Marketing Review St.Gallen 6 | 2019 "Sponsoring: Best Practices"

Sponsoring is booming. Year after year, companies invest more and more in this communication instrument. Sponsoring clearly stands out from other forms of communication: Sports sponsoring conveys emotions, while cultural sponsoring emphasizes the stylistic element.

The selection of the right sponsorship engagement is crucial for success – and unfortunately often occurs for personal or political reasons rather than for business management considerations. Mistakes in this regard are difficult to correct, because sponsoring is a long-term instrument that requires continuity in order to be effective. And sponsoring should not only pursue awareness and image goals via simple communication contacts with the target group. For example, professional activation programs multiply the sponsoring effect – creativity, uniqueness and authenticity are required. In this way, clearly defined target groups can be provided with individualized messages in digital or analog form and invited to an interactive examination of the sponsor’s content.

Additional impact potential can be achieved through cooperation with other sponsorship actors. Rights holders such as UEFA or FIFA open up new possibilities in activation, co-sponsors create synergy potential for the dissemination of joint messages. Agencies bring creative elements to the implementation of activation programs, for example via new digital formats. Orchestrating the cooperation of all sponsorship players requires a high degree of initiative, competence and consistency.

Sponsorship must be regularly reviewed for its effectiveness. A precise definition of objectives is essential for this. Proof of effectiveness by means of credible cause-and-effect relationships helps on the one hand to justify the (relatively high) sponsoring budgets. On the other hand, a clear definition of objectives combined with a measurement of success is the prerequisite for companies to learn and thus optimize their sponsoring commitment in the long term. For example, repeated reviews of effectiveness show whether and which activation measures make sense. If the measures do not take effect in the long term, the termination of sponsoring commitments should also be considered. The financial resources that are freed up can be invested in other forms of communication.

Sponsoring is one of the most demanding, costly and resource-intensive communication instruments – ultimately, it is all about managing a communication platform. If you succeed in correctly answering the crucial questions about sponsoring, companies have one of the most powerful instruments for addressing their target groups. In this issue of Marketing Review St. Gallen, you will learn about case studies that have succeeded in combining maximum effectiveness with cost-effectiveness. We hope you enjoy reading this issue – and would like to thank all those involved.

This text released in German as editorial of the current issue of Marketing Review St. Gallen with the topic “Sponsoring: Best Practices”. You can find the magazine in our shop.