Latest Thinking from IEG

Are Bowl Game Sponsorships Good Investments?
To answer the question of whether a brand should become a sponsor of a college bowl game, you have to first make the distinction between title sponsors and other levels of partnership.

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Filed under: sponsorship strategy, sports, valuation, bowl games

Bad Faith: Big Brother Pulls the Rug Out from under Venue Sponsorship
Unsettling news came out of Vancouver last week, as the provincial government of British Columbia killed a deal for telecommunications company Telus to obtain naming rights to BC Place Stadium.

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Filed under: Canada, contracts, government/municipal, in-kind, naming rights, negotiating, telecommunications, valuation, venues, backlash

Power Balance Pavilion: I Don’t Hate To Say I Told You So
Thirteen months ago when the NBA Sacramento Kings signed a five-year deal for wristband-maker Power Balance to take over the naming rights to the Arco Arena, I tweeted the following: “Did the Maloof/Kings/Power Balance naming rights deal just set the #sponsorship industry back 100 years? I'm leaning toward yes.”

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Filed under: non-traditional categories, pro sports, selling, valuation, venues, naming rights

Plenty of Questions Surround Mercedes’ Superdome Deal
Stadium naming rights sponsorships never fail to create conversation about their value, origins and overall worthiness, and last week’s agreement to put the Mercedes-Benz name on New Orleans’ Superdome is no exception.

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Filed under: naming rights, pro sports, valuation, venues, automotive

How Do You Value Social Media Benefits in a Sponsorship Package?

When we launched the IEG Valuation Service in the late ’90s, the phrase “social media” still primarily referred to getting a group of friends together to watch TV. More than a decade later that same term has become a marketable asset for properties, but as with many other benefits offered to sponsors, one that is not easy to value.

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Filed under: negotiating, social media, valuation, assets

Why Leagues Should Not Regulate Team Sponsorships

English Premier League club Manchester City recently signed a 10-year deal—which includes title of the team’s stadium and shirt sponsorship—with Etihad, Abu Dhabi’s national airline, for the princely sum of £300 million ($482 million), according to media reports.

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Filed under: international, naming rights, pro sports, valuation, backlash

Virtual Advertising as New Sponsorship Inventory and Activation Platform

Reading this month’s Partnership Activation newsletter (a must read for sports business professionals), I found the utilization of virtual advertising during in-game broadcasts by several NHL teams compelling. While in-game virtual advertising is not a new concept (baseball has been utilizing it for behind-the-plate advertising for 10+ years), it is becoming more prevalent amongst NHL teams in recent years. Thinking about it in greater detail, selling digital advertising inventory would be a great fit for teams in several different sports and a potential league-wide activation platform for a sponsor.

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Filed under: college sports, digital media, pro sports, valuation, activation

Livestrong Sporting Park: Nice, but not a Big, New Idea

The deal between MLS team owner Sporting K.C. and Livestrong to make the cancer-fighting foundation the naming rights sponsor of the new soccer stadium opening in June is certainly commendable. However, it is neither unprecedented, nor the best example of this type of partnership between a sports property and a nonprofit.

Those that have come before include:

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Filed under: cause marketing, naming rights, nonprofit, pro sports, trends, valuation, venues, what is sponsorship, assets

Sponsor Overload!

Last month, I was watching my beloved Illini basketball team in the annual 2K Sports Classic benefiting Coaches vs. Cancer and I was immediately struck by the disproportionate number of sponsor logos in view.

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Filed under: selling, servicing, sports, valuation, college sports

Your In-kind Sponsorship Agenda: Questions to Ask Before Signing

In-kind is on the brain. Big time. I’ve talked with no less than a half-dozen clients in the last ten days about one or more in-kind and/or barter sponsorship arrangements they are negotiating. In some cases, companies are trying to leverage product or promotional inventory to eliminate part or all of their cash outlay; in others, properties are targeting companies based on the potential for access to their product. Yet the common thread throughout our conversations has been more about the questions they need to be asking than the type of inventory they are negotiating.

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Filed under: in-kind, negotiating, valuation, activation