Fresh Insights from IEG

Elusive Intangibles: They Are All Around Us

In my last post, I detailed the ten intangibles that are evaluated when valuing a sponsorship opportunity. The whole concept of intangibles was very new to me when I began my career in sponsorship at IEG. During my previous life as a media planner/buyer, intangibles were something that at best I thought about on a surface level, and at worst I basically ignored or discounted.

I remember a time early in my media career when the media agency I worked for was asked to evaluate and place a value on a naming rights sponsorship for a major insurance company. At the time, naming rights were not as commonplace as they are now. We evaluated and quantified things such as impressions from passing vehicles, the value of expected press mentions and impressions from event attendees. Never once did we venture into placing a value on the sponsor’s activation opportunities or the sponsor’s protection from ambush. Honestly, none of us would have even known what those were anyway. We used the advertising metrics that we were familiar with to value the opportunity.  

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Filed under: valuation, media sponsorship

Back to Basics, the Next Big Thing

We all focus a lot on the next big thing, the newest, the most unique, the thing with the most buzz. Sometimes the next big thing doesn’t pan out or live up to the hype, or it gets lost with the introduction of something bigger and better. I have to admit that I am always on the look out for what is new and hot on both a personal and professional level. However, the danger of keeping up with the next big thing is that we can lose focus on the basics.

As a Valuation Analyst, I am privy to thousands of sponsorships. I’ve valued sponsorships at all levels and I guess you could say I’ve seen the good, the bad and the ugly of sponsorship. So what do I mean by “the basics”? By basics, I mean “standard practices” that are part of a healthy sponsor partnership, such as comprehensive fulfillment reports or sponsors that leverage their partnership. The basics aren’t glamorous and I doubt a sponsor decides to partner with a property because they have a great PR report, but the combination of the basics can be really powerful.

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Filed under: selling, servicing, valuation, activation

A Study in Branded Entertainment

I am a fan of Ghost Whisperer, starring Jennifer Love Hewitt, on CBS.  I TiVo every episode. Often when I am watching a movie or a TV program I visit the Web site of that program on my laptop to look at content that is available only online or to do research on what people are saying about it. It is especially entertaining to browse the forums of American Idol during the airing of an episode; all I have to say is people have way too much time on their hands.

While viewing an episode of Ghost Whisperer, I went to the program’s pages on CBS.com to see what type of content the site had. Something called The Other Side caught my attention. The Other Side, now in its third season, is a series of original content webisodes sponsored by Saturn. The content was interesting enough and short enough (generally three to five minutes) that I watched all of the webisodes. A few weeks later when I was watching an episode of Ghost Whisperer on TV, a character from The Other Side made an appearance on the show. For whatever reason, I felt like I was let in on a secret or was privy to some inside information. I felt cool.

Additionally, as part of Saturn’s sponsorship of the show, Melinda Gordon, played by Hewitt, drives a Saturn. For the most recent season, Saturn ran a contest to visit the set of Ghost Whisperer and also incorporated an online game or “gamisode” on the CBS Web site, which like the webisodes ties into the on-air series but follows its own story line.

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Filed under: branded entertainment, activation

Does Protecting Your Brand from Ambush Sometimes Backfire?

You may have seen some recent press around NBA Orlando Magic center Marcin Gortat. A Polish newspaper published a photo of Gortat after game one of the NBA Finals that prominently displayed the Michael Jordan/Nike tattoo on Gortat’s lower right leg. Gortat, a native of Poland, has a shoe contract with Reebok. According to Tim Povak of Fanhouse.com, Reebok asked Gortat to either cover the tattoo with his socks or with make-up for the rest of the finals. Gortat said “that ain’t going to happen,” noting he had the tattoo when he signed with Rebook and it wasn’t a problem then.

This reminded me of the events that took place at the 2006 World Cup in Stuttgart, Germany where Dutch fans wearing orange lederhosen with the Bavaria Beer logo on them were required to remove their pants because Bavaria is not an official sponsor of the World Cup. This action was taken by FIFA on behalf its sponsor Budweiser.

These could both be considered forms of ambush marketing. However, a major point of differentiation is that Gortat is paid by Reebok, whereas the Dutch fans paid to attend the World Cup. It wasn’t Gortat’s intent to ambush his sponsor and it is debatable that Bavaria Beer’s intent was to ambush Budweiser. I can see both sides of this, but I wonder what the ultimate impact of these actions is on how consumers view these sponsors. Does the publicity draw more attention to the situation and their competitors’ brands then if there wasn’t any type of intervention? I would like to hear your opinion on this.

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Filed under: ambush marketing, sports, activation

Sponsorship Valuation and Fair Market Value, Evaluation and ROI Demystified

The distinction between sponsorship evaluation, valuation and return on investment is often an area of confusion for my clients.

Evaluation is a continual and important part of any sponsorship. From a sponsor’s perspective, a partnership should initially be evaluated against other opportunities and should consider—among many factors—the sponsor’s objectives, audience, budget, geography, timing, fit with messaging, etc. Ongoing evaluation of the relationship should be done on a regular basis to ensure it continues to fit with a sponsor’s objectives, budget, etc. Evaluation is generally done on the sponsor side with information provided by the property in order to properly evaluate the opportunity.

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Filed under: sponsorship measurement, sponsorship ROI, valuation, evaluation

Giving New Meaning to Sponsorship's Applications

I love my Google G1 phone and I especially like browsing the Android marketplace for new applications (apps). I know I am not alone in this, especially among iPhone users. Recently, IEG’s Jim Andrews posted a blog item discussing the introduction of the “Countdown to Copenhagen” app from the Chicago 2016 Olympic bid committee, the first bid city to use the technology.

According to Apple, over a billion apps have been downloaded by iPhone and iTouch users. Some of the most popular and entertaining apps are the most inane. I checked out the top paid apps for the iPhone and in the top five are FMyLife Pro and The Moron Test, whose names say it all. My guess is that the novelty of these types of apps will wear off and the ones that stick around are the ones that offer convenience or information.

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Filed under: digital media, new media, activation

Sponsorship and the Web

Lately I’ve been hearing a lot about branding and sponsorship on the Web, social networking, Web content, monetizing Web exposure, etc. This was a hot topic during IEG’s annual conference and continues to be top of mind for me.

Generally, sponsor exposure on the Web is part of a larger sponsorship package and how the sponsor is recognized online is an afterthought, something like a sponsor logo next to a bunch of other sponsor logos. This is a mistake; a property’s Web site is often the first point of contact for your audience and where they develop their first impression of your sponsors. The Web provides a direct link to a sponsor’s products or services and in many cases it is the quickest way to a sale for the sponsor. To top it off, it can be measured and the measurement is fairly easy to obtain.

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Filed under: digital media, new media, activation

Big Leaps, Big Returns: Watchmaker Hublot’s Approach To Sponsorship
I was in Switzerland last week meeting with Jean-Claude Biver about his keynote at Leap, IEG’s 2012 Sponsorship Conference next month.

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Filed under: cause marketing, endorsements, IEG conference, international, motorsports, sports, activation

Komen Controversy's Lessons For Sponsors
Having enjoyed many years of a productive partnership with Susan G. Komen for the Cure, the organization’s corporate partners are no doubt feeling blindsided by this week’s firestorm over SGK’s decision to no longer provide funding to Planned Parenthood.

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Filed under: cause marketing, nonprofit, social media, backlash

Sponsorship and Return on Innovation
Speakers at IEG’s 2012 Sponsorship Conference are bringing unprecedented levels of innovation to the sponsorship space.

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Filed under: arts, events, festivals, IEG conference, non-traditional categories, activation

Paterno’s Legacy And The Big Question For Sports And Sports Marketers
My family and I moved to the suburbs of Pittsburgh when I was nine and Joe Paterno was already many years into becoming a football and Pennsylvania legend.

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Filed under: college sports, pro sports, sports, backlash

Despite Many Questions, Tebow Is A Prime Sponsorship Candidate
It may seem odd that I wrote the headline to this post during the third quarter of Saturday’s night playoff game, at the exact moment Broncos quarterback Tim Tebow was getting sacked with his team down 42-7 to Tom Brady and the Patriots.

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Filed under: pro sports, endorsements

Procter & Gamble Understands The Value Of Cause Marketing Better Than Anyone
Jerry Welsh introduced the term cause related marketing—a strategy he created while EVP of worldwide marketing at American Express—at the second annual IEG Sponsorship Conference in 1985.

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Filed under: IEG conference, trends, cause marketing

Will Short-term And Shared Deals Be The Death Of Sponsorship?
In the beginning, stadium naming rights agreements were largely 20-year commitments, with a few 10-year exceptions. The bulk of NASCAR team sponsorships were for a full season, and marketers signed on to sponsor every stop of a concert tour.

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Filed under: what is sponsorship, sponsorship measurement

Measuring TV Exposure Does Not Capture Sponsorship ROI
There is much more to measuring the ROI of a sponsorship than accounting for the value of brand exposure during TV broadcasts, yet I continue to hear stories of sponsors that put nearly all of their measurement emphasis on that

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Filed under: sponsorship measurement, sponsorship ROI, international

Heineken’s Smart Approach To Sponsorship Activation
While in Amsterdam a couple of weeks ago, I dropped in on Hans Erik Tuijt, global manager of activation for Heineken and a speaker at IEG’s 2012 sponsorship conference.

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Filed under: beer, branded content, digital media, events, festivals, IEG conference, international, music, new media, research, sponsored content, sponsorship measurement, sponsorship ROI, activation

What Does Pujols Deal Mean For L.A. Angels’ Sponsorship Revenue?
While Angels fans start planning World Series celebrations and Cardinals fans assess their club’s fortunes in the wake of Albert Pujols’ departing St. Louis for Anaheim, others are looking at the impact the slugger’s arrival will have on his new team’s bottom line.

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Filed under: pro sports, selling, endorsements