In Depth
IEG Property Survey: Largest Categories Account For Fewer Deals; Media Sponsorship Nosedives
Table 1: Most Active Non-Media Sponsor Categories
Figures represent the percentage of properties reporting sponsorship from at least one company in each category.
: If there is one thing made perfectly clear by the findings from IEG’s latest annual survey of properties, it is that the old stand-bys are no longer standing by.
When it comes to the categories most active in sponsorship, the major players remain the same for the most part–beverages, telecommunications companies and even banks and autos–despite their industry woes–show up on sponsor rosters more than any other industries. But the degree to which they appear has greatly diminished.
For example, in 2000 the nonalcoholic beverage category was number one in the number of properties reporting a sponsor from the category at 42 percent. This year, the category is still number one, but with just 31 percent of nearly 2,300 properties saying they have a nonalcoholic beverage sponsor (see Table 1).
Among the top 10 categories, telecommunications is the only one this year to increase the percentage of properties citing sponsorship from at least one company in the category, growing from 18 percent in ’08 to 25 percent in ’09.
The overall decline in the portion of sponsorship rosters claimed by leading categories continued a general trend that had seen a one-year reversal in ’08, but now appears back to the pattern witnessed for most of the decade.
The upshot for rightsholders is that they cannot rely on the usual suspects to account for the sizable chunk of sponsorship revenue they once did.
Properties are having to diversify their sources of corporate income–identifying emerging and non-traditional partners to pick up the slack.
Despite a terrible year for banks and autos, they did not experience a drastic decline relative to other categories, although autos did slip from the third to the fourth spot on the list of most-noted categories, replaced by telecommunications.
This could reflect that, despite some high-profile drops, companies in the category may have chosen to reduce spending with many properties rather than leaving the deals altogether.
Poof! Media Partnerships Vanish Like Some Media Outlets
Looking specifically at the category of media sponsorship, the survey found a similar decline in the number of properties reporting a media partner, as with non-media sponsor categories (see Table 2).
Because media sponsors provide such specific benefits–primarily advertising and other promotional support–the decline in activity in this sector creates additional challenges for rightsholders, in particular that the loss of those benefits cannot be replaced by a sponsor from another category in the same way a cash sponsorship can be.
Although the decline of newspaper sponsorships is by no means shocking given the dire situations many print publishers find themselves in, the steep drop in other media segments, especially radio, is a bit more surprising, as many stations have come to rely on the added value that sponsorships can provide to advertisers and the role they can play in opening doors to other businesses who are not traditional broadcast advertisers.
A possible explanation is the rise in media outlets owning and producing proprietary events, thus lessening their need to sponsor independent properties.
In addition to radio, this has been a well-documented trend in the magazine world, where publishers often choose to host unofficial parties, lounges and other ancillary happenings in the same market and at the same time as a major entertainment or sports event.
Coke And Pepsi Continue To Top Company List
Switching from categories to companies, the top two sponsors–including sponsorships undertaken on behalf of individual brands–remained the Pepsi and Coca-Cola soft drink families, each sponsoring 12 percent of the participating properties (see Table 3).
In a slight surprise, Ford returned to the top 10 most active companies list after a one-year absence, taking the place of AT&T, which jumped into the top 10 last year but did not remain.
Although that may appear to be a ray of light for the automotive sector, the four percent of properties with sponsorship from Ford represents half the percentage the company claimed two years ago; General Motors, which held on to fifth place also has half the “market share”–six percent vs. 12 percent–it had among properties two years ago.
Editor’s Note: Analysis is based on data from free-listing applications for sponsorship opportunities appearing in the 2010 IEG Sponsorship Sourcebook ($399; call 1-800/834-4850 or visit www.sponsorship.com to order).