In the digital era, marketing is obsessed with performance metrics and it would be wise to clear this point on the outset as tracking event specific discount codes, social media impressions and generated lead lists could create unnecessary contention.
The main reason why a business would consider sponsorship is because it offers quite distinct advantages where an astute marketer can differentiate their brand while bypassing some very common marketing pitfalls.
In a world where the average consumer is bombarded by an avalanche of information, Ad fatigue sets in quickly but while the consumer routinely tunes out display ads or commercial breaks, they pay attention during event and community experiences they enjoy
When an audience loves an event, the positive feelings organically transfer to the brand that supports the event. This transfer of brand affinity happens imperceptibly and an astute marketer recognizes the brand building opportunity.
In many situations sponsored events are excellent avenues for experiential activation where the customer can touch, test or sample products on the spot hence significantly shortening the period between lead generation and actual sales.
For the emerging and mid-sized brands, a calculated sponsorship gives the brand immediate legitimacy as they align themselves with established and respected organizations hence lending them instant credibility.
In the relational arena the partnership tends to see the advantages of the arrangement since it is based on immediate gains anchored on the ego needs but frequently ignores the social cost and stress that the partnership imposes on both partners.
Since the partnership is by all definition non-existent, there is a tendency for the relationship to be exploitative where the sponsor can set restrictive boundaries that turn the partnership into a financial prison as the sponsored youth evaporates.
In business the sponsor can so easily antagonize the audience because the sponsor knows what they hope to achieve in the short term but does not understand how to achieve genuine integration with the sponsored event.
In many situations a sponsorship can feel like it is interrupting the event without adding any actual value and this can end up
132 MAL72 / 26 ISSUE feeling like commercial exploitation rather than genuine cooperation between equal partners.
One of the main mistake sponsors make is to halt the natural flow of an event to insert a forced pitch or intrusive branding which the consumer views as a barrier between them and the experience they paid to watch or attend.
Sometimes it is a sponsor’ s overzealous attempt to identify with the event without understanding the history or context ending up with the audience perceiving the brand as fake, out of touch, or patronizing.
The sponsor can sometimes demand the audience data or app downloads or boring surveys in exchange for basic participation or trite giveaways that frustrates the audience and makes them feel exploited rather than appreciated.
There is also the mistake of overbranding which takes away from the core reason the event takes place and makes the audience feel the event has sold-out to the sponsor or creating operational bottlenecks just to accommodate the sponsor’ s whims
Ochieng has noted that the real problem in a sponsorship partnership tends to be that the person given operational mandate to execute the sponsorship usually has no clue what is expected of them and creates roadblocks as they work.
Sponsored companies want collaborative partners who help elevate the event not entitled and uncooperative bosses. In such a situation the sponsor starts to treat the partner as an employee to be given orders since they are paying.
You find a sponsor demanding a guaranteed return on investment by simply slapping their logo on the event without co-investing in any meaningful activation and proceed to claim dissatisfaction and non-renewal of the sponsorship.
Then there is the sponsor who is constantly asking for extra favors, last minute logo updates or free VIP tickets outside contract terms. This behavior overburdens the sponsored partner’ s operations and creates friction that interferes with the events execution.
There are sponsors that insist on aggressive signage, unapproved colors and off-brand messaging which conflicts with the events core identity or other official sponsors who feel sidelined and bullied.
There is also the associated delay that a clueless sponsor creates when their corpo- rate legal and marketing teams take ages to sign off copy and approve artworks and generally behave as though the event dates is a suggestion rather than a fixture.
But the main frustration that an uncooperative and indifferent sponsor can create is to ignore the fact that an event is financed by the proceeds of the sponsorship and withholding pre and post payments as per the contract has a real financial cost to the sponsored.
Ochieng is sure that in the relational arena there must be a way for the partners to set boundaries where the sponsor does not feel that his investment is threatened by the next highest bidder and the sponsored does not go through life as owned property.
But on the business front issues can be cured by not treating the sponsorship as buying advertising space but seeing the event as a strategic long-term joint venture where both parties commit to growing both the event’ s stature and the audience reach.
Sponsors can also stop seeing the attendees as passive targets waiting to be captured and see the audience as a community that must not only be served but respected knowing that their event experience will create positive word of mouth outcome.
The sponsor can realize that dominating the event is not equivalent to ensuring a genuine experience which can only be enhanced by investing in activation during the event and gaining the trust of the sponsored as a fair and dependable ally.
The last word on this subject seems obvious that any relationship whether business or personal is likely to suffer if the partnership is not based on equality and is exploitative. Building a partnership is not an event but a process and both must invest in it.
A sponsor’ s return on investment is proportional to the input and the trust that he confers the event organizer as the expert in his area and the realization that the sponsor is tapping into an existing event that was already successful before the partnership.
A tunnel vision riveted on metrics may sound professional but any entrepreneur will tell you that if businessmen waited until they can measure the results from their efforts before action then they would be investing in the death of creative imagination.
The sponyo culture is apparently awkward both in business and in everyday life!