Sponsorship and Web Design

Welcome to my final marketing promotions post, sponsorship and web design….

You probably know the format by now, but just to remind you....

Firstly I will be giving some definition and academic basis covering sponsorship, followed up by detailing how it is used in both my events. I will then finalise by comparing the differences between my events and suggesting why these may occur. I will then follow roughly the same structure for web design.

Academic basis

Although there are many different definitions for sponsorship due to its wide use in business, for the purpose of this blog I will be focusing on this single definition by Guy Masterman. I have chosen this definition because I feel Masterman’s links to event studies mean it could be more relevant to this specific industry.

‘Sponsorship is a mutually beneficial arrangement that consists of the provision of resources of funds, goods and/or services.... In return for a set of rights that can be used in communications activity, for the achievements of objectives for commercial gain.’

Masterman, Guy (2007) Sponsorship For A Return on Investment, London: Elsevier

This definition basically explains that sponsorship is an agreement between two parties, that through the provision of resources (This could be anything from cash to tangible goods) One party will grant the other rights to conduct promotional activities (Such as brand name placement or billboards) for the objective of commercial gain.

When you think about it sponsorship is a very simple concept, but can have many different objectives, such as....

• Direct Sales Development: Driving sales, this could even be through exclusive sales rights.
• Brand awareness development: Making people aware of your brand and hoping in the future to increase market share. This is much harder to measure than direct sales due to the number of factors that could effect market share growth/decline.
• External corporate awareness development: Sponsorship can also be used to position or re position a brand as well as making people aware of its morals and values. Influencing and informing stakeholders can also be a result or corporate awareness development.
• Internal relations development: Creating goodwill via involvement with employees.

Source: Masterman, G; Wood, E (2006). Innovative Marketing Communications - Strategies for the events industry. Oxford: Elsvier Butterworth-Heinemann.

In terms of my events I will firstly start with who sponsored Cisco Live. From their website we can see that in 2012 their ‘Offical Sponsors’ were 3 different companies, each given a specific sponsor title.

 

- Technology infostructure company ‘Commscope’ were named the Official Cable Sponsor of Cisco Live 2012.

 

- Telecommunication software company ‘samwin’ were named the Official IP Telephony Application Sponsor for Cisco Live 2012.

 

- Finally interactive whiteboard giants ‘Smart Technologies’ were named Official Technical Solutions Design Clinics Sponsor of Cisco Live 2012.

 

From the titles of these sponsors it is clear that they have not just provided capital to the event organisers, they have provided products, support and possibly even staff to run them. In terms of how much this could benefit the Cisco Live as a whole it is very positive, they are receiving services and products that are vital to the running of their event for a reduced price, possibly even for free and in exchange they are promoting the companies to a huge audience.

 

On their website Cisco Live offer information on why it would be beneficial to sponsor/exhibit at their event....

 

-       Showcase new solutions

-       Interact with dedicated Cisco customers

-       Increase brand awareness

-       Generate new leads and sales opportunities

 

As well as the key sponsors I have mentioned, Cisco Live also have a list of Exhibitors split into different categories, there are so many it would be impractical to mention them all so I will just list the categories in order of importance:

 

-       Platinum Exhibitors

-       Cisco Platinum Exhibitors

-       Gold Exhibitors

-       Cisco Gold Exhibitors

-       Word Exhibitor Plus

-       Cisco World Exhibitor Plus

-       World Exhibitor

 

As each category goes down the number of Exhibitors lessen, their space for logos on the website also reduces. This implies that Exhibitors at ‘Platinum’ level will have provided much more capital, products or services to Cisco Live than say one at World Exhibitor level.

 

Now moving on to my other event, the Rallye Sunseeker. For the sake of not repeating myself I will just spend a brief amount of time on this subject as I have covered some of it in a previous post, to see the list of sponsors take a look about halfway down my ‘Marketing’ blog post.

 

From the list of sponsors we can see that they are not split into category’s of importance like Cisco Live. They are grouped together with the same size images, implying that they are all of equal importance. All but one, the main sponsor ‘Sunseeker’. The rally began to use the name Rallye Sunseeker in 1999 after being through a verity of sponsors. One can presume that luxury motor yacht company SunseekerSunseeker their headquarters and main factory is based in Poole.

 

The main advantage for the sponsors of being part of this event would be local business, they hope that by having their name included in this extremely popular event will lead to local people using their business. They could also want to be involved in the event for the ‘Internal Relations Development’ side of sponsorship, more of a reward to their workers, perhaps for them to be part of the corporate hospitality events that follow alongside the Rally.

 

In conclusion the two events have sponsors for different reasons, at Cisco Live the sponsors are their exhibiting as well as having their brand name shown. This implies that they are there for direct sales over brand awareness. On the other hand at the Rallye Sunseeker there would be very minimal sales, if any for the sponsors. After all Sunseeker would be insane if they thought they were going to sell a ten million pound yacht to some local rally fans! The sponsors are there to gain awareness that their business exists in the local area, and as I said to reward their employees with a day out at the corporate hospitality events along side the rally.  

In part two I will finally talk about the websites of my events, there advantages, disadvantages and how they differ!