How Do You Value Social Media Benefits in a Sponsorship Package?
Posted: 9/19/2011 10:26:12 AM by
Jim Andrews | with 0 comments
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.
My take is that if you view a property’s social media platforms through the IEG Valuation methodology lens of tangible and intangible benefits, they straddle the line between the two. Certainly there is a quantifiable aspect to Facebook fans and Twitter followers that allows us to calculate a value for the exposure of sponsors to those audiences in a way similar to valuing signage and other non-measured-media benefits.
But unlike signage, where the value to sponsors begins and ends with the impressions generated, social media also impacts the intangible side of the equation. And that side, as you have probably heard countless times from me and other IEG folks, is where the real value of sponsorship is found.
Looking at the major intangible factors of sponsorship, you can see that a vibrant social media program has the potential to substantially impact how well a property delivers across many of them, including recognizability, ability to activate, opportunity to provide exclusive and clutter-free environments for sponsors to “own,” etc.
So the bottom line is that any true valuation of social media’s worth must account for its impact beyond the simple tally of followers, friends and community members, and assess how well the property uses its presence to raise its profile, build relationships with its audience, and promote—judiciously—its sponsors.
This evolving element of sponsorship valuation is sure to see further developments as social media itself matures. What type of conversations are you having with your partners around the inclusion and valuation of social media in sponsorship packages?
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Filed under: negotiating, social media, valuation, assets