARE THE WINNING TRAITS
SPONSORSHIPS ARE BECOMING MORE RICH AND MULTI-LAYERED
Sponsorships are continuing to evolve into richer, two-way relationships. The market had already been trending in this direction, but today the most successful sponsorships truly are proper partnerships.
Rights holders must have a broader skill set than ever to succeed in today’s marketplace. Among other capabilities, they must:
Leading rights holders begin their sponsorship conversations by seeking to understand brands’ individual goals and challenges. They then think creatively about how the assets they control can be leveraged to create a campaign that delivers against those goals and challenges – we are long past the days of selling a fixed menu of assets. If rights holders are to extract maximum value from sponsorships, they must be flexible and allow tailoring when it comes to assets, and be open to changing things mid-contract to take advantage of opportunities as they arise.
Of course, rights holders’ sponsorship teams are only so big, and they must consider the value they are getting back from such a flexible approach. A fine example of a win-win from 2017 was the Formula 1 and Heineken project to create a revolving podium at the Mexico Grand Prix, on which DJ Hardwell played to the post-race crowd. Staging the event required significant investment, but it paid off in that Formula 1 was able to give race-goers a unique experience, and both sides benefited from sensational imagery and content that amplified their marketing messages.
Technology partner agreements contain further good examples of successful two-way relationships. Rights holders are getting IT support and more from brands such as SAP, IBM and Microsoft in return for powerful storytelling opportunities. These brands are able to tell stories of how they solve real business challenges for the rights holders, such as building CRM systems or delivering statistics to fans and partners.
In order to secure these valuable partnerships, top rights holders are putting together detailed, data-driven pictures of their fan bases to convince brands that they are worth the investment. Data is gathered from touchpoints including live events and digital content interactions. Some sponsorships themselves include joint data collection and sharing. Rights holders are working with specialist firms to process the data and explore the different segments within their audiences. This work is giving sports a better understanding of their fans than ever before, and is the mark of a savvy, modern rights holder.
What has been described here is the cutting-edge of sponsorship work. Many partnerships are still on a more traditional basis, where cash is exchanged for basic branding assets. But sponsorship revenue can be expected to increasingly flow towards deals with the cutting-edge characteristics.
