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There’s a saying in baseball: Every team is going to win 54 games, and every team is going to lose 54 games. It’s what you do with the remaining 54 games that will define your season.
This maxim can be applied to just about anything, particularly when it comes to activating sports sponsorships via public relations activities.
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Today there are hundreds of articles written about sports sponsorships. They reference the how and why, the financials and obligations of working with the major sports leagues and other organizations that laud the benefits of partnering with a particular property. Many of these very same articles also criticize the lack of ROI.
However, successful sponsorship activations have one thing in common: they are able to be publicized. It’s a newsworthy story if the publicist can simply tie in all of the competing aspects involved. A sports sponsorship tied to PR draws a direct line between the emotional core of the event and potential consumers. In short, it has a strong PR element within the very nature of the sponsorship. It focuses on the remaining 54 games referenced above.
In addition to elevating the experience of each of the event’s attendees, the best executed sports sponsorship activations bring the excitement of the event to those who cannot attend. Utilizing social media platforms, companies can actively engage fans before, during and after the event extending the emotional tie the sponsor has to the property.
Companies are placing more and more value of the presence of social and digital assets in their sports partnerships. This is not only integral but also adds a more focused strategic execution, where a synergistic combination of emotional driven marketing and creative execution strategies begins with clear benchmarks and ends with a positive ROI.
Unfortunately, PR professionals tend to be the last involved in developing the strategy surrounding a particular sponsorship. That is, if there is a strategy involved at all. That said, any sponsorship can be supported and enhanced through several tactics including but not limited to the following:
Creativity
Being new is news. The key here is not to be ostentations or crazy, but to constantly develop campaigns that fit the client’s brand, engage its target audience in compelling ways and most importantly bring the client to where consumers live their emotional lives. Creativity also allows you to go beyond the limitations of the sponsorship contract and use the media, both traditional and social, to communicate very clear, very finite commercial messages.
Merge CSV and CSR
The concepts and beliefs that form the culture of a company can be articulated through sponsorship activation by tying into similar sports properties In addition, your client’s CSG agenda can be promoted and connect with potential consumers. “Doing good while doing well” has become a call to arms for many companies and consumers rally towards the potential to be a part of societal changes.
Hope for the best, expect the worst
Every tournament director would love to have the #1 seed play the #2 seed in the finals. However, every sponsor needs to prepare for #15 to face #16. Meaning that activating a sponsorship merely starts with the event. The campaigns you develop need to take the excitement, passion and emotions surrounding the sport itself and expand it past the physical event.
In doing so, you not only build awareness for the event but catalyze trial and purchase, enforce images, entrench consumer loyalty, and most importantly, make the client more money. By going beyond the event, you can focus on promoting distinct elements of your client directly to any and all specific demographic subsets of their target markets.
Make it participatory
Being a part of the action is always a good goal for a sponsor. It’s nearly universal that the fan watching or attending the event has participated in the sport at one point in time and has the same passion for the sport as athletes on the field. A call to action is as synonymous with marketing as it is with sports. Because the messages we communicate with a participatory campaign can be so exact and so credible, the effect is most likely to motivate behavior and in turn generate sales.
Bring the fun
When all is said, sports are fun. It’s why we play them when we are kids. It’s why we watch our favorite teams and athletes every season. The joy, excitement and pure pleasure of attending or watching a New England Patriots game — yes, I am a Pats fan and I did not think Brady altered the football in any way — is a visceral experience in itself. So when activating a sponsorship your goal should always be to support and enhance that experience and marry the brand’s attributes and qualities to what the fans are feeling either at the stadium or on their couch.
What does this all mean? Have an activation strategy prior to your sports sponsorship and ensure you are working hand in glove as the PR team with your client’s ad agency, street team and all of the other cooks in the kitchen. Otherwise, you could be missing out on a big PR win.
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John Krisiukenas is Managing Director at Marketing Maven.
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