With summer in full swing, there’s no doubt you’re getting out to many of Columbus’ events, fairs and festivals this great city has to offer. And while you’re out enjoying yourself, you may have noticed various companies and their brands also participating in those events. That is the beauty of sponsorship marketing—companies can take part in their community by supporting events, and in return showcase their brands and products or services to a targeted audience. Leveraging sponsorships through event-related communications and experiences as part of your experiential marketing is a smart strategy that helps accomplish your company’s goals.
The Benefits of Sponsoring an Event
Being an event sponsor can bring great benefits to your business. While experiential marketing alone can be successful, associating your business or brand with a credible event can result in even greater rewards. This is why major name-brands like Pepsi, Red Bull, Under Armor and Toyota are all utilizing sponsorships as part of their marketing strategies. They recognize the enormous tangible and intangible benefits sponsorships bring. Similarly, your business can benefit too.
Specifically, one of the major benefits of event sponsorship is brand awareness. Regardless of the investment, most sponsorships will offer some sort of logo and possibly message or product placement around the event site. Even if attendees do not engage with your activation, they will still be exposed to signage, marketing materials and displays that include sponsor logos. This exposure increases credibility among a wider audience. Seeing your logo and products at an event allow attendees to associate your business with the relevance tied to that event generating positive brand perceptions.
Sponsorships are also another great way to stand out from your competitors, especially in combination with experiential marketing. In this way you can provide samples or demonstrate your products and services in fun and engaging ways for a memorable brand experience, perhaps through a game interaction, contest or photo opp. This can be a low-cost way of showcasing what you have to offer and help with the launch of your new products or services.
Additionally, sponsorships can have added benefits for your staff as you may receive free event tickets and perks such as free parking through your partnership with the event.
Levels of Sponsorships and Associated Benefits
Depending on the dollars invested, events will offer varying levels of sponsorships and benefits. Low-tier sponsors typically receive basic advertising and minimal logo placement while top-tier ‘marquee’ or’ presenting’ sponsors may receive prime recognition, announcements and prominent logo placement in several places, as well as other unique benefits tailored to that event.
Often sponsorship benefits are negotiable and in many instances, if it is part of the event, there’s a chance you can sponsor it. This leaves the door open for some seriously creative sponsorship opportunities no matter what your budget. We’ve had a blast exploring fun, non-traditional benefits for our clients to maximize their existing sponsorships. A few creative examples of this include sponsoring a beer festival and adding your company logo to the souvenir beer cup sold at the event, adding signage to the back of the infamous skyglider as an Ohio State Fair sponsor, or branding an entire main stage as a music festival sponsor at an event like the Park Street Festival.
Maximize Your Sponsorship
In order to fully maximize your sponsorship, here are a few questions you should consider to determine which one is best for you:
- What do we want to accomplish through the sponsorship?
- What audience does the event attract?
- What part of this event can we sponsor—a stage, an area, an activity?
- What types of benefits offered would provide the most return on our investment?
- What engaging experience can we create and activate in order to maximize the sponsorship?
- What data can we obtain through our sponsorship to measure success?
Capitalizing on just some of these opportunities will generate huge returns for your business. Event Marketing Strategies has maximized the value of sponsorships for a number of clients including Nationwide, AEP Ohio and OhioHealth. Our team can help you answer these questions to determine the right sponsorship for your business that gets results. Consider sponsoring an event today!
— Event Marketing Strategies (EMS) is an experiential engagement agency helping companies to create unique and memorable connections with their audience. If you’re looking for unique ways to differentiate your product or service at an event, EMS can help you access your consumers face-to-face so you can build brand equity, gain product and service exposure, and most importantly, drive results. To learn more about our services and capabilities, visit eventmarketingstrategies.com. —
