Sports sponsorship and case studies of brands

Sports sponsorship is an effective marketing strategy which has immense utilization in today’s marketing scenario by companies to gain brand recognition through sponsoring sports events, tournaments and team sponsorship. When there is similarity between the brand and the sport event, it has maximum effectiveness on the audience.

In order to have effective brand enhancement, the sponsorship must define the objective primarily i.e. what exactly do you wish to achieve through it, hypothetical goals must not be set as target and there must be proper measurement of the sponsorship to understand the effectiveness.

One of the major advantage with sports sponsorship is that it has the potential of creating new association with the brand and the audience’s mind. It builds perception on how consumers see your brand, enforcing loyalty for the brand and inducing trust values.

Since there is mass audience viewing these events, it has the potential of reaching new audience who either have not been exposed to the brand message or have not experienced the product as yet of now. Through sports sponsorship brands can benefit by creating new markets, grow their customer base and boost sales.

In case of team sponsorship, the exclusivity of sponsoring remains only with the brand, this makes it possible for audience to believe that team and the company support each other exclusively, this increases goodwill of the company. Therefore, sports sponsorship is an effective tool for growing the brand, creating dominant position in market and increasing the sales.

It is the most vital tool to attract fans at the stadium, once loyalty is generated; it has direct effect on their purchasing intention, which is the indicator of sponsorship effectiveness.

 

Battle to win sponsorship rights of Indian cricket team

Associating brands with Indian cricket team is a matter of prestige for any company, forget about visibility; there is an entire range of brand value, effectiveness and media coverage that can be achieved through this.

After Sahara withdrew team sponsorship of Indian cricket team with BCCI and the ownership of Pune Warriors from Indian Premiere League, Companies bid high amounts to win sponsorship rights to experience the benefit of association from team.

Sahara had been sponsoring Indian Cricket Team for past 11 years, but after its withdrawal BCCI gave Star India Pvt. Ltd the rights for team sponsorship because BCCI had legal disputes with Sahara. Star India’s four-year association with the team ended this year, Oppo became the new sponsor.

Oppo paid the highest amount as Indian Team’s sponsor so far, 1079 crores for five-year deal thus winning against the race with Vivo as competitor. Now Team India’s jersey will have logo of Oppo on it.

Oppo is a growing brand in India and now it will enjoy the advantage of associating with Team India- it will give the brand Global exposure during the International tournaments. Since, cricket is just not a sport, but a religion in the country it has highest TRP and large viewership which would ensure to build consumer awareness and grab their attention. It would have visibility also on the medium that is covering it, such as electronic medium.

The Pepsi Coke War

The rivalry between Coca-Cola and Pepsi is well known to everyone. Both the companies try their best to overshadow their competitors and they have carried forward this legacy of endless battle in sports sponsorship.

Indians are not habituated to the soft drink culture and its consumption is very low in the country. To dominate the market share, two major soft drink companies planned to invest huge money on sponsorship to increase soft drink consumption habits in India, thus driving sales.

Both the companies decided to sponsor the Indian premiere league in 2014, Pepsi became the official sponsor of IPL by investing 80 Crore per year to Board of control for cricket in India. In other words, for title sponsorship they had to pay 400 crores for 5-year deal. Coca-Cola came up with the witty strategy to dominate visibility, they took the pouring rights where they would serve the beverages for the inhouse team during the IPL series. Coca-Cola also purchased space on player’s jersey to promote their brand, placed their logos on player’s helmet, and advertised on boards of the stadium.

Both the brands are an epitome of Ambush marketing, this is not the first instance; in 1996 coca cola paid huge money to become the official sponsor of cricket world cup, but Pepsi launched its campaign “Nothing official about it” to steal the thunder. Coca-Cola paid enormous amount to become the official sponsors, while the competing brand associated itself with the event in a very witty fashion.